August 11 – McClaren drops Beckham

MOST England fans were distinctly under whelmed when Steve McClaren was appointed as Sven’s successor as national team boss.

He had after all been an integral part of Sven’s regime which had ultimately come up short – particularly in Germany in 2006 when the squad was clearly unbalanced, and the team never really got going, eventually going out on penalties (of course) after they had limped to the quarter-finals.

McClaren was aware of his image amongst England fans as a poor man’s Sven, and rather than just getting on with the job and dispelling this image by winning matches, McClaren instead opted for a number of PR stunts to try and get the nation on his side.

Sadly for McClaren these stunts were about as convincing as David Cameron and most people saw right through them. A good example was getting PR guru Max Clifford to improve his image. Rarely can the employment of a publicity expert have led to so much bad press.

Then he took on cheeky chappy Terry Venebles as his second in command. This was a blatant attempt by McClaren to try and get some of Venebles’ popularity with England fans to rub off on him. The duo still do not look comfortable working together, and Venebles’ has not helped matters by publicly disagreeing with his boss in his newspaper column.

It is well known that during his reign Sven never once left out, or substituted David Beckham from a competitive match when he was fit (and sometimes when he wasn’t fit).

Here was McClaren’s next target. What better way to distance himself from his old boss by not picking his favourite player. It was on this day in 2006 that McClaren appeared to end Beckham’s England career when he left him out of his first squad, for a friendly against Greece.

Reaction to this move was mixed, although many thought Beckham was still a useful enough player to keep in the squad, but McClaren stood firm …. for a while.

Following some bad results and performances by the England team, and an up-turn in form for Beckham, the England coach showed he was about as decisive as Claudio Ranieri when he buckled and recalled Golden Balls for the prestige friendly against Brazil at the new Wembley.

To no one’s surprise, Beckham played well and provided the cross for John Terry’s goal. Well he does have a bit of a thing about proving people wrong, just ask Fabio Capello.

Watch Beckham mark his comeback with a trademark free kick as Terry scores for England:

August 10 – Sharpey Shuffles off to Leeds

FOR the benefit of our younger readers, the reality TV star Lee Sharpe was actually once a footballer. A very fine one too, who jostled with Ryan Giggs and John Barnes for a place on the left wing of Manchester United and England respectively. Like Brando in On The Waterfront, Sharpe “coulda been a contender.” But it was on this day in 1996 that Sir Alex Ferguson gave up on the injury-prone party animal from Halesowen and sold him to their cross-Pennines rivals Leeds United.

Sharpe had signed for Manchester United as a YTS player from Torquay for a record £200,000 in 1988 and within a couple of years he had forced his way into the first team with a number of eye-catching displays. A hat-trick at Highbury in a 6-2 League Cup win over Arsenal in 1990 soon followed, as did a call-up from England boss Graham Taylor, as Sharpe looked set take advantage of his obvious potential. And how England could have done with a world-class talent with a left foot throughout the 1990s. However, as we all know, this wasn’t to be the case, as illness and injuries were to put the brakes on Sharpe’s career.

Sharpe quickly gained a reputation for living the high-life at Manchester United. Urban legend has it that Fergie had a network of spies who would tip him off whenever one of Sharpey’s parties was getting out of hand, and the gaffer himself would storm in and, with his typical Glaswegian demure, would break up the party and give Sharpe the famous hairdryer treatment. As time went on Sharpe was spending more time on the treatment table and was even unfortunate enough to suffer from viral meningitis. This enabled a young Ryan Giggs to cement his place in the Red Devils’ midfield and become the most decorated player of his generation.

In 1996 Ferguson had had enough and Sharpe was sold to Leeds for £4.5 million, making him their record signing. The famous “Sharpey Shuffle” goal celebration was in short supply at Elland Road however. Thirty appearances in two seasons for Leeds saw Sharpe farmed out on loan, spending a few weeks with his pal David Platt during his misguided spell in charge of Sampdoria, before signing for Bradford. Like so many before him, Sharpe slowly slipped down the divisions, taking in spells at Portsmouth, Exeter City, Grindavik of Iceland and finally Garforth Town, where he would, somewhat bizarrely, share the pitch with Brazilian legend Socrates.

