Photo courtesy of Nelson Ndongala (@whodunelson) at Unsplash.com Arsène Wenger and Mae West may not appear to be natural allies at first glance. The 71-year-old may be blissfully unaware of West’s collection of pithy sayings but in light of his endorsement of Fifa’s plan to host the World Cup every two years it appears thatContinue reading “Arsène Wenger and the Biennial World Cup”
Category Archives: European Championships
Euros 2020: Best tournament for 50 years.
Italy started and ended this tournament on a high. The Azzurri lit the blue touch paper 0n 11th June in Rome when they eased past Turkey with effortless elan and exactly one month later they slowly but surely wrested the initiative back from England after conceding the earliest goal in a European Championship Final. NobodyContinue reading “Euros 2020: Best tournament for 50 years.”
How Gareth Southgate’s qualities have restored pride
Where to start? After 55 years England have made it to a Final. I was alive when we last did it but have a very sketchy recollection of watching the game at home with my parents and elder brother on our black-and-white television. My abiding memory was going to see the official FIFA film “Goal!”,Continue reading “How Gareth Southgate’s qualities have restored pride”
The Euros Last 16 – a fantastic feast of fulminating football.
At its very best football can be so enthralling and intoxicating to watch that it is actually exhausting. The perfect mixture for a match involves moments of high quality, high drama and even the odd bit of misfortune to provide a dose of reality amongst the dream sequence. There also needs to be a degreeContinue reading “The Euros Last 16 – a fantastic feast of fulminating football.”
Euros 2020 – Group F’s fantastic finish, Ronaldo’s record and a gaggle of own goals .
As final rounds of games go the fluctuations of Group F on Wednesday night provided a classic of the genre. At the start, only France were guaranteed to move on to the last 16 while the other three teams were in with a chance of qualifying. Hungary were discounted as no-hopers by the cognoscenti, beatingContinue reading “Euros 2020 – Group F’s fantastic finish, Ronaldo’s record and a gaggle of own goals .”
First European Championships Finals match in 1960 set a record that has never been beaten
The opening matches of major tournaments are traditionally cagey affairs with neither side willing to risk too much so early on and consequently entertainment is often sacrificed for the sake of a solid, if unspectacular start. For example, in the last four European Championships there have been nine goals scored in total in those quartetContinue reading “First European Championships Finals match in 1960 set a record that has never been beaten”
The Football Mine 