The England captaincy debate over John Terry is missing the point

So it's confirmed. John Terry is to return to the England captaincy after "one year of punishment" for his alleged indiscretions with the former partner of an international teammate.

Over the past week, as the media speculated that Fabio Capello might be about to do this, a lot of people have been coming out in support of the idea. Some said that Terry has paid his dues and duly noted that most other England footballers aren't exactly angels either. This is a fair point. Others have expressed frustration at the way the armband has been handed around almost randomly during Terry's captaincy hiatus, particularly in the friendly against Denmark last month, when the armband changed hands (or should that be 'arms'?) three times during the match. And then there are those who have put forward the argument that the armband doesn't matter and that this whole debate is pointless anyway. 

It is not. An England captaincy is still a position of great import - regardless of the sport. Andrew Strauss in cricket, Mike Tindall in rugby; these guys represent more than an on-pitch hollerer-in-chief. They are by a distance the most important ambassador in the squad; they embody the values of their sport. By having John Terry as England captain we send out a message that a guy who is entering the twilight of his career, who has already been part of several failed England sides of the past and who evidently endorses hounding referees as exactly the sort of man we want in charge of our national team. Gee, that's some progressive thinking.

But even more importantly - and the reason the Terry decision depresses me more than any other that Capello has made - is that we should be looking to the future now, especially after such an abject World Cup when we realised that the 'Golden Generation' was actually a damp squib. Reinstating Terry smacks of desperate short-termism. The fact that most of you are reading this paragraph and shouting "I don't need you tell me this!" just illustrates how blatantly obvious it is - England must do this. 

I think we can all agree that the best two teams at the World Cup were Spain and Germany - two countries that have clearly set out to nurture young players and help them grow. Spain are obviously far further into this development process and it has already borne fruit with two trophies in succession. Germany's time will come again soon and few people will be surprised.

Barring some sort of Greece-like, backs-to-the-wall, anti-football miracle England are not going to win the 2012 European Championships. We should just accept this now. Capello should be ordered to face up to this by the FA, rather than be allowed to make decisions for the now, decisions that are designed to protect his own position. After all, he won't be around for the World Cup in 2014. 

People will argue the very reasonable point that if Rio Ferdinand is too injury prone, who else but Terry? Sadly we are still a couple of years away from the answer to this question (the answer being Jack Wilshere, of course), but for the next two years I would give the armband to a player that conducts himself in the right way on the pitch (that rules out Wayne Rooney) and who will almost certainly still be in the first team for the duration of the next two years. This leaves us with one realistic option: Joe Hart. I'd give it to Hart - a steady, calm presence and one who looks set to play a big part in England's future. Make Hart captain from now until Euro 2012, involve our most crucial young players in the squad regardless of whether they will play or not (so Josh McEachran, Chris Smalling, Kyle Walker and the such like), and rather than be distraught by a quarter-final outclassing from a Germany or Spain, instead revel in watching our young charges grow in maturity. They might just become men a little ahead of schedule.

In England today, youth lasts longer than it did for our parents' generation. In the sixties and seventies, if you were in your early twenties, you were a 'man'. These days it seems manhood doesn't even begin until you're at least 25. But this slow maturation process is depressingly out of kilter with the mechanics of the human body. If we cannot consider players as 'men' until their mid-twenties, then we only get a few short years of them at their mature peak. We still mollycoddle Theo Walcott like a shy 16-year-old. He's 22 - one year older than Tony Adams was when he became Arsenal captain in 1988 - and should be capable of looking after himself now. Bobby Moore was England captain at 22.

Two more years of John Terry at the helm. Fabio really had better hope he delivers now.

As soulless as football can be

A trip to Arsenal's Emirates Stadium and a free seat in the corporate tier for their FA Cup replay with Leyton Orient turned out – perhaps unsurprisingly – to be one of this writer's least enjoyable evenings at the football

First, let's get one thing clear. I am not anti-Arsenal. I have no agenda against the club, manager or most of the playing staff. In fact, I probably like Arsenal more now than I have ever done. As a child I found them dull as dishwater and, as a result, vaguely disliked them in much the same way that I now vaguely dislike Stoke. You know that joke about children snapping one arm off each of the back four of their Arsenal Subbuteo team and gluing the arms back on the other way up – as if claiming an offside decision? That was my favourite joke as an 11-year-old. These days, they play admirably beautiful football, and while they have obvious flaws, I can at least gain plenty of pleasure from watching Arsenal. This is something my childhood self would never have thought possible.

But yesterday evening I had perhaps the dullest, most lifeless, anodyne football experience of my life. I'm struggling to think of a worse one. I guess the only consolation was that I did not pay for it. But, in a way, my free ticket did not help.

