Articles from When Saturday Comes. All 27 years of WSC are in the process of being added. This may take a while.
Spain's managerial strategy is non-existent, but the public hardly cares, says Phil Ball
The Spanish national team is called La Selección, as if it magically picked itself. Maybe the name has arisen from some sort of collective wish-fulfilment, for despite the surface appearance of relative stability (only two managers in the past 19 years) the story of their footballing representatives is certainly no happier than the present English one.
Sunday 1 Leicester are top for the first time since JFK was president after drawing with Sunderland – “We’re grinders,” says Peter Taylor – while Man Utd lose to a Thierry Henry “wonder goal”. “It was so spectacular. He’ll never do it again,” says Sir Alex, complimentary yet grudging. Chelsea recover from their midweek embarrassment to beat Liverpool 3-0. “I find it difficult to forgive international players when they make mistakes like we did today,” snaps Gérard.
Ireland may not be Britain, but the downfall of of Jack Charlton's team against Holland in his last match in charge spoke volumes for the limitations of a certain British style, says Cris Freddi
Both sides had known for some time that the play-off was their only real chance of reaching the finals of Euro 96, but recent results left them with very different expectations. While Holland were winning their last three qualifiers without conceding a goal, the Republic had won only one of their last five, drawing in Liechtenstein and losing 3-1 home and away to Austria and 3-0 to group winners Portugal. Austria’s 5-3 defeat in Belfast gave them the play-off chance, but Big Jack’s reign seemed to be coming to an untidy end.
Ian Plenderleith enters the egocentric world of footballers' websites to discover new blends of philosophy, art criticism and Frank Leboeuf's love of frocks
The world is not a big enough place to accommodate the egos of most professional footballers, so it is not surprising that many of them have embraced the internet as a new forum to promote themselves and their brilliant achievements. It would be wrong to avoid such sites simply on the grounds that pros have little to tell us beyond how misunderstood they are, because in many cases their homepages are not just a vehicle for self-promotion, but unintentional platforms for protracted self-prattery.
Only in the caricatured land of football is the King's Road thought of as trendy, argues Harry Pearson. Are you reading Mrs Karembeu?
Planet Football is a peculiar place, an alternative Earth where nothing ever changes and the hopelessly inaccurate can become the truth simply by repetition. This is a world where all Frenchmen are urbane, the whole of Brazil is a beach, no one relishes a trip to Turf Moor in January and everything north of Hadrian’s Wall is in Scotland. (How lucky Alf Ramsey was, by the way, that the Charlton boys chose to turn their backs on their native land and opt instead for England; and why don’t Newcastle United play in their own country, I wonder.)