It was always going to be a close-run affair but you only needed to witness the relief on the faces of the victorious French delegation and the look of total despair on those of their Turkish rivals to understand just how agonising it was.
Under normal circumstances, FA Cup Final week should be about excitement, anticipation and gaining maximum publicity for all the right reasons.
But Portsmouth are no ordinary club as the last few months have starkly illustrated.
England’s 2018 World Cup campaign team have been at great pains to highlight the progress that has been made since the dark days of football hooliganism that became known around the world as “the English disease”.
The national stadium is supposed to represent the maximum a country can offer, an iconic venue that provides the best possible platform for deciding the outcome of the most important fixtures.
A venue that should give players the freedom to express themselves, managers the ability to change tactics without fear of accident and fans the unique experience of watching football at its most expansive.
By Andrew Warshaw
It will go down as the day football’s lawmakers decided they knew better than fans, players, managers and referees alike. And you had to be there to believe it.
Whatever happened to compassion, understanding and taking each case on its merits?
The recent decision by the Africa’s football confederation to ban Togo from the next two editions of the African Nations Cup following their withdrawal from the tournament in Angola was so mean-spirited it bordered on the immoral.
Priorities, priorities. Is Arsene Wenger beginning to trust his own judgement to the point of becoming self-delusional? And more alarmingly, are Arsenal fans beginning to lose faith in their beloved manager?
Not for the first time, Wenger’s decision to send out a weakened team to play Stoke City in the FA Cup at the weekend came back to bite him on the backside.
Ask football fans across the major leagues to name the biggest change of the last ten years and one word stands out: money.