Innehållsförteckning för September 2024 från FourFourTwo UK

Back in the summer of 2000, Florentino Perez became president of Real Madrid and set about making them the Harlem Globetrotters of the sport by signing the biggest and best names from Planet Football. He built a team that had the best player from France, and arguably best in the world, Zinedine Zidane. Among others, there were some Brazilians, Ronaldo and Roberto Carlos, plus England superstar midfielder David Beckham. While they were pretty on the eye, they won just two La Liga titles and one Champions League crown in Perez’s first tenure. The Spaniard was re-elected to the Santiago Bernabeu hotseat in 2009 and Real Madrid have enjoyed plenty of success during his second stint. Now, he’s building ‘the new Galacticos’ in a similar way to how he created the…

“THERE’S SIMPLY NO BIGGER GAME IN FOOTBALL. I WOULD HAVE PICKED IT REGARDLESS OF THE RESULT” Leverkusen 3-2 Gladbach December 19, 2009 Bundesliga “I’ll start with a game for Bayer Leverkusen, where I made my breakthrough as a professional. The club gave me the opportunity to show I belonged at the top level. I’ll always be grateful to Leverkusen for taking a gamble in loaning me as a teenager from Bayern Munich and giving me a platform. Before that move, people had spoken about me as a promising youngster, but proving that in the Bundesliga was what really mattered to me. I spent 18 months with Leverkusen as they helped me on my journey. I was thrilled to see them lift the Bundesliga last season. They were the best team…

“Good afternoon, everyone. I’m going to try to speak Spanish.” As ice-breakers go, Kylian Mbappe’s was about as well-rehearsed and effective as they come, eliciting a roar from the sun-kissed stands of the Santiago Bernabeu. After striding down a royal-blue catwalk leading to a stage in the centre of the pitch, Mbappe – flanked by club president Florentino Perez, the man who makes everything possible – delivered his coronation speech to 80,000 adoring Madridistas. “I spent endless nights dreaming about this,” he beamed. “Today, I’m one happy guy.” Tickets to the event had sold out two days in advance. Growing up on the outskirts of Paris, a young Mbappe had slept beneath posters of Cristiano Ronaldo on his bedroom wall; now he was standing in the same spot where his…

Three smart coaches decorated in Liverpool’s You’ll Never Walk Alone livery edge slowly into heavy traffic in the rain outside Columbia’s Williams-Brice Stadium. The Reds have just beaten Manchester United 3-0 in a college football stadium that boasts a larger capacity than Old Trafford and Anfield. Despite being staged in a South Carolina city with only 136,000 residents, well off the big-city track usually beaten by visiting European giants, it’s the only game to have sold out during Manchester United and Liverpool’s 2024 US pre-season tour, with 77,559 spectators inside the stadium to witness it. With a severe weather warning and thunderstorms threatening the game, there’s relief that it was played – soon after the final whistle, both English football giants are in a race to return to Manchester Airport.…

After 101 minutes of action at Wembley in May, referee John Brooks blew his whistle. Adam Armstrong removed his shirt, twirling it above his head as he charged off to celebrate with Southampton’s fans. It was the greatest moment of his career – he was the match-winner in the play-off final, sending the south coast club back into the Premier League. One problem, though: Brooks had actually blown for a foul to Leeds, not for full-time. Armstrong sheepishly looked around, put his shirt back on and moved back into position. “I went too early, didn’t I?” the striker laughs, recalling the moment to FourFourTwo. “I had looked at the scoreboard, we were past the amount of time the ref said he was going to play, then he blew his whistle.…

Edinburgh City’s 2023-24 relegation to League Two – conceding 98 goals in 36 games – was accelerated by a six-point deduction for failing to pay players. A club with an average gate of 447 was on the brink. Again. Drastic cost-cutting measures meant fan favourites had to go. July’s pre-season friendly against Broxburn Athletic had to be abandoned after supporters set off flares; others ended almost entirely in humiliating losses. All this on the back of a short-lived, unpopular name change, under the previous ownership to FC Edinburgh. So why the optimism around Meadowbank? Robert Fallon – fans’ representative and host of the unofficial Edinburgh City FC podcast – admits that he has found football fulfilment in the unlikeliest of places. In 1999, jaded by fellow capital club Hearts, he…

There aren’t many fans who legitimately need to weigh up if winning the National League South was a better moment than getting promoted to the Championship. But ask any Yeovil Town supporter which achievement they cherish more and you should expect at least a momentary pause. Ever since reaching the second tier in 2013 with a fairytale victory over Brentford, the Glovers have endured a decade of steady decline, not just slipping back into League One at the first attempt but falling all the way down into non-league a few years later. The final insult: relegation from the National League into the regional divisions in April 2023, a month shy of the 10th anniversary of their triumph at Wembley. It’s a story pockmarked with mismanagement, misery and missed opportunities. But…

