Articles from When Saturday Comes. All 27 years of WSC are in the process of being added. This may take a while.
What makes Ajax so good? It seems to have a lot to do with what they teach their under 12s, as John Perlman reports
On the last Sunday in April, Ajax fans thronged up the Middenweg that runs through Amsterdam’s eastern suburbs and covered their beloved old De Meer Stadium in red and white for the very last time. The players responded to the occasion – it’s a habit they have – and hammered Willem II of Tilburg 5-1 to secure a 26th league title, Ajax’s third in succession.
Up until the mid-1970's Ajax were just one of four first division clubs in Amsterdam. Karel Stokkermans explains what happened to their local rivals
It is over a decade ago since Ajax last played a match against local opposition – a second round cup tie in December 1983 against the amateurs of DWV, which they won 6-0.The last league derby in Amsterdam was nearly two decades ago: on March 19th, 1978, when Ajax beat FC Amsterdam 5-1.
Dear WSC
I’m sorry for having caused a misunderstanding with a line from my piece, Hardcore Football. Of course Derek Megginson is perfectly right (Letters, WSC No 111): Matthäus, Völler and Klinsmann were neither born in the Ruhr, nor have they ever played for a team from this region; actually, few places can be imagined that are further removed from the Ruhr than these gentlemen’s respective birthplaces. And that, I have to confess, was supposed to be my point.“Matthäus, Völler, Klinsmann . . . they all come from here, the Ruhr” was not meant to be taken literally; it functions as a metaphor (to avoid another complaint: yes, in highbrow lingo it’s a synecdoche). I thought a reader would stumble over this statement and, as a consequence, have a closer look at the err, subordinate clause, “the place where German football was spawned”. No matter how smart, suave and stinking rich these modern pros may be, they are still footballing descendants of the men with furry brows and callused hands. That’s what I wanted to say; and I thought it would work, because few people ran out and checked JFK’s birth certificate when he claimed, “Ich bin ein Berliner.” Alas, it’s not what you want to say, it’s what you say. Any misunderstanding in a text is always the writers;’ fault; metaphors are tricky bastards, and they have fooled better writers than me. We all make mistakes (Derek made one too: Pelé wasn’t born in Scarborough; he was born in Tres Caracoes, Brazil; it’s true that he spent the summers of his youth in Scarborough, with his uncle Simon Garfunkel, but he never would have qualified for Walter Winterbottom’s team). I promise to be less pretentious from now on.
Ulrich Hesse-Lichtenberger, Witten (birthplace of nobody), Germany (home to few)
The media's double standards are plain to see in the build-up to Euro '96
So, let’s see if we’ve got this right. Geoff Hurst scored a hat trick in the 1966 World Cup Final (though some spoilsports still mutter darkly, in German, about his second goal). After the match the ball was spirited away to Germany by Helmut Haller, who had scored the opening goal. Geoff himself doesn’t seem to have been unduly bothered about getting his ball back until roughly a month ago when he endorsed rescue missions by the Sun and the Mirror, the latter able to make the Hallers the best offer (all money to charity, of course) after receiving help from Eurostar and the ubiquitous Richard Branson.
The FA took their time didn't they? And even then Howard WIlkinson and Frank Clark were on standby. What a caper
The next couple of months will be an interesting time for Glenn Hoddle and Terry Venables, as they edge towards a handover date.