I was sat with the prawn sandwich brigade in the middle tier. And it wasn't even my employer that was paying for it. Another company with an interest in maintaining a good relationship with ours was footing the bill. In short, you could argue that I was one of the most freeloading corporate tossers in the whole stadium. But the difference was, the other freeloading corporate tossers were all there to watch Arsenal turn on the style; to see a Nasri or a Wilshere massacre a lowly Football League minnow and toy with its carcass. I was there in the hope of seeing something special, namely Leyton Orient making a fight of it and giving Arsenal a fright. The others got what they were baying for. Arsenal scored early and quickly killed the game as a contest. I got precious little, bar enormous respect for the Orient fans who were sat directly below me in my legroom-tastic middle tier.

As the second half started with the score at 3-0, the Orient fans were still in very fine voice. A boy sat near me, who looked for all the world like a younger Jack Wilshere, couldn't get his head around this. Surely these silly fans of such a comparably terrible team should be slumped in their seats? "Oi! Shut up Orient, you're crap! We're smashing you three-nil!" His parents seemed to think this was fair comment and continued to gaze gormlessly ahead.

As the strange mix of genuine fans and freeloaders around me lapsed into chatting about work, Barcelona and last night's telly, Arsenal won a penalty. I knew this because I'd heard the whistle and seen the referee point to the spot. But the fans didn't react to winning it. There was no cheer at my end of the stadium at all. They either didn't realise or didn't care sufficiently to emit any sort of noise. Yes, they cheered as the delightful Nicklas Bendtner duly completed his hat-trick, but it was more of brief "wa-heey" than anything else.

Bendtner had previously scored two first-half goals down in front of us. If I was in any doubt as to his character, his pointless goading of the Orient fans on netting his second did little to improve my mood. Classy behaviour from a man who ranks himself among the world's best. Having been in celebratory mood to this point, the Orient faithful suddenly had their backs up. A boo for Bendtner preceded a hearty and very salient burst of: "Four-nil and you still don't sing!". This chant echoed around an increasingly listless stadium.

"Stand up for the Orient," they sang, as eight or nine thousand away fans got to their feet and applauded. With the game now put to bed, surely this was the Arsenal fans' chance to acknowledge the efforts of Orient who'd played so brilliantly to force a replay in the first leg? Nope. I scoured the stands looking for Arsenal fans showing any sort of appreciation. I spotted one solitary fellow stand up and offer a clap in their direction. That was it. One guy.

Bemused and perhaps a little hurt, the Orient fans had had enough. They knew they deserved better than this. It was time to give the Gooners a quick jab in a painful and tender place. "Two-one to the Birmingham!" came the chant.

Clichy thumped in a decent fifth to complete what should have been a confidence-boosting rout for Arsenal. But surely a big part of rebuilding the side's confidence would be a standing ovation at full-time, in the hope of giving the team a lift before they head off to Barcelona? Instead, three quarters of the Arsenal fans had left by the 88th minute. The final few minutes were played out largely bereft of home fans, while the Orient contingent continued to sing.

I realise this was probably quite a different sort of home crowd to a regular league game. Some Arsenal die-hards might have given this fixture a miss for financial reasons, and that is more than fair enough. But Arsenal still had 50,000-plus in attendance last night, and only a fraction of those were freeloaders like me. Surely the lion share were Arsenal supporters of some description? Those in the regular seats did not seem to be enjoying it very much, nor did they seem interested in playing their part in rebuilding their side's dented confidence.

As the final whistle sounded and the players left the pitch, my fellow prawn-munchers and I filed out through our executive lounge area towards the stairs. At this point, I spotted a series of paintings depicting Arsenal legends. I couldn't resist taking a snap of the painting of Tony Adams. I've seen lamp-posts that look more like Tony Adams than this.

Bottom left: Tony Adams (apparently)

While I'm fully aware that I was on a hiding to nothing in hoping to see Orient pull off a shock in this game, once Arsenal took control it turned into a football experience that summed up much of what seems to be wrong with the game at the moment. I'm not telling you anything you don't already know of course – just providing a little snapshot of the game's ills in microcosm.

Phil Collins and the Genesis 'Match Of The Day' song he'd rather you forgot all about

I suppose Phil Collins was always going to write a football song really. After all, he's a man of the people, an earthy Chiswick boy made good. He's the plucky drummer that stepped into the breach when Peter Gabriel left Genesis and Collins took over on vocal duties.

So dedicated to serving his public in musical form is Collins that he famously performed in both London and Philadelphia during Live Aid in 1985 - the unselfish act of a generous man, and in no way a publicity stunt to make him appear to be the most do-goody of the pop star do-gooders that day, far better than that idle Geldof fella who just lounged around in London all day. I'm sure Collins travelled economy class on Concorde as he dashed off to give the Philly folk their Phil fill.

