September 10 – Beasant’s 11

ODDS are that if you support a football club in England than today’s subject has more than likely turned out for your side. Whereas some players are happy to remain the loyal husband to their hometown club, there are others who put themselves about more than Russell Brand at a sex-addiction clinic.

Big-haired goalkeeper Dave Beasant was just such a player and today in 2002 he signed on the dotted line for his 11th club, Bradford City, as the 43-year-old showed no sign of hanging up the gloves.

Beasant began his hobo-like career playing for non-league Edgware Town in 1978 before moving to Wimbledon a year later where he would make over 300 appearances for the club, earning himself the nickname ‘Lurch’ after his resemblance to the Addams Family’s butler.

During his spell with the Dons he became the first ever ‘keeper to save a penalty in an FA Cup Final, when Beasant, also captaining the side, kept out John Aldridge’s spot kick during their famous win over Liverpool in 1988.

Unfortunately for Beasant, it’s not the Cup Final save, the England appearances or the 774 matches he played that he is most famously remembered for.

During his four-year spell at Southampton in the mid 1990s Beasant joined the pantheon of comedy injuries, as he dropped a jar of salad cream on his foot and spent two months on the sidelines with ruptured ankle ligaments as a result. The injury came when he believed he could control the falling condiment that he had accidently knocked over, but he ended up proving all those ‘good touch for a big man’ clichés that Peter Crouch has to face on a weekly basis sometimes ring true.

Beasant’s spell at Bradford proved to be a short one, as he would soon move on to Wigan, then Brighton, before becoming player-coach at Fulham where he would finally call it a day in 2004 after a 26-year career that saw him take in no less then 14 clubs.

As much as we’d love to show you salad cream-gate, YouTube just doesn’t come up with the goods, so instead see him saving from Aldridge in 1988. If you were wandering what was going down in south London today in 1905, click your mouse here. We’ll be back tomorrow, but before then – shameless plug alert – why not pre-order the forthcoming OTFD book here. Until tomorrow footy fans….

September 9 – Manchester United Sell Out

AS multi-million pound takeovers are all the rage in Manchester at the moment we thought we’d bring you the story of a former suitor of the second biggest team in they city, as today in 1998 United confirmed they had accepted a bid from BSkyB to buy the club.

Ten years ago the notion that Premier League sides would be the latest playthings of the international billionaire boys club set was as out there as Newcastle United employing a sensible managerial policy. Being the biggest club in the country Manchester United had always been seen as an attractive acquisition, with UFO-nutter Michael Knighton coming close to a takeover in 1989 for the knockdown price of £20m.

Showing how much the game had changed in the following decade, BSkyB had agreed on a price of £623.4m for the club as Rupert Murdoch saw this as the next piece in his plan to dominate football broadcasting in England.

Murdoch’s price was around £50m more than the going price and the bid was quickly accepted by Martin Edwards and his cronies, much to the disdain of fans, football authorities and also the government. New Labour were still in their honeymoon period, as Secretary of State for Trade and Industry Peter Mandelson promised the offer would be examined “very completely and extremely searchingly.”

Chairman of the all-party football group Joe Ashton pointed out that “What Murdoch is trying to do is sit on both sides of the table at once. He wants to sit on one side for Sky offering deals for showing matches, then sit there for Manchester United accepting them. That can’t be fair trading or be in the public interest.”

The BBC meanwhile began to panic that Match of the Day would be under threat, as Murdoch would prevent it showing highlights of United’s games. The case eventually went to the Monopoly and Mergers Commission and in April 1999 Stephen Byers, who had taken over as trade secretary from Peter Mandelson after some dodgy dealings in Notting Hill, proved to be the hero for the United fans as he blocked the sale. This was a brave move, as it risked the wrath of the Murdoch empire that has such an influence on any election in this country.

BSkyB would react by withdrawing thousands of pounds of funding for a football forum at the Labour Party conference in 1999 and Murdoch had to come up with a new strategy for world domination.

Amid the chaotic action behind the scenes that year at Old Trafford the club managed to block it all out and get on with securing the greatest season in the club’s history as they won that historic treble of the Premier League, FA Cup and European Cup.