Nowadays, Lee Sharpe is a well-established member of the reality-TV bandwagon, most famous for his on-screen romance with Abi Titmuss on Celebrity Love Island, a show that Stephen Merchant watched “praying for a tsunami.” Perhaps the clip below is a better way to remember him. Meanwhile, join us tomorrow for a lesson in how to stamp your authority in your new job.

August 9 – Carbone Joins The Bantams

WHEN Bradford City went into administration in the summer of 2002 many blamed the fact that they were still paying some players Premiership wages, despite having been relegated to what was then the First Division.

The chief culprit was seen to be Italian striker Benito Carbone, who was earning a reported £40,000 a week at the Yorkshire club.

It was on this day in 2000 that the Bantams signed Carbone in a deal that was to become symbolic of smaller clubs trying to live beyond their means by signing big-name players that they could ill afford.

Carbone was regarded as something of a journeyman in Italy where he notched up six different clubs before Sheffield Wednesday paid £3m to take him to Hillsborough in 1996.

He would become very popular with the Wednesday faithful over the three years he spent there, but as his contract ran down, he refused to sign an extension and moved on to Aston Villa on a free transfer in 1999.

After one season at Villa Park, he was signed for Premiership strugglers Bradford by new manager Chris Hutchings, who had just taken over from his old boss Paul Jewell.

Although Carbone was popular with Bantams fans, and is still regarded as one of the best players ever at Valley Parade, he couldn’t prevent the team’s relegation – the key factor in their subsequent financial problems.

Carbone eventually signed for Italian club Como in 2002 to take the burden of his huge wages away from Bradford, and allegedly waived some of the money he was owed by the club to help their plight.

He was often cast as the villain of the piece – the mercenary foreign player who was couldn’t care less about the club as long as he picked up his cash, but as his agent Gianni Paladini said at the time: “It was a mistake on the part of Bradford to give him that money in the first place.”

Paladini was essentially correct, but not everyone learned from Bradford’s mistakes as their Yorkshire rivals Leeds were to find out a few years down the line.

Have a look at this peach of a goal Carbone scored for Villa against Leeds in the FA Cup:

August 8 – Links Fills Des’s Shoes

GARY LINEKER is described as ‘Leicester’s favourite son,’ although to be fair, there aren’t many others to choose from. Emile Heskey? Do me a favour. Playwright Joe Orton? Now you’re just being obtuse.

Lineker it is then, and it was on this day in 1999 that Old Big Ears was announced as the new full time presenter of Match of the Day, following housewives’ favourite Des Lynam’s defection to ITV.

Perma-tanned Lineker had been back up for Des on MotD for some time, and had also been presenting Football Focus and doing radio work on BBC Five Live, so the flagship highlights programme was the natural progression for him.

Golfer Gary actually started his broadcasting career way back at the 1986 world cup. After England had been knocked out, he joined the BBC pundit team for the remainder of the competition, in which he became the only Englishman to win the Golden Boot scoring six goals.

In a club career that started at his hometown club Leicester and took in Everton, Barcelona, Tottenham and Japanese side Nagoya Grampus Eight, he famously never received a single booking. Mind you, he never made a tackle either so it’s probably not that surprising.

Tune in tomorrow to see which flamboyant Italian was marauding around Yorkshire a decade ago, but before you go here’s one of Links’ early appearances on MotD when Des was still in charge, with Gary looking like a small boy who’s wearing his dad’s suit jacket…

August 7 – High Tech Hooligans

HOOLIGANISM has long been a problem for football in Britain and if there is one club that, rightly or wrongly is seen as the worst offender, it is Millwall.

A 1975 Panorama documentary about football violence at Millwall somewhat blackened the name of the club, and it has never recovered since (mind you, having Dennis Wise play for you is never going to help). One of the favourite chants at their home ground The New Den is ‘No one likes us. We don’t care,” or variations on that theme.

Many have claimed that the club’s reputation is unfair, and that the small minority of ‘fans’ that cause trouble are not representative of the Millwall supporters. A former Chairman of the club, Reg Burr, once said: “Millwall are a convenient coat peg for football to hang its social ills on.”

It was on this day however in 1999 that this small minority showed their reputation was well deserved, when they clashed with Cardiff City fans (no angels themselves) at the first fixture of the season in the Welsh capital.