Clive Tyldesley has invited FourFourTwo into his home in leafy Berkshire and, fittingly, a five-a-side football goal stands in the garden. “He does keepy-ups and I go in goal!” jokes the 69-year-old’s wife, Susan. “It’s purely for decorative purposes these days,” Clive explains – the couple’s four children are now adults and have moved out to pursue careers of their own. In the kitchen, there’s a pile of Tyldesley’s commentary charts, which he writes by hand for every game he works on. These days, he sends copies to the many people who order them online as souvenirs. Born in Radcliffe in northern Greater Manchester, Tyldesley knew as a child that he wanted to be a commentator. He has since been in the business for 49 years, starting out by covering…

If you ever start to feel like you’re trapped in a Mitchell and Webb sketch of ‘Constant, dizzying, 24-hour, year-long, endless football: the football is officially going on forever!’, get yourself over to Greenland. The European club campaign feels more crammed than ever, with an extended Champions League format and a league season of 10-and-a-half months in some countries – Romania’s top flight kicked off on July 12, 10 days after their national side were knocked out of the Euros, and usually finishes in the last week of May or the start of June. In Greenland, they had the whole season done in a week in early August – bish bash bosh, here’s your trophy lads, see you again in 358 days. Travel is near enough impossible, so there are…

A large banner runs across the length of Villa Park’s North Stand, emblazoned with the greatest moment in Aston Villa’s history. “Shaw, Williams prepared to adventure down the left,” it reads in block capitals. “There’s a good ball played in for Tony Morley… oh, it must be… and it is! Peter Withe!” Brian Moore’s hallowed commentary from the 1982 European Cup Final describes the goal that won Villa their only continental crown. That achievement puts the club on a pedestal alongside history’s greatest ever teams, despite having only ever featured in the competition on two occasions. Well, until this season, that is. A fourth-placed finish in the 2023-24 Premier League means Unai Emery’s men are the first Aston Villa side in 42 seasons to embark upon a campaign in Europe’s…

30 MARSEILLE There’s never a dull moment when Marcelo Bielsa is involved, as l’OM learned when the passionate Argentine led them into Ligue 1’s 2015-16 season. Marseille lost their opener 1-0 at home to Caen and Bielsa immediately resigned, saying, “I have completed my work here”. A tad dramatic? For him, not really. DID THEY TURN IT AROUND? Well… sort of. Marseille eventually finished 13th – their lowest league placing in 15 years. 29 BOURNEMOUTH Several clubs found themselves in a pickle at the start of the 2008-09 League Two season: Luton were docked a whopping 30 points while Rotherham and Bournemouth were deducted 17. The Cherries looked doomed to non-league after winning just three of their first 18 matches, but then they appointed a first-time boss by the name…

XI BEST: Adriano Basso, Bradley Orr, Adam Webster, Aden Flint, Joe Bryan, Marvin Elliott, Alex Scott, Albert Adomah, Niclas Eliasson, Tammy Abraham, Nicky Maynard. WORST: Stefan Marinovic, Nicky Hunt, Adam El Abd, Taylor Moore, Brendan Moloney, Tyreeq Bakinson, Henri Lansbury, Hakeeb Adelakun, Ryan Kent, Lois Diony, Rodri (not that one). PLAYER B: It just has to be Alex Scott (right). As the chant goes, he is wonderful, and, once he gets the ball, it is beautiful, and magical. W: Lots. Lucky dip? Nicky Hunt. MOMENT B: Hands down, it’s Korey Smith’s late winner against Manchester United in the League Cup quarter-final in December 2017 (right). Sold-out Ashton Gate, under the lights, against a Jose Mourinho side. That moment will stay with me forever. W: Dean Windass, the Championship play-off final…

THE BEAUTIFUL GAME DRONING ON Canada’s women’s team were lambasted for using drones to film opposition training sessions at the Olympics, deducted six points as a result. Thankfully this drone was launched for rather less underhand reasons, simply to take some pictures of random five-a-side matches. Very pretty. Photo Richard Newstead/Getty “HELP, I’M TRAPPED!” Kadidiatou Diani may be one of France’s leading strikers, scoring regularly for Paris Saint-Germain before joining Lyon last summer, but that didn’t stop her being attacked by her own hair during the Olympics. The braids picked their moment, then pounced, temporarily blinding Diani in Les Bleues’ victory against Colombia. Photo Olivier Chassignole/ AFP/Getty ON THE VOLLEY Wolves got into the Olympic spirit themselves while away on a pre-season training camp in Marbella – many Brits head to the…

