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Owen Amos on Airbus UK, the Welsh club just trying to go about their business quietly
Everyone knows the joke. The result pops up on Soccer Saturday and, within seconds, someone has cracked it. So, are they dancing in the streets of Airbus UK? They are not, but they are doing all right. The club, in the Welsh Premier League, are based at the huge Airbus aeroplane factory in Broughton, north Wales. The site, which employs 6,000 people, is a mile from the English border, and the ground is tucked away in the south-east corner.
It is not only the FA Cup that mixes minnows with giants: county cups do so, too. Gavin Willacy champions these wrongly neglected events
Having despatched Northern League Second Division strugglers Prudhoe, Newcastle United face the University of Northumbria in the cup quarter-finals. This is not fantasy football, FIFA 08, or Football Manager. It’s the Northumberland Senior Cup, one of the many county cups that feature Premier League giants taking on not only players who are unknown outside of their front doors, but whole teams that few people have even heard of. In the midst of the 21st century sports business world, they are as much of an anachronism as the Boat Race, the Varsity Match or cricket festivals.
The Italians are going off the English model, says Matthew Barker
Having long been the mantra of choice for would-be reformers of the sport here, adopting the modello inglese is beginning to lose its appeal. Italian reaction to the Premier League’s proposals for a 39th game generally chimed with Michel Platini’s widely reported comments about foreign owners, foreign coaches, foreign players and now foreign fans: that English football had finally gone a step too far and was steadily losing its soul.
Arsenal are attempting to control their fans' nickname, as Jon Spurling reports
With the media gleefully fanning the flames of boardroom discontent (described as a “civil war” in the Daily Telegraph), the last thing Arsenal need is a protracted conflict with sections of their own support. Yet with the announcement that the club has applied to trademark the word “Gooner”, a damaging legal struggle could ensue. The battle over the club’s financial direction could rumble on for a long time – Arsène Wenger and chairman Peter Hill-Wood’s desire for self-sufficiency within five years is in marked contrast to the David Dein-chaired Red and White Holdings’ urge for a rapid injection of cash. The war against global capitalism in N5, however, was lost long ago. Arsenal’s plan to register a word that was coined by supporters over 30 years ago is further evidence of the club’s frequent heavy-handedness when it comes to exploiting their commercial potential.