Yes, there can be no denying that the Genesis frontman is a multi-talented instrumentalist and singer, not to mention creatively dexterous enough to have pulled a few (surprisingly non-Oscar nominated) acting performances out of his bag of tricks over the years, all while still supporting his beloved Tottenham Hotspur, generally loving his football and being an all-round folk hero. A fair assessment, no?

So given that we've established Phil's credentials as a suitable man to pen a football song for the masses, what in the name of Subbuteo is this?

There have been an abundance of terrible football songs over the years, but this has an earnest quality to it that makes it all the more offensive. How cheap does that keyboard riff sound? I keep expecting John Shuttleworth to pipe up with a burst of "Austin Ambassador Y Reg". And in saying this, I worry I might offend John Shuttleworth...

And why does Collins keep going so high-pitched on the vocals? Like tomato in a shop-bought sandwich or casual racism at the barber's, there are certain things we shouldn't have to put up with, and Phil Collins singing up an octave is most certainly one of them. He sounds like Vinnie Jones has got him by the goolies.

And then there's the lyrics. It's a ludicrously naff attempt at conveying the passion and commitment of a football match. And he does rather focus on the negatives, doesn't he? Was this song co-written with Barry Davies? You suspect that Phil doesn't really like football that much, he just likes having a good old grumble. He's certainly not fond of referees - slating officials is a common theme of the lyrics, with the idea of kicking one to death even getting an airing at one stage. Much of the rest is gibberish and barely makes sense. I've posted the full lyrics below for you. Take a moment to pore over them as you listen to the song. They are ludicrously bad from start to finish, but my personal highlight is this:

"There's a few things before we go
That I think you ought to know
Obstruction, body checking, heavy tackles"

I like how he sets this up as if he's going to give us some insider knowledge, something that will enrich our lives or keep us safe from harm - and then he just lists three more things he doesn't like about football. Thanks for the handy hints, Phil.

The following quote was supposedly made by Phil Collins on his internet forum in November 2004: "Match Of The Day... no video was done for this as far as I can recall... but I am weak and my limbs are frail.....etc. Etc. It was also not our finest hour looking back at it now!!! I wrote the embarrassing lyrics and the track featured an attempt to bring some of the hipper grooves of the day into Genesis, with very suspect results."

Hipper grooves? I think what we can take from this is that there definitely was a video for this song, but that it has been lost in the annals of time. There's an internet rumour that one was filmed on the terraces at Loftus Road. Does anybody have any further information? If anyone has a copy of the video, put it on Youtube - you will be a hero.

As bad as this song is, if one thing is telling, it's that Collins doesn't even touch on MOTD in terms of punditry or commentary. Because, as I have written about more thoroughly recently, it was much more about the football action in those days.

It's 1977. The kids are growing tired of radio-friendly pop and bookish prog. Something is brewing. Punk rock is about to whip them up into an angry, glorious frenzy. You'd like to think this song was something of a tipping point.

Collins: touched by genius? (Feel free to
insert your own 'Invisible Touch' gag here...)

LYRICS
Genesis - "Match Of The Day"
Released on "Spot The Pigeon" EP, 1977.

There's the Reds and there's the Greens
Super slicks and has-beens,
They're accompanied by three men dressed in black,
One's a whistle, two are flags, and quite often they're the drags
Kick the ball into the goal, they put it back.

Yes Match of the Day's
The only way, to spend your Saturday

Each side's eleven men, with numbers on their backs
But at a distance they all tend to look the same
But some own their boutiques, well they clean up every week
Inciting riots, causing chaos, such a shame!

But Match of the Day's
The only way
We spend our Saturday

And that's not all, our mates the keeper
Slippin' and sliding in the mud
Arms as long as creepers

Send him off Ref'
Where are your specs Ref'?
We'll kick you to death Ref'
Oi! Are you deaf Ref'?

There's a few things before we go
That I think you ought to know
Obstruction, body checking, heavy tackles
So put on your hat and scarf
Have a drink, have a laugh
From the terrace you can see your men do battle

Yes Match of the Day's
The only way
You can spend your Saturday

Don't forget, the trainers with their sponges
Managers with open cheques, liquid business lunches

Send him off Ref'
Where are your specs Ref'?
We'll kick you to death Ref'
Oi! Are you deaf Ref'?

...Phfff! Good game 'ey, Ron?...
...D'you see that goal in the second half? Cor!...
...Bit of a dirty tackle that, mate!...
...I reckon that should've been a penalty myself...
...We paid £400,000 for him, d'you realise that?...
...Ooh, look out, here comes a bottle...
...Yes, fancy a pint then? My round...

