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Mihir Bose: Football racism; personal or institutional?

You may think, if you live in England, enough has been said about Sol Campbell’s extraordinary claim that had he been white he would been an automatic choice as England captain. Despite all those who have rubbished his claims he remains adamant, as he told me, that the colour of his face, as opposed to that of Michael Owen, just did not fit with the FA. All Campbell will budge on was that he did not mean to say he would have led the national side for ten years as originally reported but for a long time during the ten year period he played for his country.

Matt Scott

Matt Scott: Yeung experience should show Leeds Cellino is no way forward

“Whoever is careless with the truth in small matters cannot be trusted with important matters,” Albert Einstein

Football, to paraphrase the former Liverpool manager Bill Shankly, is a very important matter. Most would agree that paying your debts should be at the forefront of everyone’s minds too, but for years some of those involved in the game have played it fast and loose with their obligations to the tax authorities.

Lee Wellings

Lee Wellings: CL’s ugly little brother just became more interesting

I haven’t wanted to criticise the Europa League. Honestly I haven’t.

I loved the Cup Winners’ Cup and UEFA Cup. I have soft sports for many clubs who play at Europa League level. And there is undoubtedly something heartwarming about a club breaking through to play in Europe. The potential for fans to dream, to follow team over land and sea. From my country England it’s been Wigan and Swansea this season and you won’t find their fans complaining about European football,

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Inside Insight: And then there was a Brazil World Cup, after all

‘Tourist shot dead on golf course’. ‘Stadia will never be finished on time’. ‘Political mayhem leading up to World Cup’. ‘World Cup will be a failure, local population protests’. ‘Street violence and lacking infrastructure’.

No.

These are not headlines pre-Brazil.

These, and worse, were the headlines prior to the first ever World Cup in an African country, in South Africa, four years ago.

Matt Scott

Matt Scott: Want to get doshed up? Then work the agency gravy train

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“Friendship is constant in all other things Save in the office and affairs of love… Let every eye negotiate for itself And trust no agent,” Claudio, Act II, Scene 1, Much Ado About Nothing

William Shakespeare seldom got much wrong about life and how we live it. His comedies, his tragedies and his histories contained some fairly implausible scenarios and embellishments at times but the enduring value of his work lies in his ability to skewer all facets of the human character.

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David Owen: Could Neymar’s Brazil play future matches at London’s Olympic Stadium?

What do the following international football matches have in common: Brazil 0 Portugal 2 on 6 February 2007; Nigeria 1 Ghana 4 the same night; and Australia 3 Canada 0 on 15 October 2013?

Right, they were all played in London.

So was an extraordinary encounter last week pitting the Socceroos, once more, against Ecuador, France’s future World Cup opponents. While Roy Hodgson’s England were labouring to beat Denmark at Wembley,

Osasu Obayiuwana

Osasu Obayiuwana: Libya’s Cup of Nations takes some believing

Charity, they say, is supposed to begin at home. Or, at least, in your continent.

But I am wondering whether it is an adage that officials of Libya’s government and the football federation have ever taken to heart.

At the recent laying of the foundation stone, at a stadium to be built in Tripoli, the country’s capital, ahead of the 2017 Africa Cup of Nations they are to host – assuming the war-torn country is peaceful enough –

Lee Wellings

Lee Wellings: Immigration vote a game changer for Switzerland

FOOTBALL TEAM BEFORE

This is how the Swiss national football team lines up, proudly ranked as one of the eight top ranked teams for the World Cup in Brazil…

Massimo Cecchini

Massimo Cecchini: When Italian clubs buy foreign clubs

Il paradosso della globalizzazione selvaggia, in fondo, si nasconde anche nelle pieghe di un calcio specchio dei tempi. Archiviata l’età dell’oro – quella che appiccicava alla Serie A l’etichetta di “campionato più bello del mondo” – proprio in questo periodo di crisi i club italiani stanno scoprendo il gusto dell’espansione estera. Cioè, dalle vere acquisizioni alla semplici partnership – diverse società hanno deciso che per consolidare le proprie posizioni è opportuno scavalcare le Alpi o attraversare il mare.

Matt Scott

Matt Scott: Let the high-flying stars be Pied Pipers for football everywhere

“We bring you the circus, pied piper whose magic tunes greet children of all ages, from six to 60, into a tinsel and spun-candy world of reckless beauty… and high-flying stars. But behind all this, the circus is a massive machine whose very life depends on discipline and motion and speed. A mechanised army on wheels, that rolls over any obstacle in its path.” Narrator, The Greatest Show On Earth

Football today is as the circus of the 19th and early 20th Centuries,

Lee Wellings

Lee Wellings: Never mind World Cup – Zlat’s Entertainment

I have a confession.

Nothing too bad, I haven’t expanded a tournament from 16 to 24 teams or anything like that.

It’s about an autobiography I haven’t read. That of Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

As I am a sport correspondent for a world network…as he is one of world’s best players…as he also has employers in Qatar (he earns more)…as he is one of sport’s most interesting characters…and the book has plenty of good reviews…don’t you agree I should have read it?!

Mihir Bose

Mihir Bose: Michel Platini needs help not abuse

Now you may think Michel Platini can look after himself and does not need the help of others, certainly not journalists like me, who in terms of footballing skills, would not be entitled to carry his boots let alone lace them. But he might do well to consider that he needs to learn how to present his ideas better and, what is more, make sure his announcements have been preceded by proper debate so that the thinking football public,

Andrew Warshaw: Za’atari – where football provides hope and has humbling purpose

I had been warned in advance. It will be the most humbling experience of your career, said a colleague. It will move you to tears and put football into stark perspective.

It was all those things – and more.

In a week when most of the footballing banter was about the 2016 European qualifying draw or who would progress from the cash-rich Champions League, far removed from the Real Madrids and Chelseas of this world,

Archive

Inside Insight: Let’s destroy Russia, Qatar – and of course Brazil

It is a bit rough to be writing about such enormously important things like football when the world around us appears to be going completely bonkers. Wars in every corner of the square-headed globe, some idiot developing and launching ever “better” drones (they kill faster and with laser gun precision), robots that will replace humans by 2029, and are smarter – well, hardly a difficult task considering the stupidity that reigns everywhere where humans congregate.

Matt Scott

Matt Scott: Football’s new megastars are worlds away from the players of yore

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“I have hit rock bottom and I don’t see any way out of it,” Chelsea’s former European Cup Winners’ Cup winner, Alan Hudson

Alan Hudson is 62 years of age now but when he was the playmaker for a useful Chelsea team during the 1970s he was one of the Kings of the King’s Road. He was a household name, leading a lifestyle as flamboyant as the football he played over the 400-plus top-flight appearances he made as the creative force of clubs that consistently challenged for trophies.