See action from ‘that night in Barcelona’ below and check out what else was happening today here. We’ll be back tomorrow for more of the same, but if you can’t wait that long you can always order the new OTFD book, available here.

September 8 – Black and whites in the red

ITALIAN super club Juventus would still be sporting a distinctive pink playing strip had it not been for a club currently plying their trade in the fourth tier of English football.

In 1903 Juve were looking for a new shirt design because their pink outfits were fading so much in the wash (true story). The club asked one of their team members, Englishman John Savage, if he had any contacts in England who could supply new shirts in a colour that would better withstand the elements, so Savage turned to a County-supporting friend who obliged by shipping out a batch of black and white jerseys.

Notts County is the world’s oldest professional football club but today in 2003 the Magpies came within a whisker of extinction after 141 years of existence.

Financial mismanagement meant the Meadow Lane club had been in administration for 450 days and the Football League was getting to the end of its tether, having already given the club three extensions on the time-frame to sort out their finances.

On this day the chairman of the Football League, Sir Brian Mawhinney, convened a meeting of the organisation’s board at which they had to decide whether County should be wound up.

“I’m sure they’re not going to look to throw out the world’s oldest league club,” said the chairman of the supporters trust, David Hindley, before the meeting. “But we’ve already been given three extensions by the Football League and I’ve still got a niggling feeling that they might want to make an example of us.”

The supporters trust were determined to raise £250,000 to help the club and at their home match with Luton Town, collection buckets were filling up rapidly, not least thanks to an unlikely donation from one of Nottingham Forest’s players. Forest striker David Johnson attended the game and at half-time threw £500 in cash into a passing bucket.

It seems Mawhinney was feeling charitable as well when he announced: “Notts County FC have been in administration longer than any other club in Football League history.

“By December this will have lasted for 18 months, which should be plenty of time to reach a satisfactory solution.

“The board has now considered this issue on nine occasions and has received numerous assertions from the administrator a financial solution was imminent, including a personal assurance at the League’s August board meeting.

“Despite this, the Football League has agreed to give Notts County another 13 weeks to resolve its financial difficulties, it is after all the board’s business to help its clubs stay in business.

“Based on the information provided to the League by the administrator, this should be ample time to finalise arrangements.

“Should the club fail to do so its membership of the Football League will be withdrawn.”

Thankfully it did not come to that and the club was out of administration by December. A key part of English football’s heritage, the world’s oldest professional club was saved by a £4.2m take over by the Blenheim Consortium’s £4.2m.

Here is a little montage about the club’s recent struggles. Today was also the day the first ever Football League matches were played, back in 1888, with Notts County among the 12 teams taking part. Read all about it here.

September 7 – Your boys took one hell of a beating!

PERHAPS the most famous piece of football commentary was Kenneth Wolstenholme’s immortal words in the 1966 World Cup final at Wembley when a pitch invasion started seconds before Geoff Hurst scored England’s fourth goal. “Some people are on the pitch. They think it’s all over,” he said, before adding, “It is now,” after Hurst had scored.

Wolstenholme’s words were so special because of the occasion and the timing with which they were delivered, but today we remember a piece of football commentary that outstrips Ken’s for sheer emotion and spontaneous brilliance.

On this day in 1981 Ron Greenwood’s England were playing away in Norway in a qualifier for the 1982 World Cup and were favourites to win, and put out a side including Ray Clemence, Kevin Keegan, Trevor Francis, Bryan Robson and Glenn Hoddle.

Robson scored after a quarter of an hour to give England the lead but Norway hit back through Roger Albertsen and Hallvar Thoresen before half time. In the second half England could not force and equaliser, much less a winner, and Norway had their first ever win over England. Not only was it the first time England had lost to Norway, it was the first time they had failed to score more than four goals against the Scandinavians.

It was a famous victory and Norwegian radio commentator Bjørge Lillelien saw it all happen. Amid scenes of jubilation at the final whistle Lillelien cried: “Lord Nelson! Lord Beaverbrook! Sir Winston Churchill! Sir Anthony Eden! Clement Attlee! Henry Cooper! Lady Diana! Maggie Thatcher – can you hear me, Maggie Thatcher! Your boys took one hell of a beating! Your boys took one hell of a beating!”