Brian Moore and 'The Big Match'

The release of a DVD archive of the best moments from ITV's 1970s and early 1980s football programme The Big Match offers a treat for those old enough to remember it the first time around, and for the rest of us, a glimpse into an era when football really was all about the football, and not about vast sums of money, image rights and WAGs. And at the centre of this feast of proper football is one of the true gents of sport - the late, great Brian Moore

***

Those of you who are, like me, born after the 1970s will probably only be familiar with Brian Moore as a commentator. For the duration of the 1980s and 1990s Brian Moore was the consummate football commentator – passionate yet professional, with a vocal range that went from a gruff, excitable roar [think Michael Thomas’s title-winning goal for Arsenal at Anfield in 1989, heard from 6mins 50secs here] to beautifully understated, often letting passages of play elapse commentary-free until there was something that needed saying. An example of him letting the football do the talking comes here as Norman Whiteside scores an FA Cup-winning goal in 1985 - simple and succinct, but very effective. Most television commentators say too much, as if the game is on the radio and we can't see it. No need to fill every second of airtime with noise. 

What The Big Match lacked in style, it made up for in substance

But before my time Moore was also a football anchor for ITV, fronting their coverage of The Big Match alongside Jimmy Hill and - for a time - Brian Clough as well. I'd seen bits and pieces of this classic football show, and it all looked charming and entertaining, if rather low-budget compared to today's high-tech efforts. But my interest was piqued when I was sent a review copy of a DVD entitled The Big Match: The Best From The Studio. This sat around the house for a bit until I finally had a free evening to sit and watch it. It's no exaggeration to say that I became completely lost in it's rather geeky, retro charms.

The footage turned out to be an absolute joy; a fascinating glimpse into the football world that existed just before I was old enough to notice. The is very much a no-frills compilation. No new footage, no director's commentary, no bonus features, no accompanying documentary - it's just a bunch of clips, arranged in logical clusters that you select from a main menu. You can't even 'Play All'. To all intents and purposes this is not designed as a typical entertainment product; rather it is an archive, a time capsule, a nerd's paradise.

There's so much to enjoy here and most of this blog will be devoted to telling you of some of the delights to be found on the DVD. But before I do, it's important to stress that while the footage is truly memorable, it is an absolute pleasure to see so much screen time of Brian Moore talking about football. I miss Brian. He was always my favourite commentator. Better than Motson. Better even than the brilliant Barry Davies in my opinion. He brought warmth and energy to every game he commentated on - and he very much stuck to commentating. Davies would get on his high horse about topical issues of the day (hooliganism, England being awful, etc), while Motson could be a bit anecdotal and bring himself into the commentary rather too often for my taste. Moore just commentated on the game he was watching. That was his job. He did it perfectly and professionally. Even if you aren't too bothered about some of the footage on this DVD, it's still a pleasure to watch Moore at work. Right, onto the action.

JIMMY FANCIES HIMSELF AS A REF
We start with a section looking at 1970s refereeing and the laws of the game, something of a labour of love for Jimmy Hill (blissfully unaware of how unevenly trimmed his beard is) and his one-man quest to right all of football's wrongs. We see footage of controversial moments, Hill's suggestions for rule changes to improve the game, debatable bookings (or 'name-takes' as Jimmy insists on calling them). He's irked that the FA are meddling with things, and not the right things; they're trying to fix something that, in his opinion, isn't broken. "We should be on top of the world. Our teams are winning in Europe. I don't see why we should be committing hari-kari in this way," he offers.

We're treated to footage from the occasion when a referee was injured and Hill, a spectator that day, had to step in as an emergency linesman at an important game. You've probably heard about this incident but it's illuminating to see so much footage of it. There is a wonderful look on Arsenal manager Bertie Mee's face as he realises that, yes, Jimmy Hill really is going to be running the line. Hill, anxious that viewers might think he did it because of an enormous ego, stresses: "In order to be an efficient linesman, I had to fade into the backcloth. I wasn't there to entertain people, I was there to do a job of work."

Moore reads Hill a letter sent in from a Mr G Iyson, chairman of a Bristol refereeing association, who is convinced that Rodney Marsh was offside when he scored the previous week. At this point ITV show a replay - no clever angles, just the regular footage, and Hill rather easily demonstrates that Marsh is clearly onside. Case closed. G Iyson shamed.

IT'S JIM ROSENTHAL! HE'S YOUNG! HE'S GOT HIS OWN BIT!
Up next we have Jim Rosenthal's News Desk, a compilation of quirky news features run in this section of the show during the early 1980s. The finest of these profiles two ex-Chelsea stars Peter Osgood and Ian Hutchinson playing for their local non-league side Spital Old Boys and running a pub together. The lads, puffing quite a bit, are interviewed on the touchline at the full-time whistle. Rosenthal asks them about the pub. Turns out it's a really grotty looking place called The Union Inn. They show a still of it. Yuck. "Peter looks after the bar and I look after the catering side," says Hutchinson. I doubt this had the viewers flocking there in their droves.

Fresh-faced Jim

Among the other highlights in this section are Fred Dinenage getting chucked in the bath at Bournemouth and a brief snippet of footage of a bouffant Glenn Hoddle out on his bicycle as he tries to regain fitness after an injury. Hoddle is huffing and puffing along, the bike creaking noisily as he does so.

