Articles from When Saturday Comes. All 27 years of WSC are in the process of being added. This may take a while.
The significance of fan loyalty is called into question as FA Cup tickets go to the highest bidder
We would like to apologize for an omission from last month’s ‘wish list’ editorial. We failed to require Graham and Sir Bert to pay to get into a Cup Semi-Final – though obviously Sir Bert would have to go on a ‘Decimalisation Made Easy’ course before setting out for Old Trafford or Villa Park.
Richard Parkin describes how two fanzines set out to defuse a local derby with a recent history of trouble
“I wish to state now that players, officials and fans of Sw*** n T**n (sic) have been, are and always will be SCUM.” So read an excerpt from one letter sent to the Oxford United fanzine Raging Bull. The fanzine’s editor, Ed Horton, was able to identify him as a regular contributor to the publication. This letter was one of many received in response to a joint initiative proposed by the editorial staff of Raging Bull and ourselves, the Swindon Town fanzine The 69er. The initiative addressed the growing problem of crowd violence at derbies between the two clubs. The letter, though untypical of the feedback we received, gave us an idea of what we were up against.
A fans' pressure group has come to the fore in Italy recently. Roberto Gotta explains who they are and what they want
The recent upheavals in Italian football – the players’ strike and the battle over the control of TV rights – produced a curious side effect: FISSC’s name was in the papers again, as big a surprise as a postcard from a long lost relative.
The European Parliament is looking forward to Euro 96 almost as much as we are, according to Philip Cornwall
There’s a language school in London offering English courses to overseas fans which has captured a few headlines recently; perhaps they could also try teaching the Met enough Dutch, German and French to help the thousands following the Netherlands and Switzerland to Euro ’96.
A version of football has been played in Japan for over a millenium, but no one has managed to win a match yet, as Jon Watts explains
Half a world away from Wembley, a crowd of about 500 people have gathered in the grounds of a small temple on the outskirts of Kyoto. In front of them a group of seven men and women, dressed in elaborately-patterned and brightly-coloured robes, stand in a small circle facing inwards. One of them, an elderly Japanese man, holds in his outstretched hands a round white football.