The Archive

Two of the biggest clubs in Brazilian football have been affected in different ways by the strange nature of the game there. Robert Shaw investigates

Back in the 1950s and 1960s, Botafogo v Santos games were titanic struggles involving the cream of Brazil’s talent, with Garrincha and Pelé taking top billing for their respective sides. In 2002 the two clubs had divergent fortunes. Santos won the championship, beating Cor­inthians 5-2 on aggregate in December’s play-off final. The team were coached by Emerson Leão, the former goalkeeper renowned more for modelling swimming trunks than for a less-than-successful spell as national coach during World Cup qualifying.

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Prime Minister Robert has relatives in high places and, as Tom de Castella explains, nephew Leo has presided over a sharp decline in Zimbabwe's domestic football

Earlier this season Peter Ndlovu returned from a family funeral in Zimbabwe two hours before his club, Sheffield United, were due to take on Rotherham United in the First Division. Ndlovu came off the bench to score the game’s only goal. Whatever issues preoccupied him on the trip home to a country facing political meltdown and desperate food shortages, they were not enough to distract him in the midst of a south Yorkshire derby.

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Looking to build a club up from nothing? Everything you need – and quite a lot you don't – can be found online according to Ian Plenderleith, from players to speakers for the end-of-season awards

You have won the lottery and have millions to spend. Your family and your investment analyst are all pleading desperately with you to think of their long-term security. The prob­lem is, you always wanted to sit in the directors’ box of your own football team, and so with a manic gleam of distant glory in your eye, you buy your local struggling Ryman League Div­ision Two outfit and announce at a press con­ference, “Champions League within the next ten years”. But where do you start to build a team of champions? The internet, of course!

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Having a bad season? Worried that things couldn't be much worse? Cheer yourself up with som schadenfreude as Roberto Gotta looks back on AC Milan's darkest hour

AC Milan had to wait a long time for their tenth title, and with it the gold star that permanently adorns the red and black shirts. But it all came good in 1978-79 – three points ahead of the surprise challengers, un­beaten Per­ugia, and seven in front of the hated Juventus. The fol­lowing year they finished third, but were then relegated in the fall-out from the Totonero betting scandal, some Mi­lan players (led by goalkeeper and notorious racing enthusiast Enrico Albertosi) having conspired with others to fix results. But, as a teen­age Milan fan, I felt strangely unconcerned. Iconic mid­fielder Gianni Rivera had retired so this was a chance to rebuild and come back much stronger. Going down for the first time in the club’s history was not going to be a disaster – but it turned out to be even worse.

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Tim Springett wonders why Kevin Davies has gone downhill after a promising start to his career, and if it is already too late to do something about it

All the talk in Southampton concerns James Beat­tie’s prospects of earning an England call-up. Yet five years ago Kevin Davies was seen not only as Saints’ brightest hope but one of England’s. Now, however, he languishes in the reserves, his copious ability dimmed by a seemingly insurmountable crisis of confidence. He has gone from being an international star in the making to the scrapheap by the age of 26. How – and why – has this happened?

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