Glory years Bristol City go with Swansea, Rovers go with Cardiff. Well, up to a point. City’s flirtation with the First Division in the late Seventies matched Swansea’s march to the top, though Swansea got there just as City were sinking. The early Eighties also saw Newport’s last fling, reaching fourth in the Third Division and the quarter-finals of the Cup-Winners Cup. Cardiff’s great days were in the 1920s, when they were league runners-up (1924), Cup finalists (1925) and finally Cup winners (1927). But their last decent First Division spell was in the Fifties, also when Rovers got to their highest league position (sixth in the Second Division) and twice reached the sixth round of the Cup.
Jim Gwinnell finds the two Bristol clubs still resolutely incompatible but at last in a position to move forward
The West Country is quite possibly the least successful and therefore the most anonymous of all the footballing regions in the League. No past or present behemoths, the likes of which can be found in the north west, north east and London. No “sleeping giants” dozing fitfully in the manner of the midlands clubs. Not even the novelty value of being Welsh (though some Londoners would seem to insist that we are), but even clubs such as Cardiff and Swansea have had their fair share of success.
Foreigners both obscure and notorious are flooding into Scotland. Gary Oliver suggests some clubs may have bought better than others
If Jim McLean is proved to have cut the lip of BBC reporter John Barnes, it will be a rare instance of a Dundee United man hitting the target this season. The team, like the former manager and chairman, has become a parody of its former self. At Tannadice there no longer appears to be a quality control department, and the club is recruiting increasingly obscure foreign players of dubious ability.
Jim McLean severed his links with Dundee United in spectacular style. Ken Gall reflects on the fall of a hero who became an embarrassment
In a recent poll, the Great British Public selected the Apollo moon landing as television’s greatest moment, with the funeral of the Princess of Wales, the fall of the Berlin Wall and the release from prison of Nelson Mandela listed among other cherished memories of our time.
Spain's managerial strategy is non-existent, but the public hardly cares, says Phil Ball
The Spanish national team is called La Selección, as if it magically picked itself. Maybe the name has arisen from some sort of collective wish-fulfilment, for despite the surface appearance of relative stability (only two managers in the past 19 years) the story of their footballing representatives is certainly no happier than the present English one.