Search: 'Emile Heskey'

An inevitable punfest ensues as England book their place in the World Cup finals

England’s qualification for the 2010 World Cup was deemed important enough to knock even current tabloid fixation Jordan off the front pages. To qualify with eight consecutive victories, scoring 31 and conceding only five, is indeed an impressive feat and the manner in which qualification was confirmed, with a resounding victory, was also noticeably un-English. In the immediate aftermath the papers quietly acknowledged that overhyping the national team has been counter-productive in the past. But they were completely unable to resist the temptation to do so again, sometimes even on the same page as the pleas for restraint.

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Leicester’s tussles with Atlético Madrid left fans simmering at injustice but, as Saul Pope recalls, these were heady days

Eleven years ago their fans would have never accepted it, but Leicester City’s UEFA Cup first round tie against Atlético Madrid in September 1997 will probably be as good as it gets. Leicester didn’t win the game, but for a time they were leading thanks to a player once described by the club fanzine The Fox as looking “knackered whenever he ran on to a football field”.

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Paul Jewell has always been popular with the football media. Derby fans are not so keen on him, as Richard Barker explains

Last Christmas, Derby County manager Paul Jewell told the Sunday Times that while Harry Redknapp would be his choice as the next England manager, Jewell personally “would never take it; too many blazers, too much politics”. Following his heroic attempts to keep Derby up (played 24; won 0; drew 5; lost 19; for 15; against 56), the thought of Jewell ever being in a position to turn down England is risible. A year after announcing that the national job wasn’t for him, Jewell scuttled out of Pride Park with Derby fans contemplating another relegation battle. So much for his promise: “The pain we are suffering now, I will repay next year with promotion.” He arrived pledging: “I am not here to raise the white flag.” Yet after presiding over the most humiliating season in Premier League history, he also threw in the towel after a rotten ­performance in the Championship.

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Wolves are the quintessential Championship side, in the second tier for two decades, bar one season. Coventry used to be the epitome of top-flight survivors. Both are casting their eyes upwards this autumn, though neither is exactly confident, writes Josh Widdicombe

At 2.15pm in the car park Molineux shares with a 24-hour Asda, a sprinkling of people amble away from their cars, the odd old-gold replica shirt peeking out from under a coat the only clues that they aren’t here for the weekly shop. The loudest shouts come from the raffle-ticket sellers and the strongest evidence of pride in the home colours can be found on the metalwork in and around the ground, an area painted on the Midas principle: anything that can be gold, should be gold.

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The heat is on – and not just because summer has put in a rare appearance. A spending spree has raised expectations at Upton Park, but so far money hasn’t bought Hammers happiness, as Barney Ronay reports

Money: does it ever really make you happy? Heading towards Upton Park through the exciting new infrastructure of the Greenwich peninsula prompts this kind of question. South London’s former dockland has been ambitiously made over of late. Money hasn’t just been spent, it’s been recklessly slathered around the place with a loaded pallet knife. Here and there it even covers some of the cracks. There is probably some kind of comparison here with the new model West Ham United. At its old industrial heart, Greenwich now has the Millennium Village, known for its gleaming white dome, symbol of an aspirational spending beano that never quite got where it wanted to go, but did spark off a whole load of aggravation. West Ham, these days, are fronted up by Eggert ­Magnusson, the Icelandic businessman also known for his gleaming white dome, ­symbol of an aspirational spending beano that… well, you get the idea.

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