Football

In all the years I have followed Fulham I have never renewed my season ticket with a heavier heart. Indeed even in the darkest days when we might have fallen out of the league altogether it would have been unthinkable not to renew. In those bleak days of the early 90s I was reassured that the board [...]

A month or so ago I was contacted by John Pargiter. It sounds treacherous but I was more optimistic of Juventus’ chances in the Champions League than ours in the Europa League. He duly backed Juve each way at 20-1 which is looking good as they defend a 2-1 lead in Madrid next Wednesday. Last [...]

There was tucked away in the ‘Slicker’ financial section of Private Eye an article on Fulham’s finances. It reported that Shahid Khan bought Fulham for £121m (not the £150-200m bandied about). The net assets of the Bermuda Company Big Cat Holdings, that were the vehicle for al [...]

Grudges and conspiracies live long in the Florentine soul. Perhaps it is to do with the historic rivalry of the Guelphs and Ghibellines. Nowhere is this more apparent than in the rivalry of Juventus who are derided as ” gobbi” (hunchbacks). This hatred is based on 3 factors: the sale to [...]

Here is a fact. At roughly the same time that Bournemouth, with 17 points docked for going into administration and in the bottom division, Fulham were a Premier side about to launch a Europa League campaign that saw us overcome Juventus, Shaktar Donetsk and Hamburg. So why – seven years on [...]

When I was a kid and became interested in football in the sixties, Charlie Buchan’s Football Monthly was required reading. It had big colour photos of our heroes but some interesting copy as well. Basil Easterbrook, a football writer for 35 years would recall great games he saw with a style [...]

Brighton’s defeat by Watford followed predictable form. We scuffed an early chance, the game became an attritional midfield battle which we might have won if we had a goalscorer. Watford did and broke the deadlock. We had better chances in the second half which we did not convert and Watford [...]

Yesterday I received my renewal package for my season ticket. The theme- spin would be a better word – was that Fulham is a “club like no other”: one of the attributes of this is is ‘resolve’. It’s a quality our defence might envy but does not possess; they have [...]

It’s now over 8 hours since Brighton scored a goal. Last night in one of the dullest football games I have ever seen there seemed precious little chance of a goal spectacular. The Seagulls hit the bar and post, once fortuitously, and that was the sum total of the excitement. I found myself [...]

I may make no bones about it that when Kit was made permanent manager I had deep reservations. However I’m not going now to say “Yah boo, I told you so” as I fully understood why the appointment was made. Kit had many things going for him. He was not Felix Magath but a popular [...]