After several years of success the likes of which the club hadn't seen for three decades or so, it has been a difficult couple of months for all involved with Brighton & Hove Albion. Promotion into the Football League Championship and moving into a new stadium was followed by consolidation in the second tier, a couple of cup wins against Premier League opposition and, last season, a run of form that took the club into a play-off places with a sense of belief that a return to the top flight of English football was on the cards for the first time since 1983.
Relegation from the Football League at the end of last season was a bitter blow for the supporters of Aldershot Town Football Club, but it hasn't taken long for it to start to feel as if even this was only the beginning of the the club's problems. It took less than five days from this demotion being confirmed for the club to placed into administration, but the release of the administrator's report at the end of last week by Quantuma Restructuring, the company appointed by club director Michael McGinty to manage the administration, have shown the financial condition of the club to be worse than had been widely anticipated prior to their release.
It was noted at the time of the Dream Football League fiasco, in which a journalist from The Times newspaper was hoodwinked by the odd combination of a French football website and a fantasist with a chequered past over a non-existent story about the oil-rich of Qatar creating a super league paying absurd amounts of money to the biggest club sides in the world, that it was entirely possible that this story was likely to make somebody, somewhere start stroking their chin and wondering if this wasn't something that they could make a reality.
The mental image of football's administrators as ossified relics from a bygone age is a familiar one. Hidden away in oak-paneled boardrooms that are stained with the musty scent of decades worth of cigar smoke, they twirl their walrus moustaches whilst passing judgement, always ensuring that their own personal fiefdoms remain untouched by too much change.
If you were to look for a microcosm of everything that is wrong about English insolvency law in the twenty-first century, you couldn't find a much better example than the short period in administration of Coventry City Football Club Limited. A company which owed money effectively to itself put the company into administration, therefore getting their choice of man in the job.
There was a time when football clubs would either play in the same design of football shirt for years on end. This, however, wasn't making anybody any money so in recent years football kits have increasingly started to resemble showbusiness events, with moody photographs of players standing in front of gritty urban backgrounds with their arms folded and a scowl on their faces.
The summer in a year that ends in an odd number can leave us all twiddling our thumbs for a few weeks. Here's Mike Bayly on how this time of year can cause so much grief and anguish to those who slavishly follow football throughout the rest of the calendar.
The front cover of John Williams's book ‘Red Men: Liverpool Football Club – The biography', carries the image of a small child holding a football whilst looking reverently at the Anfield Gates.
It is turning out to be another eventful week for the put-upon supporters of Coventry City Football Club. It has only been four days since our last update on the subject but enough has happened since then to warrant it, with further developments over the last couple of days only further clouding waters that had in recent weeks already become so muddy as to be practically impenetrable.
It is turning out to be another eventful week for the put-upon supporters of Coventry City Football Club. It has only been four days since our last update on the subject but enough has happened since then to warrant it, with further developments over the last couple of days only further clouding waters that had in recent weeks already become so muddy as to be practically impenetrable.
We're heading towards the middle of football's twilight zone. It's an odd number year, so there are no European Championships or World Cup to raise the blood pressure we are left twiddling our thumbs, marveling at the nonsense that is fifteen year old boys pretending to be agents on Twitter and wondering whether Confederations Cup might not be so bad after all.
We're heading towards the middle of football's twilight zone. It's an odd number year, so there are no European Championships or World Cup to raise the blood pressure we are left twiddling our thumbs, marveling at the nonsense that is fifteen year old boys pretending to be agents on Twitter and wondering whether Confederations Cup might not be so bad after all.
Three years ago, Bradford City supporter Jason McKeown told us the story of his club's lost decade. Last season, however, the Bantams came back, and here's Jason again on a most extraordinary season for his club.
I can remember the exact moment when the song ‘Feel the love'by Rudimental changed in my mind from run-of-the-mill drum and bass chart hit to one of the greatest songs of all time.
Three years ago, Bradford City supporter Jason McKeown told us the story of his club's lost decade. Last season, however, the Bantams came back, and here's Jason again on a most extraordinary season for his club.
I can remember the exact moment when the song ‘Feel the love'by Rudimental changed in my mind from run-of-the-mill drum and bass chart hit to one of the greatest songs of all time.
It may feel a little as if there is a yawning chasm of a summer ahead of us, but there are actually only eight weeks left now until the start of the new season in the Football League. Bearing this in mind, it is understandable that supporters of Coventry City Football Club may be starting to wonder whether their team will actually be able to begin next season at the moment.
It may feel a little as if there is a yawning chasm of a summer ahead of us, but there are actually only eight weeks left now until the start of the new season in the Football League. Bearing this in mind, it is understandable that supporters of Coventry City Football Club may be starting to wonder whether their team will actually be able to begin next season at the moment.
