There's a famous clip featuring comic duo Morecambe and Wise where their show featured a special guest, and on one particular week, that guest was renowned conductor Andre Previn. In the clip, Eric Morecambe sits at the grand piano and knocks out a tune, terribly as it happens, and draws criticism from Previn. Eric protests that he is playing all the right notes, but not necessarily in the right order. This sketch came to my mind this week as John Eustace tried yet another ri

I once had a boss who used to love to use the phrase 'it's a perfect storm' whenever the shit was about to hit the fan, usually after reeling off a list of all the factors that were contributing to the mire we found ourselves in at any given time. That phrase sprung to mind earlier today as I scrolled through some fairly suicidal posts on social media following Derby County's awful display against Swansea City. The contributors (of which there were many as you can imagine) we

Some things seem to be inevitable, death, taxes and Derby County being unable to progress in cup competitions. That was going to be the nub of this blog. How a club that attracts good support, has great facilities and can point to being a founder member of the Football League yet be so uninspiring in cup competitions and broadly unsuccessful in collecting silverware. One domestic cup semi final in 50 years. Woeful. I’d so many tales lined up of missed opportunities over the y

Cristiano Ronaldo (the version that strolls around the pitch these days) reminds me of my time playing football. I’d contribute next to nothing for the whole game, the odd flick here or there, notoriously didn’t get my kit dirty, then score a penalty and give the impression I’d saved the game for my team. That’s where the comparison ends, as invariably my Sunday morning manager would have hauled me off well before squad rotation became a thing. My retirement came as an unused

The World Cup is well under way now. Some talking points were to be expected; VAR of course, hydration breaks and the occasional upset or plucky effort. In the Uk we are so used to vilifying VAR, we rarely actually feel any sympathy for the people in the bunker of doom. So it was with some surprise that last night, in the France vs Senegal game, the Iranian referee (who I’m normally impressed with when I’ve seen him in the A League in Australia) bucked the trend of ‘he’s gone

The football World Cup is upon us. The men’s World Cup in fact. There seems to be a need to emphasise the ‘men’s element’ in the same way as emphasising the women’s T20 cricket World Cup. I’m not sure it’s entirely necessary as if you are a fan of either you’d surely know which gender is playing? And if it’s a casual watcher who has just happened to tune in then surely the aim is to encourage viewers regardless? Anyway I tuned in to the Mexican portion of the opening ceremony

Being overseas has the effect of latching onto all things English and there can’t be anything more defining of an English summer success story for English football fans than the World Cup final of 1966. Every two years ‘it’s coming home’. I rather think I will be coming home before football does. Like most, I’ve seen the Geoff Hurst goals many times, two of which would nowadays have VAR crawling all over them, but I have never seen the whole game, let alone in colour, and so

Good morning!! This is my first blog. My late father was an excellent sportsman, able full back in football, excellent left hand opening bat (represented his college and played 2nd 11 at Cambridge Uni) and this first blog is dedicated to him. He once shared digs with Sir David Frost hence the title of this initial entry (for those old enough to recall Sir David’s catchphrase!). Dad took me to my first football and cricket matches, taught me how to win and accept defeat, and m