David Rocastle died of cancer on March 30, aged 33. Sean Hanson looks back on the life and career, both all too brief, of the Arsenal and Engalnd star

It was on the fields of Beckenham Place Park in south-east London, playing schools and park foot­ball, that the young David Rocastle began to shine, and any­one watching knew he was going to be some­thing special. A few years later, he was signing school­boy forms at Arsenal, a contemporary of Tony Adams, Martin Keown, Michael Thomas and Gus Caesar.

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Is George Graham's departure a victory for Tottenham tradition? No, says Paul Kelso, he paid the pricce for not winning football matches

Since George Graham was turfed out to make way for the Second Coming at White Hart Lane there has been so much talk of The Spurs Way that the uninitiated would be excused for thinking Haringey Council were renaming the Tottenham High Road. Of course many clubs have a distinct self-image, an un­written statement of principle based in equal parts on tradition and nostalgia – West Ham’s academy, Ever­ton’s school of science or Wimbledon’s school of hard knocks – but at Spurs the blend is particularly potent.

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Irving Scholar was just one of the strange heroes of The Men Who Changed Football. The BBC documentary gave only a partial account of the past two decades, says Nick Varley

I was one of the men who changed football. Well, actually, I was one of those in The Men Who Changed Football, BBC2’s three-part documentary on how the game was transformed from “national disgrace to big business”. Granted, it was a fleeting appearance, lurk­ing behind Tony Banks and David Mellor, the Laurel and Hardy of west London, after they completed an ill-advised football-playing photocall before the launch of the Task Force. The press conference which followed the slapstick routine was, you won’t be surprised to hear, a lot less entertaining.

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The trial of Lee Bowyer, Jonathan Woodgate and Michael Duberry has thrown an unflattering light on the values of Leeds' young players. John Williams argues the club should bear some of the responsibility

In one sense, of course, the coverage of the trial of Jonathan Woodgate, Lee Bowyer et al in Hull has been faintly ridiculous. Since when did a post-nightclub brawl, of a kind which takes place pretty much everywhere in this country every week­end, become the stuff of front page tabloid stories, day after day? Even with the suggestion of racial overtones – unfortunately by no means unusual either – this hardly stands up as a big spread. Except, of course, that these young guys are already B-list celebrities, actual or prospective England international footballers. Well, here’s more than a start: in a celebrity-fixated, reality-TV culture, this already offers enough for the full media treatment.

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Italian football, beset by corruption and cynicism, is now suffering from a frightening new wave of hooliganism. Richard Mason reports

Few people paid much attention to the 1-1 draw between Atalanta and Pistoiese in their Italian Cup match played on August 20. In fact, for Italian football, it was the start of an annus horribilis. Two days after the game there were reports of strange betting patterns involving relatives of some of those playing, and seven months later six players, four of them from Atalanta, were suspended for up to a year.

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