Today Milton Keynes, Tomorrow Pretoria

Jun. 7 | Milton Keynes seems like a strange place for an international friendly, but it has actually staged 2 in a week – and there have been no complaints about their pitch.  It is obvious that the town/stadium is on some kind of inside track as they were...

Life before the Mexican wave

Jun. 7 | 1986 – Mexico To be sixteen again – who wouldn’t want to go back to such innocent days when compared with the stress and strains of modern life.  Sixteen when some of the good things in life were now legal, although growing up with...

We’re in Ron’s 22

Jun. 7 | 1982 – Spain Any English football fan over the age of 35 should  be able to sing the first few lines of the classic This Time.  One of the most underestimated football songs of all time, made all the better for seeing the England squad in the...

We’re on the march with Ally’s Army

Jun. 4 | 1978 – Argentina Has there every been a World Cup for drama and intrigue than Argentina in 1978?  I was 8 years old and with England failing to qualify I was beginning to believe that we were above such tournaments, especially as the Scots were...

It was 40 years ago today…

Jun. 4 | 1970 – Mexico I was just 6 months old when England took the real/fake Jules Rimet trophy out to Mexico to defend their crown of 1966.  We moan today about the distractions off the pitch for players, but it was no different forty years ago.  The...

Grazie Gazza – The story of 1974

Jun. 4 | 1974 – West Germany On his 7th birthday Paul Gascoigne woke up in his Dunston home with one thing on his mind – the forthcoming World Cup Finals in West Germany…probably.  But that day it was another Gazza making the back page headlines...

The Danish rock way

May. 28 | It is only 3 years ago since Wembley Stadium threw its doors wide open, over budget and over its original 2 year construction time scale by some 4 years. It seems like an age ago that the England “roadshow” used to see internationals played...

Allez les Bleus!

May. 27 | Domenech has originally selected 24 players to be reduced to 23 on the 1st of June depending on Gallas’ calf injury. However Lassana Diarra was  ruled out of the World Cup because of a blood disorder on Sunday. There are therefore now 23 players in...

Could it be any easier?

May. 26 | Fancy playing in the next World Cup finals?  Then get yourself down into the Pacific and sit in a bar for a couple of years and get residency to play for the likes of New Caledonia, Vanuata or Fiji and you could be just eight games away from realising...