VIEWERS' LETTERS: BETTER THAN TEXTS AND EMAILS
The segment of the DVD dealing with viewer correspondence is perhaps the best stuff of the lot. When reading out each letter, Moore's house style for crediting authors is remarkably thorough in the detail. "This letter's been sent in from a Mr W E Aveling of 93 Cedar Road, Strood in Kent", he says. What? You've told the nation where this poor sod lives, Brian! Imagine this nowadays. There'd be rude daubings all over the guy's house within half an hour of Match Of The Day finishing.

One letter comes from a puzzled Australian viewer enquiring what the strange pitch-side alphabetical hoardings are, that he's seen during televised games. We learn that the letters correspond to fixtures in spectators' matchday programmes, and the numbers indicate the half-time scores in those games. Another viewer asks, "Where are the Spurs double-winning side now? ITV have prepared a board (yes, a physical board, not on-screen graphic) to answer this one, and they run through the whereabouts of each player in turn and what they do for a living now. Alongside more typical entries like "football coach" and "lives in Toronto" are a few more notable ones. Bobby Smith is, rather vaguely, involved with "buying and selling", John White died tragically after being struck by lightning on a golf course, and Maurice Norman, wonderfully, now runs a knitwear shop in Frinton-on-Sea. I doubt you'll see any current Premier League players treading this path in the years to come.

We're treated to a peculiar tale of a cow invading the pitch at a game, breaking a goalpost and causing the rest of the game to take place with a spectator holding the post up. There's some video of hirsute Norwich striker Dave Paddon scoring powerful free-kicks in much the same way as Cristiano Ronaldo 'pioneered' at Manchester United. A couple of younger viewers have written in too. One asks how to prevent getting blisters from football boots (again, imagine Alan Shearer dealing with this sort of query now), and he is given an insight into how Clough does it at Derby County, ie. force your players to sit with their feet in a trough of surgical spirit. We even see a photo of David Nish undergoing this ordeal - necessary precautions because "Nish's feet are worth a few bob". The other young lad to write in asks if The Big Match can please re-run the clip from last week of a policeman falling over because his sister "laughed so much it made her cry".

Finally, rounding off this section, we get some cracking footage of German goal machine Klaus Fischer practicing overhead kicks in a crash-matted penalty area, complete with Brian Moore's purring over the beauty of the slow-motion replays, followed by scenes of The Big Match presenting Brian Clough with a birthday cake in his office at Nottingham Forest. A dopey-sounding Peter Shilton does the honours with the cake, showing some subtle signs of coercion as he does so:

Shilton [with cake]: "I've got to... err... I've been asked to present this to you."
Clough: "Give over! From Brian Moore? It doesn't blow up does it?"
Shilton [cogs visibly turning]: "Uhh, I don't think so. It better not do. It's his fault if it does."
Clough: "Give us a kiss!" [pecks him on the cheek]

***

GOLDEN GOALS
No need for me to say too much on this section, it is simply a compilation of goal-of-the-season competitions played one after the other. There are dozens of absolute corkers, but just a few personal highlights to whet the appetite: Bobby Kerr for Sunderland v Birmingham in 1972, smashed in from a cross a la Paul Scholes against Bradford about 10 years ago; Chris Garland scoring against Spurs for Chelsea in 1972 - worth a look for the way the crowd on the terrace swell forward en masse as it goes in; Don Rogers goal of the season from 1973, scored against Stoke while looking pretty damn awesome in a white Palace kit with solitary red and blue stripes down the centre. Rogers, wearing 11, gets one gold digit on each stripe. This (pictured below) looks undeniably cool; Brian Bason scoring for Chelsea against Carlisle in 1976, notable for the fact that he's down injured in the build-up, but picks himself up and, despite a severe limp, wellies in a rocket.

Don Rogers scoring for Palace in 1973, wearing a rather nifty shirt

BACK IN TIME
The regular 'Where Are They Now?' segment on The Big Match was probably even more interesting to 1970s viewers than it would be to us now. I for one am always fascinated to learn what random players of the 1980s, say Vince Hilaire or Ian Crook, are up to these days. Multiply that by five for viewers in a pre-internet age - it's not a service Rothmans has ever provided, sadly.

The format seems to be: get a letter from a viewer wondering where some old boy is now, track him down, get him to pose for some awkward photos, show the photos one-by-one on the telly while saying what he's been up to. There's some belters in here too. Former Swansea forward Trevor Ford is now "sales director of a prosperous car dealership in Merthyr Tydfil" and is apparently saddened that he remains Wales all-time top scorer, something he puts down to the fact that "centre forwards these days just aren't prepared to get hurt in their quest for goals".

