Introduction
Editor’s Note – Jonathan Wilson
Jonathan Wilson’s Editor’s Note from Issue Two
Le Blues
Font of all Knowledge? – Matt Spiro
The Clairefontaine academy was once the envy of the world, but has it gone stale?
What Makes a Nation? – Philippe Auclair
The recent French race furore ignores the diversity of France’s footballing culture
Interview
Dragan Stojković – Andrew McKirdy
Dragan Stojković on his philosophical similarities to Arsène Wenger, his lost years and Japan’s development
In Argentina
Óscar Bravo – Jonathan Wilson
How Óscar Washington Tabárez led Uruguay to Copa América glory as Argentina and Brazil misfired
La Historia de los Piñeyros – Rupert Fryer
A fictional account of one family’s experience of the 1978 World Cup
The Media
The Man who Said it was Magnificent – Rob Smyth
Barry Davies relives some old memories and discusses the state of modern commentary
The Man who Made Calcio – James Horncastle
How Gianni Brera shaped the language and style of Italian football
The Man Who Ate His Hat – Scott Murray
The story of Lieutenant Commander Tommy Woodrooffe, the BBC’s first football commentator
Back From the Brink
Football to Remember – Uli Hesse
How Borussia Dortmund returned from the verge of extinction to win the Bundesliga title
Theory
Wenger, l’Auteur – Miguel Delaney
What Francis Ford Coppola, Michael Cimino and the Hollywood of the seventies tell us about Arsenal
Brazil and the Rise of the Back Four – Rob Sweeney
How foreign influences led to the evolution of the back four in Brazil
Italia 90
A Sentimental Journey – Gabriele Marcotti
The 1990 World Cup as experienced by a teenage Italian
Polemics
Is Football Still Sport? – Rory Smith
It unfolds like a soap opera for the entertainment of millions and the profit of a few. What has football become?
Too Fast, Too Furious? – James Grossi
Why have so many creative players suffered such dreadful injuries in the MLS this season?
Football Manager
The Ballad of Bobby Manager: My Autobiography (Part Two) – Iain Macintosh
When somebody takes their game of Football Manager just a little too seriously…
Greatest Games
St Étienne 3 Dynamo Kyiv 0 (aet) – James Horncastle
European Cup quarter-final second leg, Stade Geoffroy-Guichard, St Étienne, 17 March 1976
Eight Bells
Finals Before the Final – Jacob Steinberg
A selection of eight games that really shouldn’t have been wasted on the earlier rounds
