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Steve Menary explains how qualification for the Champions League is becoming a closed shop

Spurs’ appearance in this year’s Champions League qualifiers is the first in four seasons by a team outside of the Premier League’s big four. Since 1994-95 and the start of the group format, just nine English clubs have played in the Champions League. The Premier League is a cash cow but between 1992-93 and 2008-09, Man Utd earned €261 million (£217m) from the Champions League – and that’s just from UEFA. Research from tournament sponsor Mastercard shortly before this year’s final claimed that whoever won would earn €120m in total.

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There is a section of Italy that it using football as a way of campaigning for independence. Matthew Barker tells all

Last month’s European and local elections saw the Lega Nord increase its support base beyond the traditional heartland of the Veneto and Lombardy in the north-east of Italy, reaching as far down as Emilia Romagna and the northern edges of Tuscany. The Lega, seeking to break away from the national government in Rome and the Mezzogiorno south, forms a strong coalition with Silvio Berlusconi’s ruling People of Freedom party, and has been steadily winning over disgruntled voters with far-right policies based exclusively around twin obsessions of immigration and security.

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With Middlesbrough struggling to survive the drop Steve Wilson asks why the chances of Hope Powell succeeding are so slim

As Middlesbrough’s steady slide towards relegation fast approaches a vertical drop into the Championship, questions are inevitably resurfacing over the wisdom of employing Gareth Southgate as the club’s manager in his first job in the dugout.

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We take playing international football in England for granted but as Steve Menary explains it can be a long fight to be gifted that right

When West Ham signed Valon Behrami from Lazio this summer, he became the club’s first ever Swiss international. His status may change on December 19, when FIFA meet for a second time to consider a membership application from Kosovo, where Behrami was born in 1985.

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Trabzonspor make their debut, a significant event as they went on to take six titles in nine years and break the dominance of the big three, writes Alp Ayhan

The long-term significance
Brazilian World Cup winner Didi had taken over as Fenerbahce coach in 1972, finishing second in his first season, taking the title in 1974 and again the following season. Fenerbahce wouldn’t win two in a row again until 2005. This was a bleak period for local rivals Galatasaray, who were to go 14 seasons without winning a championship, a run they broke in 1987. Both Istanbul clubs were to be overshadowed over the next decade by the Black Sea side Trabzonspor, who made their 1. Lig debut in 1974-75 and went on to take six titles in the next nine years.

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