Then there's former Brentford keeper Joe Crozier, now director of a lighterage company, with a fleet of tugs and barges to his name. There's a cracking shot of him standing on one of his barges and pointing at nothing in particular, but the best photo is the one from his playing days. How wonderful is this photo? The panic-stricken facial expression, the ball that looks less like a football than any you've ever seen, the fact that he appears to be screaming "Nooo!". It's slightly like Patrick McGoohan fleeing from the big orb in The Prisoner, only in reverse.

Meanwhile there's ex-Portsmouth man Norman Uprichard, who now works behind the bar in a student union; old Spurs forward turned newsagent owner Len Duquemin, who these days has to leave Spurs games early, in time to get back to his shop and sell the evening sports papers; and what's this - yes! - it's Maurice Norman. They've tracked him down to his wool shop. They've got photos! Natty cardy, Maurice.

ANNUAL RETROSPECTIVES
The DVD wraps up with a couple of Year In Review features, where they look back on the footballing year just past (1970 and 1971 are included). A clear highlight in this section is Malcolm Allison's thrilling argument live on the show with Alan Mullery. They don't hold back, saying exactly what they think of each other. It largely consists of Allison informing Mullery that he's not as good as he thinks he is, and that he doesn't have any pace. Mullery generally takes this abuse while doing lots of facial expressions like this, before having a pop back. It's compulsive viewing.

There's also footage of Eusebio taking penalties against Gordan Banks (he scores nine out of 10); a player colliding with the goalposts at Swindon and breaking them - quite a dramatic thing to witness; some cracking footage of a packed early-1970s Kop in full voice at Anfield; and Banks again, this time making 1971's Save Of The Year from a penalty in the League Cup semi-final against West Ham. What's most noticeable here is that some of the West Ham team can't look as the taker steps up. Imagine any Premier League team caring that much about the League Cup now.

And that's it. A superb two hours of the sort of football - and coverage of football - that tends to be sadly lacking today. Coverage that focuses purely on the game, diverting only for any aspects of mild humour around it, all glued together by the most tremendous of football men that was Brian Moore.

***

Fittingly, not wanting to cause a fuss, Brian Moore passed away the same night that England thrashed Germany 5-1 in Munich. His death was largely overlooked by the media - a tragedy almost as great as the fact that he was never included in any Queen's Honours List. However, if any good came of this, it is that it's as if Brian never really died. He lives on in his magnificent commentaries and in his gentlemanly presentation style on The Big Match.

The Big Match: The Best From The Studio is available for £9.99 from Tikabooson.com

A moment from Football Manager last night, starring Connor Wickham and Emile Heskey

I ruddy love Football Manager. And the 2011 incarnation is the best yet. This is for a multitude of reasons, among them the new 3D game engine, fans jumping up and down on the terraces, improved realism and much-improved tactics and training. But one of the biggest leaps forward is that you can actually converse with your players now. Admittedly, this is crudely done using a multiple choice system, with your player then reacting to your desired comment based on the intricacies of their in-game personality.

I'd been trundling along nicely as manager of Lewes. Two promotions in three seasons and sitting pretty in the upper echelons of League Two. [Does League Two have echelons? Maybe that great sporting word 'reaches' would have been a better choice?] Anyway, I was loving life at Lewes but the main problem was that my puny ground sold out its 500 seats and all space on the terraces every game. I needed a bigger ground if I was going to take the club further. But the board wouldn't even consider it. Good FA Cup runs had meant away days at Manchester City and Sunderland in successive seasons - so there was plenty of money in the bank. In short, I had perhaps taken Lewes as far as I could.

I remember Chris Mann, aka '@equaliserblog', tweeting a while back that after several seasons on Football Manager with Dynamo Dresden it had "got a bit tiresome", and he'd started again with a bigger club. Or, as he succinctly put it, he decided to "go and win some stuff". Having hit a similar wall myself, I decided to have a bash with Aston Villa. Always quite liked the Villa. There's lots of reasons why: my brother supports them, so do a few mates, I like the colours, Shaun Teale played for them, Big Ron, they used to be sponsored by a yoghurt and so on. Time to turn them into a Champions League force, I thought.

Part of the plan would be to do it with a good smattering of youth. I wasted little time in snapping up some promising young players in the shape of Tom Cairney (Hull), Connor Wickham (Ipswich), Gary Deegan (Coventry), Sebastién Pocognoli (Standard Liége), Jordan Spence (West Ham) and Lee Hodson (Watford). Chuck the experienced striker Liedson (Sporting Lisbon) and CSKA Moskow keeper Igor Akinfeev into the mix and I was all set for an exciting season.

Then I asked Emile Heskey to tutor Connor Wickham.

This seemed like a fail-safe idea to me. Sure, Heskey's not the most prolific of strikers, but what budding young England prospect - dubbed on the game as "the new Alan Shearer" no less - wouldn't want to learn from Big Emile's movement and hold-up play? Clearly the Football Manager 2011 incarnation of Connor Wickham only thinks of glaring misses and terrible goal-to-game ratios when he thinks of Emile William Ivanhoe Heskey.