The city’s ‘café quarter’ had to virtually close down for two hours with shop and café owners locking themselves in until Police and dogs were sent in to break up the mob.

This fight was no spur-of-the-moment thing between two sets of fans who had had too much to drink. This marked the day when hooliganism went online.

Police revealed that the two sets of fans had been organising the clash through internet forums, so the abuse could start weeks before the match itself.

Apparently one message on a forum described the trouble as the “tear-up of the year”. Another said: “Get ready Taffies, we are coming to wreck your country.”

One site even posted a running commentary of events, presumably to keep other hooligans who couldn’t make the journey up to date with events.

Chairman of Cardiff City Steve Borley said at the time that the trouble was disgraceful.

“Football is the loser,” he said.

Happily, another visit of Millwall to Cardiff was altogether more peaceful. Not a single Millwall fan was arrested at the 2004 FA Cup final which they lost 3-0 to Manchester United.

Here are the fans signing their signature chant at the match:

August 6 – Steel City Merger Dismissed

WITH the formation of the Premiership in 1992, clubs floating on the stock market, and sky (TV) high player wages, football was changing in the 1990s from a sport to a multi-million pound business.

While this was all well and good for those at the top end of the game, the money did not trickle down to the less fortunate clubs.

Two teams that were finding life hard in the late 1990s were two proud old clubs that shared a fierce rivalry, as well as a city.

Over the 1997/98 season, Sheffield Wednesday and Sheffield United lost a combined total of £16.5m. In response to this crisis United Chairman John Thurman suggested in an interview with the Yorkshire Post that the answer to these woes could be a merger of the two clubs.

Thurman said: “It would be a radical idea, but one that will have to come under active consideration.

“I can personally see a lot of benefits from it.

“The whole football business is evolving and the only way for smaller clubs to survive is by merging to become stronger.

“I’m not aware of any serious debate having taken place so far but I would expect that in the future there will be and market forces may decide it is sooner rather than later.”

On this day in 1999 Wednesday secretary Alan Sykes echoed the feelings of Wednesday and United fans alike when he dismissed Thurman’s suggestion.

He said: “In London obviously there are clubs in close proximity to each other – Tottenham and Arsenal are close to each other and have sustained Premiership football for a long time.

“There is no reason why Sheffield can’t support two clubs.”

Indeed, there are stories that many fans in Sheffield literally did that before ticket prices rose sharply. When they could afford it, some fans would apparently attend games at both clubs on alternate Saturdays, although you would probably be hard pressed to find anyone who would admit to it now.

The two clubs do share a lot in common: both have used Brammall as their home ground, and both used to be nicknamed ‘The Blades,’ a reference to Sheffield’s steel industry. It was only after Wednesday moved to Owlerton that they adopted ‘The Owls’ as their moniker.

As it has turned out, Thurman’s prediction has not materialised, and the two clubs remain independent of each other, and the Steel City Derby remains the most important game of the season for both teams.

If anything, since 1999 the rivalry between the two sets of fans has increased, although this can probably be put down almost entirely to Neil Warnock – the Marmite of football managers: you either love him or hate him. Needless to say, not that many love him.

Find out why ‘no one likes them but they don’t care’ tomorrow, but before you go, check out the abuse Warnock dishes out to this poor linesman…

August 5 – First British Match Decided By Penalty Shoot-out

IF there is one thing England fans dread at every major tournament, it is a penalty shoot-out.

Including the 1990 World Cup, England have exited three world cups and two European Championships thanks to profligacy from the spot, losing out to Germany and Portugal (both twice), and Argentina.

Even when they did win one in the quarter final against Spain in Euro 96, it was only to prolong the agony as Germany eliminated the team on penalties in the semi.

Penalties have always been a cruel way to decide a match, and it was on this day in 1970 that Hull City became the first British casualty of the shoot-out as they lost at home to Manchester United in the long-forgotten Watney Mann Invitation Cup.

The curiously named competition was named after the Watney Mann brewery, in the first sponsorship deal of its kind in England, and was held before the start of each season for four years, between 1970 and 1973.

