Adam Brown of the Football Supporters Association was in Turin for a Champions League game between Juventus and Man Utd. He recalls seeing some highly old-fashioned police tactics first hand

This is getting to be a bit of a habit. Manchester United head off to Europe, full of optimism that this year we’ll get it right, only for things to go horribly wrong both on the pitch and off it. Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised then, when our trip to Juventus ended in tears, not due to the 1-0 defeat but because we’d been tear-gassed, as well as beaten with batons and crushed.

Read more…

Tim Springett explains why the FA's widely publicised anti-booze campaign is doomed to fail.

A mere day after Tony Adams owns up to an alcohol problem comes the announcement by the FA that they are to intensify their programme of random breath-tests of players. Such testing, so it seems, has already been taking place for three years. Apparently there have been no positive tests so far: for the FA’s sake, this is just as well.

Read more…

During his time at Birmingham David Sullivan called for away fans to be banned – but he was talking about his own supporters. John Tandy is baffled

In the last issue of the Birmingham City fanzine Wake Up Blue there’s an interview with owner David Sullivan in which he describes himself as “pissed off”.

Read more…

English clubs are struggling in Europe

It’s not often that something Graham Taylor once said comes flooding back but it happened last week, after another set of bad results for English and Scottish clubs in Europe. 

Read more…

Sunday 1 England beat Moldova 3-0. "We came here with a few banana skins lying about and sidestepped them," says Glenn, whose metaphors might need a bit of working on.

Tuesday 3 Sheff Wed extend their lead at the top to five points after a 2-1 home win over Leicester, the first of their two coming from 'teenage sensation' Richie Humphreys who now has three in four games. "He came, he saw, and (guess…) he conquered," says David Pleat.

Wednesday 4 Never a dull moment for George Graham. Both he and Frank Clark are to help Norwegian police with their enquiries into the business activities of agent provocateur Rune Hauge, facing jail on fraud charges. Colchester stage the come back of the night in the Coke Cup First Round – 3-2 down from the first leg they win 3-1 at West Brom. Southend lose 3-2 on aggregate to Fulham and Reading's first-ever visit to Wycombe ends in a 2-0 defeat. Internazionale's Nwankwo Kanu may have to retire due to a heart condition spotted during a medical following his move to Milan from Ajax.

Read more…