Innholdsfortegnelse for April 2025 i FourFourTwo UK

X @JamesAndrew_ E james.andrew@futurenet.com Five months on from the announcement of his appointment, Thomas Tuchel will finally walk out at Wembley for his first match as England manager this month. Only 15 men have previously held the prestigious position on a permanent basis, and for Tuchel, his raison d’être is clear: he’s there to win the World Cup. Tuchel has lifted silverware in each of his last four jobs, so the FA will be hoping he can land the biggest trophy of all in New Jersey next July. But before dreams of glory in America can start, England have to qualify first, – his journey as boss begins against Albania and Latvia. We assess the job that the German has in front of him, and speak to those in the…

01 Ronaldinho (right) starred for how many European outfits? 02 What is the highest-ever score in an FA Cup final? 03 Which ground has statues outside of ex-England managers Sir Bobby Robson and Sir Alf Ramsey? 04 What bird would you find on the badges of Benfica, Lazio, Eintracht Frankfurt and the Nigeria national side? 05 True or false: Arsenal and Spurs both lost Champions League finals in European capital cities. 06 Who is the only manager to have been inducted into the Women’s Super League Hall of Fame? 07 Which player was the last to seal the trinity of winning the Ballon d’Or, European Cup/Champions League and World Cup? 08 Newcastle have lost seven straight games at Manchester City and not scored a single goal – who was the…

@markwhlte SIR BOBBY ROBSON To measure managers simply by how far they went in tournaments is akin to judging songwriters purely by reading their lyrics. It neglects a story. It reduces John Lennon to 4,000 holes in Blackburn, Lancashire. Sir Bobby Robson’s contribution to English football is far more than a World Cup semi-final, a quarter-final, and club triumphs either side, from Suffolk to Sporting. He reignited these shore’s passion for football New Order-style, long before Atomic Kitten. Without Sir Gareth’s rich depth of playing talent, too. Sir Bobby had considerably less to work with. Not a single player in the 1986 World Cup squad came from champions Liverpool, with English football in the doldrums, banned from European competition and caught between Hoddle and Barnes eras. This was the impossible…

Andres Iniesta cried himself to sleep on his first day at La Masia. Fourteen years later, he beat depression’s grip on the biggest stage of all. In his own words, he tells FFT how Leaving my family at 12 years old was one of the hardest things I’ve ever experienced. Above all, I felt fear. I was leaving my tiny hometown, Fuentealbilla, and I was going to be alone in Barcelona, five hours by car to the north. My first night at La Masia was tough for everyone, including my family. I couldn’t stop crying, and my father wanted to come and take me back home. Luckily, my mother changed his mind. We had to give it a try. I never thought about having to return to Fuentealbilla if I…

Watching a Sampdoria game evokes grainy television images of European nights and great champions. It awakens memories of the club’s unforgettable 1991 Scudetto and its heroes. Gianluca Vialli with his impertinent smile and laughing eyes, Roberto Mancini’s proud gaze and ever-perfect quiff, plus David Platt, Attilio Lombardo and Ruud Gullit. It also brings to mind the Serbian former coach Vujadin Boskov, whose malapropisms such as “Gullit is like deer coming out of forest” kept plenty entertained, and president Paolo Mantovani, the man who took the team to domestic and European glory. Sampdoria, however, have long been none of these things. Their decline began with the death of Riccardo Garrone, club sponsor during the golden years, as CEO of oil firm ERG, then president of the club until his January 2013…

To the outsider, Blyth Spartans paint a bleak picture. In 2024, ownership changed hands not once but twice, and barring a miracle that would stretch the wildest imagination of even the most optimistic supporter, a second successive relegation will plonk them in the eighth tier of English football. The club’s 125th year could easily have been its last. Instead, recently appointed chairman Kevin Miles insists Spartans are experiencing “rebirth”. “Yes, it’s difficult because we’ve got to do this financial reset,” he tells FFT. “But there is a lot of positivity and optimism about the place.” Words can be empty in football, but not with Miles. As well as being a Croft Park regular since the 1960s, he is chief executive of the Football Supporters’ Association. His priority is the fans.…

Football’s road to success has never been well signposted. Transfers that appear to be no-brainers can turn into nightmares. Others that fail to get the pulse racing can catapult a player into the big time. Nothing is guaranteed. Nathan Ellington wasn’t sure which path he was taking when he agreed to join Wigan Athletic from Bristol Rovers back in March 2002. The Latics had been an established third-tier side since JJB Sports founder Dave Whelan had bought the club seven years earlier, but in a town where rugby league ruled, the JJB Stadium hardly felt like the centre of the footballing universe. “It seemed a decent enough move to a club one division higher, but you can never be sure,” the former marksman, 43, tells FFT today. “But after I…