It was contested by the teams from each of the four football leagues who had scored the most goals in their division, but were neither promoted, nor entered into European competition. Two teams from each league took part in the knock-out tournament, with the final being played at one of the finalist’s home ground, rather than a neutral venue. A delightfully pointless and over-complicated competition that only English football could have dreamed up.

Manchester United had fielded a full strength side at Boothferry Park but were trailing to an early Hull goal before Denis Law equalised late on. After goalless extra time, the match went to penalties.

George Best took the first and scored, while Denis Law became the first man to feel the shame of missing as his shot was saved by Hull keeper Ian McKechnie.

McKechnie missed the chance to become a hero by missing his spot-kick, and the next Hull miss put the home side out.

In the same year, FIFA and UEFA both adopted the shoot-out as a way of deciding matches – a decision that would dog England for many years to come. Before penalties, knock-out ties were deciding simply by drawing lots – perhaps England should have stuck to this method, they couldn’t have done any worse.

Even the England Under 21s are under the curse: despite scoring 12 spot kicks in the European U21 semi-final with The Netherlands, they still lost 13-12. The 32 penalties taken that night remains an international record.

If you really want to, you can watch the whale darn shooting match here, if not, come back tomorrow to find out which club chairman was putting his oversized foot right in it.

August 4 – Jimmy Sulks off to Atletico

I blame Jimmy Hill. Before the biggest chin in football successfully lobbied for the removal of the maximum wage in football, player power was virtually non-existent. Players were transferred when the clubs wanted to, and there was non of this “bigger than the club” nonsense. Nowadays however, with a little nudge from their Mr 15%, countless players engineer moves with their outrageous wage demands, and it was on this day in 2000 that Leeds United striker Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink sealed his big-money move to Atletico Madrid.

Jimmy, or Jerrel as his mother calls him, was a relatively late-bloomer. A series of short spells in the Netherlands and Portugal ended with a prolific season for Boavista in 1996/97, which saw him secure a £2m move to George Graham’s Leeds United.

Hasselbaink would soon become a fans’ favourite at Elland Road, where his predatory instinct and thunderbolt shot fired him to the top of the Premiership scoring charts. He could also never be accused of lacking in passion. Like all good strikers, as the saying goes, Jimmy was never shy to take a pop at goal and could often be seen manically waving his arms in the air, eyes bulging out of his head, at team-mates who had the audacity not to pass to him when he stalked the opposition’s goal.

This was possibly also the way he entered contract negations with the Leeds board. Having been Leeds’ leading scorer for the past two years, Jimmy believed that the club owed him big. It was rumoured that Jimmy was demanding £60,000 a week, which would easily make him the highest paid player in the league. These figures were so extreme that even Peter “Father Christmas” Ridsdale quickly told him where to go, and Jimmy soon requested to be put on the transfer list.

With several top European clubs tracking Hasselbaink, Atletico Madrid stepped in with a £12m offer that was soon accepted, and Jimmy was off to sunny Spain. He would only last one season in La Liga, and rather fittingly for a man who David O’Leary once said “he believed he was a special case,” Jimmy would not only get the personal glory of finishing as the leagues top goalscorer, but would also suffer the ignominy of relegation.

Still, despite being what Alex Turner might describe as a ‘mardy bum’, Jimmy certainly knew how to score a goal. See footage below of what, if not for a certain non-flying Dutchman, would be the greatest hat-trick ever seen in the Premiership, and be sure to join us tomorrow for (if you can bear it England fans) a look at an historic penalty shoot-out.

August 3 – Il Buon Gigante signs for Juventus

TODAY at On This Football Day we’re jumping back half a century to have a look the man that the Italian public rated as the greatest foreigner to ever grace Serie A. It’s not Zidane, Platini, Van Basten or even Maradona, but Welshman John Charles.

It was on this day in 1957 that Il Buon Gigante, or the Gentle Giant, left Leeds United for Juventus for a world record fee of £65,000. Surprise, surprise, Leeds were selling him due to financial problems; in September 1956 a fire had gutted the main stand at Elland Road which was not adequately insured. With a £60,000 shortcoming in the finances, Charles was sold to build a new stand.

