Jonathan Pearce, A Billion People & Several Sleepless Nights

Sometimes, comments that I have seen on the television or in the papers take lodge in my head, sit there and fester. About three weeks ago, though, a comment made on the television has started to overtake my waking hours, and it’s a comment that, in an almost abstract fashion, says about as much as [...]

The Wright Stuff

With its relatively recent descent into chest-beating populism, the BBC has left itself fairly open to criticism over the last few years in terms of its football coverage. This reached something of a nadir at the 2006 World Cup when England were knocked out by Portugal, and any pretence of rational analysis went out of [...]

Crossing Swords At Upton Park

In the football anthology “My Favourite Year”, Nick Hornby ruminates upon the subject of generation gap in football and the irony of seeing Peter Lorimer (in his final season at Leeds United) playing against Andy Sinton (in his first season as a seventeen year-old for Cambridge United). An icon of the 1970s lining up against [...]

Thursday Night In With Elton Welsby

Anyone that knows me in the slightest will know just how excited I was to discover that the digital television channel ITV4 have started repeating complete episodes of “The Big Match” from 1983 on Thursday afternoons. It’s probably worth pointing out (in the interests of pedantry) that there is actually a degree of being misled [...]

On How The BBC Got It So Wrong

Earlier this week, apropos of nothing, really, I sat down and watched the 1979 FA Cup Final between Arsenal and Manchester United. It was like a breath of fresh air, and a reminder of how good the BBC used to be at broadcasting football. I’ve watched their recent coverage, however, with increasing dismay but they [...]

Five Quick New Year Wishes

Obviously, in an ideal world I’d say “knickers” to football and go for the alpaca (see left), but this isn’t really an option and, besides, this place remains a football blog rather than an alpaca blog (although I’m open to suggestion on this subject as well). Anyway, I’m still a little feverish, so here are [...]

Look At What You Could Have Won

Talk about a fall from grace. The blog of the BBC Sport Editor Roger Mosey has got very excited this evening about the new Football League television contract. Having lost the rights to England matches and the FA Cup earlier this year (wiping out their live domestic football at a stroke) they have at least [...]

Sharpen Your Elbows

Right. First up, here is tonight’s FA Trophy results service:
Aveley 0-2 IlfordFC United of Manchester 1-4 Bradford Park Avenue (what the hell happened there, hmm?)Newcastle Blue Star 1-0 Woodley SportsRedbridge 0-3 Bury Town
I can’t imagine how relieved you must all be to know that. In lieu of any of the above matches being covered [...]

The Sunday Roast

As some of you may have noticed, I have spent this afternoon “pimping this place up”. I should point out that I’m not even sure whether “pimping this place up” is still the correct terminology to use (for all I know, I am now coming across like my dad doing an impression of Will Smith [...]

Channel Four Think You Are Idiots

The gentrification of football over the last fifteen years or so has been well documented. Buying a season ticket nowadays requires a complex system of vetting and credit checking, and that’s just the start of it. You will also be expected to fork out on merchandise, food, drink and so on. It’s a rich man’s [...]