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Maidstone United hoped that the sale of a talented young player would allow them to return home. As John Bunyard explains, this hasn't happened

I first saw it one Saturday as I walked down the side of the Sittingbourne pitch. It was best described as a half-Fellaini: an attempt at an afro curtailed by an over-zealous barber. It sat atop the head of the kid deputising for our regular centre-back, absent for the unlikely reason of being under arrest on a charge of attempted murder. Though a tall lad, he looked too young to buy a drink.

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My Autobiography
by John Giles with Declan Lynch
Hodder & Stoughton, £19.99
Reviewed by Jonathan O'Brien
From WSC 287 January 2011

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British readers remember John Giles primarily as the stocky, gifted, hyper-aggressive midfield engine of Don Revie's Leeds United. In his native Ireland, he inhabits a loftier plane as the conscience of modern football, having spent 25 years as RTE's main studio analyst.

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Jamie Redknapp's face seems to get everywhere these days. Simon Tyers tunes in to watch his latest role in Football's Next Star, Sky One's follow up to Football Icon

Jamie Redknapp is exactly the sort of screen presence Sky Sports had in mind when the Premier League started. Bearer of a boyish smile, conventionally handsome looks, artfully constant two-day beard growth, wardrobe’s worth of designer suits and familial connections with just the sort of people the image thrives on, his role seems as much advertorial as analyst.

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Owen Amos reports on how the FA Vase provides an opportunity for smaller clubs to have their moment in the Wembley sun

To understand to whom the FA Vase matters, look at the list of winners. Since 1974-75, the Vase’s first season, 20 of the winners have been suffixed “Town”: from Brigg and Bridlington, to Whitby and Wimborne. By contrast, just two winners – Truro and Winchester – have been Cities.

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Ryman League Division One North isn't normally awash with transfer scandal, however intrigue is rife after Ware FC lost manager, assistant, physio and the entire playing squad in less than a season. Si Hawkins reports

West Ham and Portsmouth fans may have spent the winter transfer window ­worrying about losing their finer players to ­better-off rivals, but at least those players left one by one, and for hefty fees. Far below the Premier League, in a leafy home counties commuter town, followers of the once upwardly-mobile Ware FC entered the new year bemoaning the loss of an entire squad, the manager, his assistant, and even the physio. Rarely can a promising club have unravelled so quickly.

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