Charles was the first British professional to sign for an overseas side and to say he hit it off is a bit of an understatement. In 1957 he was joining a Juve side that had struggled to avoid the drop, but his five-year spell at the Stadio Olimpico di Torino saw three Scudetto’s and two Italian Cups for the Old Lady, as Charles would bag 93 goals in 150 games. This goalscoring feat is all the more impressive when you consider the fact that Charles was as adapt marshalling the defence in a centre-back role as he was leading the line upfront.

Charles was perhaps the most versatile player ever to play the game. He had strength, speed and agility, as well as possessing a temperament that would make Mother Theresa look like she deserved an asbo, despite Jack Charlton’s claim that “when he went on a surge he would leave a terrible trail of human devastation behind him. Bloody gentle giant indeed!” 518 games and no yellow or red cards was a testament to this, even in the pre-Graham Poll-era. Charles started out as a towering centre-back, but upon his arrival at Elland Road, Leeds manager Major Frank Buckley put Charles upfront to great effect.

The respect amongst Charles’ contemporaries was evident, as Nat Lofthouse rated him as the greatest defender he had ever faced, while Billy Wright hailed him as the finest centre-forward he had ever seen. At Juve, he would often stay in attack until he scored, then be bought back into defence to wrap up the victory.

After five glorious years in Turin, Charles became homesick and was eventually sold back to Leeds after a drawn-out transfer saga that saw Leeds nearly bankrupt themselves, paying an over-the-odds £53,000 for their former charge. He would later claim that leaving Juventus was the biggest mistake of his career and soon ended up back in Italy, this time at AS Roma. A strong start in the capital was soon derailed by injuries and Charles would finish his career in his homeland, with a spell at Cardiff City and then as manager of Hereford United and Merthyr Tydfil.

Right up until his death in February 2004, Charles was still revered in the three countries he played in and was always mobbed by adoring fans on the streets of Turin whenever he returned. His career was commemorated in Italy when he was named as the only non-Italian to ever be conducted into the Azzurri Hall of Fame, and at Elland Road, where the stand his original transfer had funded was named in his honour.

For grainy footage of a player who should be mentioned in the same breath of Pele, Maradona and Cruyff bagging a hat-trick against former Serie A mainstays Spal 1907 see below, and be sure to join us tomorrow for the story of angry man named Jerrel.

August 2 – Suker Signs For The Gunners

ALTHOUGH the home nation won the France 98 World Cup, a team that were making their first appearance at the tournament also received plaudits for their performance.

Croatia were playing in their first ever world cup since gaining independence from Yugoslavia. Star striker Davor Suker won the tournament’s golden boot award with six goals in seven matches as the team finished third, losing in the semi-final to eventual winners France.

It was on this day in 1999 that Arsene Wenger paid £3.5m to take Suker to Highbury from Real Madrid to replace Nicolas Anelka, who had gone the other way.

Suker was an uncharacteristic signing for Wenger – rarely has he ever bought established stars, particularly if they are over 30 (Suker was 31 at the time).

Wenger needed reinforcements up front following the departure of Anelka, and Suker was bought with an eye on improving Arsenal’s fortunes in Europe.

Wenger said at the time: “He is a quality striker with experience in the Champions’ League and will undoubtedly be a great asset for us.”

After playing in Croatia, Suker enjoyed eight prolific years in the Spanish league, first with Sevilla, and then Real Madrid, before Madrid boss John Toshack deemed him surplus to requirements and moved him on to Arsenal.

The Croatian’s time at Highbury was not as successful as either he, or his manager might have hoped. He scored eight goals in 22 starts, but missed a penalty in the UEFA Cup Final as Arsenal lost the shootout to Galatasary.

A move across London to West Ham didn’t prove any more productive, so Suker moved to Germany and 1860 Munich for the last two seasons of his career.

Despite not really hitting it off in England, Suker is remembered as one of Europe’s top strikers on the 1990s, and is Croatia’s all-time leading scorer with 45 goals in 69 games.

Suker is one of a only a handful of players to play for more than one nation at full international level, as he made two appearances for Yugoslavia before Croatia became independent, scoring one goal.

In March 2004, he was named by Pelé as one of the 125 greatest living footballers and was the only Croatian player to be added to the list.

Have a look at this moment from Euro 96 when he tries to lob Peter Schmeichel from the half way line. Cheeky.

More blasts from the football past tomorrow when you can find out who is rated by the Italians as the best ever foreigner to play in Serie A.