It was a moment when impartiality went out of the window to be replaced by uninhibited passion and raw emotion, and it has become famous the world over.

In 2002 Lillelien’s words were designated the greatest piece of sports commentary ever by The Observer’s Sport Monthly magazine, and it has been parodied many times since, notably when England celebrated regaining the Ashes in 2005 with the words: “Kylie Minogue! Steve Irwin! Holly Valance! Crocodile Dundee! Natalie Imbruglia! Ian Thorpe! Mrs. Mangel! Can you hear me? Your boys took one hell of a beating!”

Listen to Lillelien’s impassioned commentary below, and as always, we will be back tomorrow. In an unhappy coincidence, today is also the day England lost to Northern Ireland in 2005 which you can read about here.

September 6 – A Sting in His Tail

MOST seasoned football fans think they’ve seen it all before. Stepovers, keepy-uppies, fancy back-heels – it’s all old hat. But just occasionally someone comes up with something new and we remember why we fell in love with the game the first time. Today in 1995 madcap Columbian ‘keeper Rene Higuita wowed the football world with his famous ‘scorpion kick’.

England were hosting the Columbians in a friendly at Wembley Stadium when Jamie Redknapp hoisted an aimless cross-shot into to the Columbian goalmouth and instead of catching the ball Higuita cleared the ball by jumping on his hands and acrobatically clearing the ball with his feet.

The 20,038 brave souls that dared turn out for the most pointless of games – an England friendly – were rewarded for their loyalty as they saw what was recently voted as football’s greatest ever trick in a recent online poll. “My philosophy is to enjoy myself and to entertain”, said Higuita, who used to do it whenever he could playing back home in Columbia for the likes of Atletico Nacional and Millonarios.

England manager Terry Venables was also suitably impressed: “I have only one word to describe it, extraordinary,” he said, before using more than one word to describe it. “I’ve never seen anything like it. They tell me he does it all the time in his own country, that’s probably why his last three managers have had heart attacks.”

England’s World Cup winning ‘keeper Gordon Banks wasn’t as convinced, saying that: “if he’d done that for England it would’ve been his last cap. Bobby Moore would have had a quiet word and Jack Charlton would have punched him on the nose.” Spoil sports.

The scorpion kick wasn’t the only form of hi-jinks that the Columbian, nicknamed ‘El Loco’, got up to on the football pitch. Fans around the world were introduced to his eccentric style in the 1990 World Cup, when he seemed to be playing a jumper-for-goalposts style ‘rush-keeper’, charging out of goal with the ball at his feet, only to be tackled by Cameroon striker Roger Milla who scored to knock Columbia out.

His personal life ticked most of the boxes of a stereotypical Columbian mad man. Higuita was sent to prison in 1993 for being implicated in a drug cartel kidnapping when he was acting as a go-between for Pablo Escobar and fellow drug baron Carlos Molina. A positive test for cocaine followed after his release and in 2005 he appeared on the Columbian version of Survivor.

See Higuita showing that he has the skills to pay the bills below and check out what else was happening today here. We’ll be back with more tomorrow, but if you’re not down with waiting for your daily football fix, then get your hands on our new On This Football Day book, available here.

September 5 – Daft as a Brush

WHAT a difference 20 years makes. It was today in 1988 that a cheeky young chappy by the name of Paul Gascoigne was first called up to the England squad ahead of their friendly against Denmark.

21-year-old Gazza had moved to Spurs that summer for £2.3m after Terry Venables had promised that he would help in break into the England team. This was despite the overtures of Alex Ferguson, who packed his bags and went on his summer holidays, confident that he had landed the young playmaker.

Fergie then got a phone call on the beach telling him that Gazza had signed for Spurs after the club had bought a house for his impoverished family. This is possibly one of the greatest ‘what if’ moments in football history. Had Gazza spent his career under the watchful eye of Sir Alex then who knows what he, and England could have achieved. Ah well, que sera sera.

As it was, Gazza’s England career had more up and downs than the average day-in-the-life of a Newcastle United fan. Over ten years he bagged himself 57 caps and nine goals, lighting up the 1990 World Cup in Italy and then Euro 96 when football was oh so close to coming home.

