By Brian Sears 10 September 2010 The first Premier League match of the weekend, tomorrow lunchtime, features two of the teams ‘ever present’ in the League since it began in 1992, with Everton hosting Manchester United. Only seven sides have been ‘ever present’, that pair plus Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Aston Villa and Tottenham. Thus 42 […]

By Brian Sears 10 September 2010 The Wolves will be on prowl in London this weekend, hunting by the river. They’re playing Fulham. And Wolves have won more Premier League points against Fulham than against any other Premier League side. Yes, yes. I know Wolves are only experiencing their third Premier League season; one season […]

By Nick Harris 10 September 2010 Irony: snooker’s world No1 player cleared of match fixing but banned for six months and fined £75,000 for talking about betting, two days before the game’s governing body announces its latest tie-up with the bookmaking industry. In a statement on World Snooker’s website today, it is announced that the […]

JOHN ROBERTS wrote for the Daily Express, The Guardian, the Daily Mail and The Independent, where he was the tennis correspondent for 20 years. He collaborated with Bill Shankly on the Liverpool manager’s autobiography, ghosted Kevin Keegan’s first book, and has written books on George Best, Manchester United’s Busby Babes (The Team That Wouldn’t Die) […]

By Brian Sears 9 September 2010 After all the talk last season that Chelsea had an old team in need of freshening up, they won the title, scoring record numbers of goals in the process. So just as “you’ll win nothing with kids” turned out to be off the mark, a mature side shouldn’t be […]

8 September 2010 The former Liverpool manager, Gérard Houllier, who last worked in English football at Liverpool – with whom he parted company in May 2004 – has this evening been confirmed as the successor to Martin O’Neill at Aston Villa. Houllier famously led Liverpool to a cup treble in 2000-01, and after leaving Anfield […]

By Pete Wilson 8 September 2010 A parliamentary debate on football ownership today in Westminster Hall heard praise for the Manchester United Supporters Trust (MUST), which had lobbied so effectively that 632 MPs (97 per cent of the total of 650 MPs) had received letters from their United-supporting constituents in recent days. (Which must say something […]

The following statement has been released by the News of the World after the verdict in his ‘match fix’ tribunal. . Further to this, Barry Hearn, chairman of World Snooker told the News of the World: “It has been a difficult couple of months for snooker and an episode from which we need to learn lessons. […]

The following statements have been released by the WPBSA and Pat Mooney after the verdict in his ‘match fix’ tribunal. . WPBSA Statement A hearing under the auspices of Sport Resolutions UK on September 7 and 8, 2010, heard of charges which John Higgins admitted through his lawyers before the hearing. The charges were 1. Intentionally […]

The following statement has been released by John Higgins after the verdict in his ‘match fix’ tribunal. . STATEMENT BY JOHN HIGGINS 8th Sept 2010 I welcome today’s judgement by Sport Resolutions and endorsed by the WPBSA following their exhaustive enquiry into the allegations against me by a tabloid newspaper. I am pleased that Sport […]