While the east midlands mourns a great manager, Brian Clough's native region has lost a great player. Harry Pearson  traces a legend's goalscoring career

It was during the 1986 World Cup. England had got off to a pathetic start and in the ITV studio Mick Channon was lamenting the inability of English players to “get by people”. “The Brazilians do it,” he burbled. “The French do it. The Danes do it…” From off camera came an unmistakable whine: “Even educated fleas do it.” Brian Clough may have won titles and European Cups, but the queasy, humiliated expression that remark put on Channon’s medieval mug will likely live longer in my memory than any of them. To anyone who grew up on Teesside the tone, if not the accent (Clough’s peculiar vocal style was all his own) was unmistakable. Funny undoubtedly, but also scornful, the humorous equivalent of a slap in the face.

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For Dan Turner, a 1990 FA Cup semi-final was the first staging of a derby against Manchester United in his lifetime and a 3-3 draw still constituted nirvana

“Nick Faldo is on the verge of a second successive US Masters, yesterday we witnessed the fastest-ever Grand National, and this was the day you saw 13 goals in the FA Cup semi-finals” – I can still recall Des Lynam’s super-smooth sign-off on the video I watched as soon as I got home from Maine Road. I wasn’t much fussed about Crystal Palace’s earlier epic 4-3 victory over Liverpool, I just wanted to double-check that my eyes hadn’t been deceiving me for the previous two hours.

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Likelihood is that Premiership newcomers Crystal Palace will be heading back to the Football League come May. Matthew Barker explains why a power struggle at Selhurst Park isn't going to help

Simon Jordan can be a difficult man to like, but equally one can easily feel rather sorry for him. This, after all, is the man who arrived at Selhurst Park in 2000, sorted through the rubble of the Mark Goldberg era and pulled the club through one of their darkest hours. A seemingly bright young thing, he spent money – lots of it (most estimates home in at around the £30 million mark) – and brought a new zippy business sense to a place that had barely survived the previous two years of calamitous mismanagement and misjudged transfer dealings.

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Philip Cornwall isn't sure exactly why England's players refused to speak to the media in Poland, but after reading the papers he can find plenty of good reasons

Stood in the corner towards which Jermain Defoe ran to celebrate his first England goal, it was obvious the team wished to thank their fans for their support in Chorzow. It had been a fraught few days, a cold night and an at times awkward 90 minutes, during which, for the most part, we had kept the faith. The previous Saturday, David James had received a post-match reception that could scarcely be called mixed. But the whole team, following the example set by David Beckham when he was substituted, came over to thank us again. And we thanked them.

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With talk of the club being up for sale, the heady days of Jack Walker's reign at Blackburn Rovers seem so long ago,  Bruce Wilkinson writes

Reports in the Daily Mirror that the owners of Blackburn Rovers could be willing to listen to offers for the club have come as a shock to the team’s supporters, under the impression that the Jack Walker Trust, set up on his deathbed, would run the club in perpetuity.

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