Every club has that one shirt which is widely considered to be their greatest. There is a clear example in my mind for Liverpool: the 1989 home. You already know the flecked triangular pattern and prominent Candy wordmark before you have to Google which strip I’m referring to. Arsenal can boast many solid offerings but the bruised banana kit ticks every box, despite the widespread criticism that it received on release. There’s a reason we still see everything from pillows to curtains to pyjamas bedecked in the same yellow and black motif. As with Arsenal, arguably the most cherished Newcastle jersey of all time is an away one. The colours are immediately evocative, the sponsor is incredibly nostalgic and the collar is truly one of the wonders of the football…

LEICESTER…?! WEAR THE FOX HAT LEICESTER, ENGLAND Seven points from 11 games wasn’t a great start for Ruud van Nistelrooy at Leicester, but a fan aimed their protest at director of football Jon Rudkin. Choosing between classic Nigel Pearson insults, he opted for the ostrich quip, rather than “f**k off and die”. Pic Catherine Ivill/AMA/Getty “MEEP, MEEP!” BARCELONA, SPAIN Exactly how quick is Kylian Mbappe? Way too quick to be captured by standard camera equipment, that’s for sure – though we did get slightly suspicious that witchcraft might be at play when Espanyol defender Carlos Romero was depicted as a Road Runner blur, too. Pic David Ramos/Getty WELCOME HOME BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA Gonzalo Montiel started his career at River Plate before scoring Argentina’s winning penalty in the World Cup final while with…

The beautiful game. We love it for the drama, entertainment and tribalism. But the humour, the mischief-makers and the pettiness also play a big part in what makes football so fun. When Myles Lewis-Skelly celebrated his goal in Arsenal’s 5-1 thrashing of Manchester City, he mimicked Erling Haaland’s meditation pose [below]. It was a targeted response to the Norwegian’s comments aimed at the youngster earlier in the season. It added another playful layer to the bad blood that’s developed between the two teams amid their rivalry in recent title races. What was clearly intended as a cheeky dig has somehow fuelled a serious debate about whether or not it should be acceptable. The Premier League had their say, suggesting that there is a need to monitor goal celebrations, and that…

Thousands of jubilant Nottingham Forest fans had gathered in the city’s Old Market Square when Reds owner Evangelos Marinakis took to the microphone, a club scarf draped around his neck. As he stood on the balcony of the former town hall, below him was a banner saying simply: ‘WE ARE PREMIER LEAGUE’. A day earlier, the former European Cup winners had beaten Huddersfield Town at Wembley to end 23 years outside the top flight. “From the very beginning, this was not an investment for me – it’s a passion for football,” Marinakis told the crowd. “This team belongs in the Premier League. We’ll give the ammunition to the manager to be very competitive. The sky is the limit. “I come from Greece, and Greece has a big history, but sometimes…

You don’t have to be over 60 to know about Alfie Conn, but one look at any picture of the Scotsman in action will carbon-date his heyday firmly to the 1970s. Shirt hanging outside his shorts, long, curly hair flowing over his collar, huge sideburns plus a moustache to die for – Conn was the epitome of a rock ’n’ roll footballer during an age when the Bay City Rollers and the Faces were riding high in the charts and fashion trends on Top of the Pops translated to the terraces. At Tottenham back then, one fan was seen wearing a white butcher’s coat with “Gilzean is King of White Hart Lane” written in blood: a unique tribute to the club’s Scottish forward, Alan Gilzean. In 1974, Gilzean was replaced…

XI BEST: Tomas Cerny, Alan Archibald, Liam Lindsay, Stephen O’Donnell, Harry Milne, Stuart Bannigan, Chris Erskine, Stevie Lawless, Scott Tiffoney, Brian Graham, Kris Doolan. WORST: Cammy Bell, Max Melbourne, Danny Devine, Lee O’Connor, Gabriel Piccolo, Darian MacKinnon, Jake Hastie, Jamie Barjonas, Mitch Austin, Mathias Pogba, Lewis Mansell. PLAYER B: Kris Doolan, 121 goals. Simply magic. W: Goalkeeper Cammy Bell dropped lots in his short time with us, and put in the worst individual performance I’ve seen in a 5-1 defeat against Greenock Morton. MOMENT B: We’ve won just two cups, in 1921 and 1971. I wasn’t around for either, so I’ll go for James Craigen’s winner against Morton at a packed Firhill in 2013. It all but won us the First Division title. W: Alan Archibald played more than 400…