Gazza’s England career came to (literally) crashing halt when he reacted somewhat badly to the news that Glenn Hoddle had not picked him for the 1998 World Cup. After being summoned into Glenda’s hotel room Gazza proceeded to smash the pace up, breaking a bone in his foot on a lamp as he kissed goodbye to ever representing the Three Lions ever again.

The following decade has not been kind to the most naturally gifted footballer that England has ever produced. A misguided spell in China saw him playing for Gansu Tianma where his inner demons started to get the better of him. A spell in rehab followed before he returned to England as manager for Kettering Town, but was dismissed after six weeks by the clubs owner that stated that he was heavily drinking every day.

Earlier this year Gazza was sectioned under the Mental Health Act as he still struggles with drink and depression. We wish him luck in his recovery and we’ll leave you with a slice of genius from his time on the pitch. Enjoy that, have a look at what Sir Alan Sugar was up to on this day and join us tomorrow for more England action.

September 4 – Beware the Owls!

HERE in Britain, we really are a different breed to the Americans. They give their sports teams intimidating names like The Giants, The Broncos, and The Bulls, designed to portray an image of overwhelming strength and power. Here in England, we give our football teams nice cuddly nicknames like the Canaries, the Lilywhites, and the Owls, all of which sound about as intimidating as as baby bunny.

Unlike the Americans however, there is usually a weight of history behind these names, as in the case of today’s subjects, Sheffield Wednesday. The club was formed on this day in 1867, and as was common, it was born from cricking origins. In the earlier part of the century, local craftsmen only worked a half day on a Wednesday and so the Wednesday Cricket Club was born in 1820.

Keen to keep the cricketers fit during the winter, the club began playing football which quickly overtook the cricket team in popularity. Indeed, the Wednesday Cricket Club was subsequently disbanded in September 1924, but the Club was simply known as “Wednesday” or “The Wednesday” until in June 1929 our name was officially changed to Sheffield Wednesday.

The club turned professional in 1887, making it one of the oldest professional clubs in England. It was also in 1887 that the club built their first stadium, the Olive Grove, having previously played at other grounds in the city including Sheaf House and even, whisper it, Bramall Lane.

Expansion to nearby railway tracks meant The Wednesday could not extent their lease at the Olive Grove, and after ten years in residence they had to find a new home. An area to the north west of the city named Owlerton was where they build the new ground, hence the nickname, the Owls.

The ground also called Owlerton Stadium until 1914 when it was renamed Hillsborough to coincide with improvements to site.

Despite their current situation near the lower end of England’s second tier, Wednesday are still considered one of the biggest clubs in the country and can point to four League titles, three FA Cups and one League Cup as proof.

More from us tomorrow, but also on this day, Phil Babb was having a right old ‘mare.

September 3 – Euro Sceptics

A LONG time ago in a galaxy far, far away…

It is a period of civil war. Rebel football clubs, meeting at a hidden base, have won their first victory against the evil Uefa Empire. During the battle, Uefa spies managed to see secret plans for the Rebel’s new European Super League, a new continent-wide league with enough power to destroy Uefa and domestic leagues. Pursued by the Uefa’s sinister agents, a mysterious man named Rodolfo Hecht races across Europe, custodian of the secret plans that could change football forever in the galaxy….

Strained Star Wars analogies aside, today in 1998 saw some of Europe’s top clubs meeting to discuss the possibility of starting a breakaway European Super League, outside of the control of Uefa.

The man behind the plan was Rodolfo Hecht of the Milan-based consortium Media Partners and his idea was to get leading clubs from around Europe to begin an exclusive midweek competition in 2000, to replace the Uefa-run Champions League, which although was very lucrative for the clubs in it, was not as lucrative as they would like. In footballer’s terms, the clubs getting in a tiz about not getting enough cash out of the Champions League was like Ashley Cole swerving off the road in shock and despair when Arsenal offered him a paltry £55,000 a week contract.

In London for the big meeting, Mr Hecht said it would be “a project with no losers”, and he was now “more confident than ever” that the project will go ahead as planned, despite threats from domestic leagues, including the Premier League, about what would happen to clubs who joined.

Speaking after being appointed to a continent-wide task force to look into the matter, Peter Lever, Chief Executive of the Premier League gave a clear warning to potential English rebels.