I've pasted the transcript of my virtual conversation with Heskey and, subsequently, Wickham below. For some reason the cold, stark frankness of the exchange made me laugh out loud. I don't know if it will tickle you to the same extent as it did me but, y'know, it's good to share these things...


Yes I think you better had, Emile.

Top 10 most improved Premier League players of 2010/11 so far...

It has thus far been one of the most unpredictable and captivating Premier League seasons to date. Yes, this league has its faults and is overrun with greed, but matters on the pitch remain jolly good viewing for the most part, with some standout performances. This article picks out a top 10 of the most improved players so far this season. To qualify, players have to have played in the Premier League before 2010/11 - because of the difficulty in comparing, say, Peter Odemwingie's form for West Brom this season with his form for Lokomotiv Moscow last term. So, here goes then, in ascending order...


10) Rafael, Manchester United 
This has been the season where Rafael has really made the step-up and claimed the United right-back slot as his own - sporadic Gary Neville horror-show cameos aside. A bustling, energetic presence up and down the flank, Rafael has been a huge factor in United's recent knack of picking up points while not playing brilliantly. Some naivety remains, as evidenced by his red card against Tottenham, but he's positionally better and stronger in the tackle than before. Imagine how good he'll be when the transformation is complete - not to mention if brother Fabio turns out to be a late bloomer...

9) Joey Barton, Newcastle United
It pains me somewhat to have to include Barton in this list. I cannot stand the guy and don't think football has a place for his brand of callous nastiness. Yet if I'd left him out, this wouldn't have been a credible list. He may have disgusted us all on numerous occasions with his behaviour, but he has been just as vital a component in Newcastle's recent success as the more widely heralded Andy Carroll. Finally, for perhaps the first time since Stuart Pearce's reign at Manchester City, we are seeing Barton's range of passing. His eye for a defence-splitting pass is up there with the best in the league, both from central and wide positions. He has flourished on Newcastle's right in a similar way that other tucked-in wide midfielders such as Mikel Arteta have done in previous seasons. 

8) Ben Foster, Birmingham City
I was guilty of moreorless writing Foster off as a goalkeeper with the potential to play for a Premier League club. My concerns began in March 2007 - during Foster's otherwise pretty impressive loan stint with Watford - when he allowed an 80-yard punt from Spurs keeper Paul Robinson to sail over his head and straight in. Since then he had looked shaky whenever he came into the Manchester United side, almost as if he found it hard to mentally prepare himself at short notice. But this season he's finally looking like the player people said he was. It wouldn't have been easy to follow in the footsteps of Joe Hart's superb loan spell at Birmingham last season, but Foster's managed it, and is the Blues' player of the season so far by some margin - even if you were to take into account his recent League Cup shocker against West Ham.

7) Matt Jarvis, Wolverhampton Wanderers
When Wolves came up into the Premier League, all the talk was of their bright, exciting young winger that was potentially going to terrorise a few opposition full-backs. They were talking about Michael Kightly, of course. But while Kightly has been blighted by injury, Jarvis has flourished away from the spotlight. Several decent performances last season played their part in helping Wolves to retain their Premier League status. But this season, with Kightly still nowhere to be seen, Jarvis has become Wolves' key man. Able to play on both sides, go either side of a player, cross, shoot and work his little socks off, Jarvis is the kind of player fans warm to. Random fact: both of his parents were professional table tennis players, don't you know.

6) Alex Song, Arsenal
Song and Arsenal are a perfect fit. It wouldn't be right if a side of Arsenal's daintiness had an out-and-out 'water carrier', ala Makelele, Tiote or Deschamps. I had a spell of observing Song regularly when I used to go and watch Charlton and he was on loan. You could see he had bags of ability, but he was prone to moments of dopiness or losses of concentration. Last season, with a prolonged run in the Arsenal team, he seemed to cut a lot of these out, with the one downside being that he stopped being remotely creative, settling on giving Arsenal some solidity in the centre. This season, growing in confidence, he's rediscovering his propensity to make inspirational bursts forward and give the team a kick up the backside when they begin to stagnate. Arsenal still have a tendency to be flakey, though perhaps less frequently as Song continues to bloom. 

5) Danny Welbeck, Sunderland (loan)
The sprightly Welbeck looked instantly promising the first couple of times we saw him in Manchester United shirt in 2008, even scoring on his Premier League debut. But back then he seemed to have a touch of Ian Wright about him - a striker with some swagger, a predator that would score some great goals. That's looking less accurate lately, as we see him blossom into a hard-working, dangerous player cutting inside from the wing. When Sunderland have played well in recent months, Welbeck has tended to stand out. When you've got workrate and goals in your locker, you'll always to be a hit with the fans. And Sunderland's will not want his loan spell to end. 