​​01 Dennis Bergkamp (right) had a famed fear of what: spiders, snakes or flying? 02 Which Championship side have a bee and a beehive on their badge, taken from the coat of arms of their city/town? 03 How many players have scored more than 200 Premier League goals? 04 Which superstar became Real Madrid’s biggest sale when he made a surprising move to Juventus? 05 Which of these Glaswegian stadiums is the largest by seated capacity: Ibrox, Celtic Park or Hampden Park? 06 Who was the last Italian player to bag the Ballon d’Or? 07 In what country were Germany’s 2000s strike partnership Miroslav Klose and Lukas Podolski (right) both born? 08 Which legendary player was nicknamed ‘King of kings’, became the UEFA Cup’s all-time top scorer and also had…

BARCELONA 2010-11 CHRIS FLANAGAN SENIOR STAFF WRITER @CFlanaganFFT What do you get when you combine the greatest player of all time with possibly the greatest manager of all time? That’s right: the greatest club team of all time. Never was that proven better than the Champions League final of 2011. If Brazil’s 1970 World Cup Final win over Italy was the finest performance ever delivered by an international team, the finest club display surely came at Wembley 13 years ago. Barcelona were already decent when they won the Champions League in 2008-09, Pep Guardiola’s first season in charge. That season, Sergio Busquets, Xavi and Andres Iniesta combined to tiki-taka Europe into submission, in an era when they were also busy helping Spain to win three successive tournaments. The Blaugrana also…

EXTRA QUALIFYING SPOTS HAVE GONE TO SURPRISE PACKAGES, AS BOLOGNA AND BREST MAKE DEBUTS MORE TEAMS For the first time since the 1998-99 season, the Champions League proper will not begin with 32 clubs. Back in 1999, the competition expanded from 24 teams; this year, it has increased again to 36. So, where do the four extra teams come from? There was one extra place available via the qualifying rounds, while the two best-performing countries in European competition last term each received another spot. England had an unexpectedly poor season on the continent – Aston Villa were the only Premier League club to reach a European semi-final – so those places went to Italy and Germany. This meant that Borussia Dortmund, Champions League runners-up in 2023-24, qualified despite finishing fifth…

Cafu couldn’t believe his ears. He had just been introduced at half-time by Carlo Ancelotti to play his final 45 minutes in a Milan shirt, as he bid farewell to Rossoneri supporters in May 2008 following five seasons at San Siro. It was then that he heard the question that still shocks him to this day. “What are you smiling about?” referee Roberto Rosetti asked, while showing the veteran right-back a yellow card during Milan’s 4-1 win over Udinese. It took a few seconds for Cafu to fully understand what had confused Rosetti – after all, a broad smile had been his trademark during his stunning career. He once said that if it were up to him, he would live on a football pitch. “Without a smile, I’m a dead…

How did the move to Lincoln happen, from Leeds United’s backroom staff? Long-term, I always wanted to get into management if the opportunity was right, but I was really conscious how that’d happen, who it’d happen with, and when, because it’s a tough world to go into. Lincoln needed to fit me and I needed to fit Lincoln. It took quite a bit of time, which I liked, because they were doing due diligence. Lincoln and [director of football] Jez George do lots of digging on players and staff to make sure they’re the right fit. We had good conversations with the board on the club’s future and then you’re in the building, playing Saturday, Tuesday, Saturday, Tuesday, which is a bit different to the pathway I’ve been on. Was…

Former West Brom, Cardiff and Stoke forward Peter Odemwingie, who also turned out for Lille and Lokomotiv Moscow on top of brief EFL stints at Rotherham and Bristol City, tended to change his clubs regularly. His infamous antics at the end of the 2013 winter transfer window – in which he set up camp outside QPR’s Loftus Road ground and refused to budge (unsuccessfully) until a potential move from the Baggies went through – proved he’s never been afraid to take risks, either. Now, he’s combining both passions. Five years after officially calling time on a career that yielded 65 Nigeria caps, appearances at two World Cups, four AFCONs, an Olympic silver medal and 144 goals for club and country, he’s swapped one ball for another to become a professional…

The ex-midfielder on boozy FA Cup celebrations, Manchester City’s rise to the summit and mixing it with the elite at Lyon… When you were making your breakthrough as a teenager, at Everton and Birmingham, how difficult was it to establish yourself in the first team at such a young age? Being a youngster in those first-team environments wasn’t easy. There were times when I’d get in the car and cry to my mum on the way home because you’re in with the big dogs. The game has changed a lot now – there’s more support and the environment is very different – but you were sort of fed to the lions as a youngster. You’d get kicked in training; people wouldn’t like that you were talented. But that’s just the…