“There’s a great determination amongst the clubs in the Premier League that anyone who wants to go their own way will have to face the consequences.

“It may well mean that they will find themselves not inside the league,” he told BBC News at the time.

Clubs were also told their players would not be selected for England duty were they to join the breakaway league.

The supporters too were mobilising against the idea. Ivan Todd, of the Campaign Against the Superleague, told the BBC: “It is silly really that Rudolfo Hecht has said that this league could benefit the fans.

“We have talked to the fans and the supporters clubs, we have had a unanimous message: the superleague sucks.”

In the end, the Premier League clubs all decided to tow the line, and accepted that any changes to European competition should be done under Uefa aspices, but the threat of a breakaway Super League continued to rear its head every so often until the G14 group of Europe’s most powerful clubs disbanded in January this year, after finally reaching a compromise with Uefa about greater say in the running of the game. Peace in the Galaxy at last.

For those of you who thought Sky Sports was so over the top it was beyond parody, think again and watch the clip below, and click here to see what else happened on this day in football history.

Podcast Review: The Best of the Rest

There are of course hundreds of other podcasts out there and most of them are very average to say the least. Similar to blogging, any idiot with a mic can make a podcast, so on the whole it’s best to stick with the professional offerings from the likes of those above. Saying that, there’s a few diamonds in the rough; EPL Talk’s ‘Best Of…” pod brings in heavyweight guests for weighty, objective discussion, TheOffside.com’s weekly podcast brings the listener a bit of everything and we’d also like to give a shout out the now-defunct Beautiful Game, which was as good as anything we’ve heard outside of the major broadcasters.

If you disagree or can recommend any other podcasts then let us know. You never know, if we figure out how to plug a mic in to our computers here we might belatedly jump on the podcasting bandwagon ourselves, so keep an eye out for that.

September 2 – Stadia Mania

IF, like us here at OTFD you were watching Sky Sports News until the wee hours getting far too over excited as the transfer window slammed shut last night, then here’s a more serene story, as we go back to look at the opening of two classic Archibald Leitch stadiums that share a birthday.

Today in 1889 Molineux Stadium, the home of Wolverhampton Wanderers opened. Named after a local boy done good, Benjamin Molineux, that bought the plot of land in 1744, the site was first used for football in the 1860s as it was opened to the public as pleasure park.

When the area was renovated in 1889 Wolves celebrated by winning their first game 2-0 as they downed Notts County, the world’s oldest current professional club in front of 4,000 happy midlanders.

Over the next forty years the stadium grew, with a record attendance of 61,315 coming in 1939 when Liverpool came to town. The Wolves team began to match their impressive surroundings after the war, with Billy Wright leading his side to three Division One titles.

Since those heady days Wolves have become one of English football’s great under-achievers spending most of their time in the second flight in recent years. Not even the goals of club legend Steve Bull in the late 80s and early 90s could pull them out of their 40-year funk.

Ten years to the day after Molineux opened another of England’s most famous stadiums was opening it’s turnstiles for the first time. Sheffield Wednesday’s Hillsborough Stadium made it’s bow with a 5-1 win for the hosts against Chesterfield, but it will forever be known as the site of the worst ever sporting disaster in England when 96 Liverpool fans died in 1989.

Like most Leitch creations, Hillsborough oozes in character and was one of the top stadiums in the country for many years, playing host to 27 FA Cup semi-finals and four World Cup games in 1966.

Despite this, the ground will never shake of the stigma of the 1989 disaster when a failure of police control lead to the deadly crush that would bring about some of the biggest changes that English football has ever seen, as the subsequent Taylor Report called for the introduction of all-seater stadia and the removal of barriers at the front of stands.

This has unfortunately lead to much of Leitch’s best work being demolished, such as the Trinity Road Stand at Villa Park, as flat-pack stadia with no character such the Walkers Stadium in Leicester or the Riverside at Middleborough are popping up all over the place.

See some footage of Jimmy McGovern’s documentary on the Hillsborough disaster, showing how the specter of April 15th 1989 looms large over the stadium below. Have a look at the debut of a legend that also happened today and head over hear tomorrow for more footballing history.