Melting pot

By Nick Harris 5 May 2014 It was self-evident in the 2012-13 Premier League that Queens Park Rangers provided their owner with the worst value for money. He spent many tens of millions on buying players and many tens of millions more on paying their wages. And they were ignominiously relegated anyway. But precisely how […]

* WHEN GFH Capital, a Dubai arm of Bahrain-based bank GFH, bought Leeds United in December 2012, executives including Salem Patel appeared on national television to assure the fans his company had the funds to take Leeds places. Patel said on the BBC (link here for video): “We wouldn’t have bought this club if we didn’t […]

. At the end of the 2010-11 Turkish football season, Fenerbahçe were crowned champions after finishing with the same number of points (82) as title rivals Trabzonspor, but with a better head-to-head record. But Turkish football was soon rocked as it emerged Fenerbahçe’s success was a result of one of the most devastating match-fixing scandals the game […]

By Alexandra Willis in Melbourne “Does Wimbledon have an extreme heat policy?” It was a perfectly innocent question. But if you’ve ever been to Wimbledon, you will understand why it was an amusing one. Rain delays, rather than heat delays, are a fact of SW19 life. The skies darken, the clouds let rip, the court […]

* By Ian Herbert 22 December 2013 The sign on the exterior wall of the building where I started out in this business, on a September morning 24 years ago, has not kept up with the sad diminution of the paper which became a rich part of my life for a decade. “Liverpool Daily Post […]

By Lizzy Ammon 12 December 2013 If you were to read the UK newspapers, you’d be forgiven for thinking that England have already handed the urn back to Australia. It’s not quite that bad as England prepare for the Third Test in Perth that starts tomorrow (Thursday night, UK time). Two down with three to […]

By Ian Herbert 12 December 2013 There won’t be any great sentiment for footballers who are banned for illegal betting but the small details of the case of what we might call the “Accrington Five” does reveal why one of the root causes of match fixing – the players need for some ready cash – […]

  * By Jonnie Baker 6 December 2013 Anticipation is obviously reaching fever pitch over the unspeakably complicated group-stage draw for the 2014 Fifa World Cup (TM), which hasn’t been obsessing too many people at all. Certainly not to the extent that anyone would come up with a draw simulator, like the one linked here, […]

By Lizzy Ammon 4 December 2013 So sledging raised its head again, as it does with boring regularity, following Michael Clarke’s audible “get ready for a fucking broken arm” jibe to Jimmy Anderson. The consensus is seems to be that sledging is fine as long as it doesn’t “cross a line” but where’s the line? […]

* By Jonnie Baker 28 November 2013 Andre Villas-Boas is fighting to keep his job. I know this is the case because everyone says so. It’s everywhere you look, and, according to the DM, failed Roma manager Luis Enrique is already in the box seat to replace him. And replace him Tottenham surely must. After last season’s […]