A peculiarly British arrogance is at play over the release of players for the African Nations Cup
The African Nations Cup has been in existence for over 40 years, making it slightly older than the European Championship. Until very recently, this biennial competition has received almost no media coverage here. Now, however, virtually every column on the sports pages has something to say about the effect it is having on the English season.
Monday 3 “Man Utd will be laughing in Brazil,” says David O’Leary as Gareth Southgate scores the Villa goals that beat Leeds 2-1 at Elland Road, while Arsenal are held to a draw at Sheffield Wed and Sunderland lose 1-0 at Wimbledon, where the officials fail to spot Nicky Summerbee being elbowed in the face by Ben Thatcher in the build-up to the game’s only goal. Branko Strupar, the Belgian Croat, scores the first Premiership goal of the 21st century and adds a second as Derby sink Watford deeper into trouble. Southampton move three points clear of third-bottom Bradford after beating them 1-0. The Nigerian FA will demand that Arsenal be dismissed from this season’s FA Cup if they refuse to let Kanu join his country’s African Nations Cup squad until after next weekend’s tie with Leicester.
The internet is not just for the younger generation. Football managers are learning to embrace it, as Jamie Rainbow found out
The League Managers Association have created a useful website for their members. One outstanding feature is a service for unemployed coaches, enabling them to display their CVs (or in the case of Ian Atkins, their autobiography) to any potential employers. Atkins’s playing and managerial career are reproduced in painstaking detail – although one wonders whether his time spent playing for Shrewsbury in the late 1970s will have much bearing on his ability to manage a football club successfully today. Nor are his credentials much enhanced by telling us that: “Holding off the challenge of some of the game’s best known faces, I secured the job of manager at Doncaster Rovers.”
Dear WSC
What with Scotland outplaying England over two legs in the recent Euro 2000 play-off and Sunderland returning with nothing after playing Liverpool off the park a few days later, I have come to the conclusion that professional football is a mockery of a game. As a Liverpool fan, I was delighted with the result of the game at the Stadium of Light but as a football fan I would generally prefer to see the best sides winning. With this in mind, I propose a minor change in the rules of professional football. I think that we should lobby FIFA to rid football of goals. At the end of many a game, the best team on the day has failed to get what they rightly deserve just because they have failed to score, which is blatantly unfair. What we should do is replace the “goals system” with a system similar to the one on TV’s Ready, Steady, Cook! programme. If one section of the crowd was replaced by a section of neutral fans, this wouldn’t be too hard to implement. Simply issue them with cards depicting a footballing equivalent of “Green Peppers” and “Red Tomatoes” (meat pies and cold cups of tea, for example) and get the ref to ask them at the end of the game which team they would prefer to win. OK, so Man Utd wouldn’t fare too well as most neutrals enjoy watching them lose, but no system is without its flaws and would this be a bad thing anyway? FIFA has always strived to find a way of ensuring fair play and the best teams winning but up to now have only come up with rubbish like two referees. I think my system may be just what they are looking for.
Phil Griffiths, via email
The claim that Wembley has more space may not have as much weight as first thought says Chris Lynham
No matter who it is who eventually fulfils their destiny and reaches those famous Twin Towers just off the North Circular, it’s only a matter of time before the size of the formidable Wembley playing surface is offered as the key to the outcome.