A lucky escape for Norwich as Giovanni di Stefano, an associate and confidant to the likes of Saddam Hussein and Slobodan Milosevic, was clearly not the sort of buyer they were looking for. Graham Dunbar reports
You can’t fault Giovanni di Stéfano for his frankness. The man with the name that suggests he played in the European Cup against Melchester Rovers in the late 1970s has offered Norwich City fans their traditional slice of midsummer drama.
Tom Davies recalls the moment when Enfield FC fans had enough with the running and direction of the club and that the way forward was to form their own new club Enfield Town FC
What to do if you’ve reached the end of your tether with your chairman, your club has been made homeless and its fans are powerless? If you’re supporters of Enfield FC you say “sod this, let’s start our own club”. Later this month the newly formed Enfield Town FC will make their debut in the Essex Senior League.
The choice of Colombia as the host nation for the Copa America caused much controversy and country's ability to host the tournament was called into question. Simeon Tegel reports
Allowing Colombia to host the Copa América was either a very brave decision or a very foolish one. Unfortunately for the officials of the South American Football Confederation (Conmebol), it was the second alternative which increasingly looked the more accurate description in the run-up to the July tournament, the region’s biennial equivalent of the European Championship.
The Old Firm's proposal to join the Premier League
Ten years ago this summer, the FA published its Blueprint for Football, which first made explicit its support for the breakaway Premier League, to be formed for the start of the 1992-93 season. At the time it was seen by many, including us, as a radical and damaging step which threatened to undermine the traditional bonds between the top of the game and the bottom. The desire of the Premier League clubs to keep a greater proportion of the game’s revenue for themselves, scandalously endorsed by the FA, seemed likely to send many of the smaller clubs to the wall.
Roger Lytollis reckons the fall into semi-pro football is feared more than ever
Hold the back page: the third division wasn’t very good last season. How else could miserably ordinary sides like Hartlepool and Blackpool make the play-offs? For every quality player there were dozens of Gary Brabins and Steve Torpeys. Cheltenham were typical. In only their second League season any romance was long gone. Their reliance on negative, strong-arm tactics left most opponents looking like extras from Gladiator by the end of the afternoon’s “entertainment”.