“WE’LL SEE BEAUTIFUL days kids, we’ll see sunny days.” This isn’t the kind of song you’d expect to hear chanted at a football game, let alone by one of the most respected groups of ultras in the world ...

There is one man who towers above the rest when it comes to the uncomfortable entwining of football and politics: Zvonimir Boban. The former AC Milan midfielder enjoyed a richly successful club career ...

The history of football is often told as one of the great sides emerging before slipping away and passing that mantle to others. Despite that, there had been something crushingly perfect about ...

Few things generate frustration among supporters quite like poor refereeing decisions. When the man in the middle appears to be giving everything in your opponents’ favour, it normally results in ...

GOOD FOOTBALL TEAMS require direction and leadership. The captain functions as the on-field general, rallying the troops in the heat of competition. The manager is really the captain steering the ship ...

With the exception of Prato, whose digits have been greatly inflated by Far East Asian immigration in recent decades, there’s just one name amongst the 23 most populous cities in Italy never to have ...

Santana had joined Flamengo shortly after the World Cup but his reputation was faltering after a difficult few years which saw him fail to establish himself at Fluminense and Palmeiras. He signed a ...

The 2002 World Cup in Japan and South Korea was a tournament of shocks and surprises, with a touch of genuine quirkiness thrown in for good measure. Never before had European audiences been treated to ...

The legendary Dinamo Kyiv side marshalled by Valeriy Lobanovskyi was widely viewed as a precise, scientific machine with clearly-defined roles. But there was one spark that stood out amidst the ...

The year is 1872. Ulysses S. Grant is elected president of the US, Yellowstone becomes the world’s first national park, and the first case of Horse Flu is reported in Toronto, Canada, which will ...