4) Johan Elmander, Bolton Wanderers
Surely the most surprising entry in this list. If you'd had to pick 10 players that might appear in this list when the season started in August, you certainly wouldn't have gone for Elmander. For so long derided as a poor bit of (£8.2m) business by Gary Megson, the bulky Swede has found his feet under Owen Coyle - perhaps because Coyle's brand of football means that he receives the ball to said feet a little more frequently than under Megson. And those feet are pretty nifty at times. His what-the-heck-just-happened-there goal against Wolves this season is perhaps the best strike from inside the penalty area for several seasons in the Premier League. He now needs a second half of the season to match the first half, and Bolton could find themselves in Europe.

3) Luka Modric, Tottenham Hotspur
When Modric joined Spurs from Dinamo Zagreb in 2008, a lot of people were excited at the sort of impact that the stand-out star of Slaven Bilic's talented Croatia side might have in the Premier League. Perhaps the one reservation was whether a player so slight of build would be able to handle the energy and physicality of England's top flight. They needn't have worried - the inspirational midfielder has proved that he can mix it with the best of them, and buzzes around the field for the entire game, rarely tiring noticeably or needing to be withdrawn (at time of writing, he's completed 15 consecutive 90 minutes in the league). Much fanfare has been devoted to Rafael van der Vaart and Gareth Bale for 'taking Spurs to the next level' this season. Modric deserves every bit as much credit as those two, he just doesn't score enough goals to hit the headlines as often. But Andrea Pirlo's record of a goal every nine games for Milan is only slightly better than Modric's one in 11 for Spurs - and that hasn't stopped people praising him to to hilt during his time at the San Siro. Plus, I've a sneaky feeling Modric might start to add a few more goals to his repertoire soon, as he takes advantage of teams doubling up on Bale and Van der Vaart. Then perhaps he'll get the widespread acclaim he fully deserves. 

2) Leighton Baines, Everton
I didn't see this one coming either, I must admit. If you'd been surveying me on my level of caring at the news of Baines' omission from the World Cup squad - in favour of Stephen Warnock, no less - I'd have taken my time deciding between "d) Only slightly" and "e) Not at all". Put bluntly, Baines did not cover himself in glory last season. For the most part he looked an ordinary left-back, prone to getting dragged out of position and leaving his centre backs exposed. This season he's significantly more solid at the back, and an absolute menace down the flank when Everton are in possession. His energy levels, hunger to receive possession and top-quality crossing have made him a rival to Ashley Cole as the league's best left-back this season. At times, Tim Cahill's had to do little more than keep his eye on the ball to score a headed goal, so peachy have Baines' deliveries been - seven Premier League assists and counting. The challenge for Baines now is to do this consistently, for the rest of his career.

1) Samir Nasri, Arsenal
Occasionally during Arsene Wenger's reign as Arsenal manager, a player that had been going about his job reasonably well will all of a sudden find a new level of performance. It's happened with Henry, Van Persie, Eduardo, Song, Gilberto Silva - and no doubt Wenger's banking on it happening with Theo Walcott as well - but Nasri's progression from one season to the next is arguably the most pronounced development seen by a player within a single season in Wenger's entire time at the club. Last season Nasri looked a tidy player, with a dash of guile and a penchant for the odd crucial goal. This season he's outshone even Cesc Fabregas in Arsenal's midfield to become the Gunners' key man in many games. Nine Premier League goals by New Year's Day indicate the contribution he has made - with six of those goals earning Arsenal extra points in the process. The only surprise is that he has just one assist to his name so far, perhaps because he is the one getting on the end of flowing moves, rather than setting others up. How many times have we seen Nasri burst into the penalty area this season to trap a through ball and get his shot away? Answer: plenty. And hopefully we'll see him do it a lot more in the second half of the season, because it's a fine sight to behold. 

Honorable mentions: Chung-Yong Lee (Bolton), Anderson (Man Utd), Stewart Downing (Villa), Phil Bardsley (Sunderland), Robert Huth (Stoke), Kevin Nolan (Newcastle) and Seamus Coleman (Everton) - as well as Gareth Bale (Tottenham), Nani (Man Utd) and Nemanja Vidic (Man Utd) who, while they've kicked on slightly, do not make this list on account of being so good last season too.

On recent Football League dismissals...

I've written a guest blog for the good people over at twofootedtackle.com. With six managerial sackings already in the Football League this January, and a whole load more in December, I've looked into why this is happening. As part of this I spoke to League Managers Association chief executive Richard Bevan - probably the busiest man in football this week - on the changes the LMA are trying to implement with regard to educating club chairmen.

Please take a look at the piece. If you have a view on what's been a controversial time for the Football League, please leave your comments at the bottom of the article itself: "Sacking silly season in the Football League".