Stoke's season began with optimism but ended with relegation, as Penny Davies explains

On Saturday August 30th 1997, 23,859 people sat down in Stoke City’s new home, the Britannia Stadium, to watch the first League match there. Earlier, Sir Stanley Matthews had officially opened the ground. The idea was that he would roll back the years by scoring in front of admiring fans. This didn’t go to plan. The 82-year-old couldn’t get enough power behind his shot and the ball stopped well short of the goal. The more prescient among the crowd knew that this cock-up was a taste of the season ahead.

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Ian Plenderleith outlines the chances of Lothar Matthaus being left out of Germany's World Cup squad

The recall of Lothar Matthäus to the German World Cup squad is not just remarkable because the 37-year-old will become only the second player ever to appear in five World Cup finals. More surprising is the fact that less than a year ago Matthäus was completely ostracised by the German footballing establishment,

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American player John Harkes is surprisingly not guaranteed a place in the USA's World Cup squad. Rich Zahradnik discusses whether he will make the cut or not

I almost choked on my Cheerios. The story was right there on page two of the New York Times sports section: Harkes Is Dropped From US Cup Team. The story covered almost half the page. I’m not sure what surprised me more – Harkes’s departure or the Times’s realisation such a big story was a big story.

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Tottenham fan Martin Cloake begrudgingly accepts that Arsenal are not only winning, but winning in style

Columns of black smoke billowed into the night sky from the wasted shells of burning cars, helicopters clattered overhead and the sound of sirens pierced the air. Arsenal had just completed the Double, and some of their fans were trashing their own manor. A strange way to celebrate, but it was a strange season.

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This season may have had a happy ending of sorts, but Everton fans know there as more hard times ahead, as Robert Mimms explains

An English Summer wouldn’t be complete without the sound of leather on willow at Lord’s, and Everton FC floundering in the transfer market. About this time every year the curtain rises on a new Goodison farce. It usually runs over most of the close season and stars some of football’s leading names. Collymore, Ince, Bobby Robson, Andy Gray, Ravanelli and Nigel Martyn have all taken centre stage in recent years.

Howard Kendall has ruled Everton out of the chase for big names so this summer’s performance may not be of the same quality. But there’s plenty of scope for drawn out pursuits of B-list names such as Lee Carsley and Alan Stubbs to come to a farcical close before August is upon us.

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