Banning of tannoy music after a team scores. (And now I bet everyone else says “Players and fans of the world to join together in mutual respect and between them put an end to war and poverty” or something similar.) Harry Pearson
The Archive
Articles from When Saturday Comes. All 27 years of WSC are in the process of being added. This may take a while.
Joyce Woolridge bought a ticket for £12, went to Barcelona and saw her team win the European Cup, albeit from a great height. Not everyone was so lucky
“If there is anyone with a spare match ticket, would they contact the gentleman in seat 16B.” An ironic cheer greeted this announcement as our plane joined the other charters making their way to Spain for the Champions League final. As it turned out, the hopeful passenger would find no shortage of people with tickets available once we touched down in Barcelona.
The latest political attempts to counter hooliganism are a step too far, argues Stan Pearce
As the political landscape of the country has changed – so runs the conventional wisdom – so has the attitude of Westminster to football. However, anyone who believed that Trade Secretary Stephen Byers’s decision to prevent the takeover of Manchester United by Rupert Murdoch signalled another stage in the evolution of politicians’ thinking towards the game should have witnessed a low-key debate in the House of Commons in the week of the Byers decision.
Saturday 3 Liverpool's first derby win in ten attempts, 3-2 at Anfield, is overshadowed by a row over Robbie Fowler's celebration when scoring the first of his two goals, when he mimics snorting cocaine from the white line, geddit, of the penalty area. Gerard Houllier, game for a laugh, claims Fowler was pretending to eat grass but the FA are expected to whip out another of their misconduct charges. Chelsea and Leeds make ground at the top after beating Charlton and Forest while Man Utd are held 1-1 by Wimbledon and Arsenal get a goalless draw at Southampton. In the First Division, Sunderland's 11th successive home win, 3-0 over West Brom, equals a club record. Ipswich stay second after thrashing Swindon 6-0 at the County Ground.
Bayern Munich club president Franz Beckenbauer has one of the most enviable CVs in the game, and Uli Hesse-Lichtenberger tells us how the man can do no wrong in his native Germany
Distinguishing features Awesome, really. He looks like the royalty he is and doesn’t even need the normally imperative elephant’s ears and protruding noses the less noble employ to stress their status. Actually, he may very well be the first person to rule Germany who’s not an ugly gnome, a shrivelled old fogey or a walking glandular disorder. Has the healthy tan that betrays the good golfer, sports the receding hairline which proves he’s been there and seen it all, and took up wearing understated glasses to suggest he might even be a bit of a thinker.