The FA Cup record holder amassed 94 England caps during an inspirational career in which she juggled football with the upbringing of her three children What was it like to start in an FA Cup final at 14, with Millwall – and win it? It gave me the hunger. I liked the feeling of winning trophies! I didn’t start playing until I was 11, so my career picked up quickly as I had the chance in the senior team at 14. It was about determination, for me. If I’m doing something, I want to practise, practise, practise. I can’t do things half-arsed; I have to be good at it. You became a full-time pro at 18 with Fulham, helping them from the third tier to become champions of England… Yeah.…

Two sportsmen were given the nickname ‘Air’ during the late 1980s and early 1990s: Michael Jordan and Karl-Heinz Riedle. At 5ft 10in, Riedle was significantly shorter than the basketball and Space Jam star, instead earning his moniker through his impressive aerial ability. The striker was part of a German squad that reached back-to-back major finals, lifting the World Cup in 1990 before losing to Denmark at Euro 92. Following a spell alongside Paul Gascoigne at Lazio during Serie A’s heyday, Riedle’s personal highlight came in 1997, when he scored twice to help Borussia Dortmund defeat Juventus in the Champions League final. Today the 59-year-old works as a global ambassador for Dortmund, representing the club at matches and at events further afield. He speaks to FourFourTwo after travelling to Singapore to…

MONACO 0 SOCHAUX 0 French First Division, 1989 “My debut, aged 18. Monaco had a huge game in Europe that week and were fighting for the league title, with 12 or 13 players injured. They didn’t have enough players, so Arsene Wenger brought me from the academy. He came to watch a game on Sunday morning, then said, ‘From tomorrow, you start training with us’. I never left the first team after that! On my debut, I played as a centre-back, marking Stephane Paille, who played for the national team. It was a massive test for me, Sochaux were one of the best teams in France back then, but we drew 0-0 and I was named man of the match.” WERDER BREMEN 2 MONACO 0 Cup Winners’ Cup Final, 1992…

Life comes at you fast if you’re San Marino. At the start of September, the microstate had won precisely zero competitive matches in their history, in no fewer than 179 attempts. They have now won two of their last four… and could be only two games away from reaching the 2026 World Cup. It’s hard to tell exactly how much of La Serenissima’s emergence as Europe’s form team has been down to their own improvement, and how much was down to Liechtenstein being hopeless. Both of San Marino’s wins came against them in the UEFA Nations League, when they also drew with Gibraltar to improbably top their group and secure promotion. That’s given them a genuine shot at a place in the World Cup play-offs, with their fate to be…

@AdamClery To assert that Nottingham Forest’s season is ‘panning out unexpectedly’ would be an understatement on a par with saying owner Evangelos Marinakis is ‘hard to miss’. He is enormous, and imposing, and impressive, and slightly terrifying… but so too is his Reds team. Under boss Nuno Espírito Santo, Forest haven’t simply kicked on from avoiding the drop last term, they’ve been making Manchester City, Aston Villa, Chelsea and Newcastle thank the good lord above that there’s probably a fifth Champions League place. As well as being surprising, it’s also baffling. The lowest average possession in the league, the second worst average shot distance, 15th on total xG, 13th on total attempts on goal, bottom for the number of attempted and completed passes. Those are numbers of a team scrapping…

Burton were 23rd in League One when you took over in December. What were your thoughts going into the job? It was a fantastic opportunity. I’d been out of work since I won the Scottish Championship with Dundee. I’d missed out on a couple of jobs in League One, turned down several offers in England and abroad, then I got this chance and, after speaking to the people here, I saw it was exciting. I already knew one or two, which made it much easier to settle in. Everybody’s been working together to try to get us out of the bottom four. How would you assess it so far? We evaluated the squad and tried to make them harder to play against. With January approaching, we had to identify players…

The Brazilian full-back remembers phone calls from Cristiano Ronaldo, issues with Louis van Gaal… and being mistaken for twin brother Fabio on the pitch You and Fabio left Brazil as teenagers in 2008 to sign for Manchester United. How did that deal come about? We were in the Fluminense youth team and took part in a tournament called the Nike Cup. That’s where United scouts discovered us. We were considering their offer when I got a phone call that I’ll never forget. It was on one of those old Nokia flip phones. This British number was calling – I answered it and it was Cristiano Ronaldo! I was only about 15 years old – it was crazy. He told me and Fabio that it only rained in Manchester but that…