Didier Drogba returned to his team in Lausanne after undergoing surgery for a fractured ulna (the inner bone of the forearm) in Berne. The Ivory Coast flies out this Wednesday to SA.

There are some doubts whether Drogba will be fit to start the first match against Portugal but his chances of resuming his World Cup thereafter have considerably improved.

The first thing I read that inspired me to write about soccer was Brian Glanville's "Story of the World Cup." My brother picked it up for me at a garage sale and wrapped it for Christmas, but it stayed unread on my bookshelf for a long time. Who wanted to read through a yellowed compendium of fifty year-old match reports?

After recovering from a 3-0 deficit to pick up two precious away goals in Berne, Tottenham will be looking to seal progress to the KO stages when they host Young Boys. The Young Boys vs Tottenham first leg game ended 3-2 in favour of Young Boys, meaning that a 1-0 win will do for Harry Redknapp's [..

This is the second in a series of posts entitled Best World Cup Player Of The Decade. Taking each decade in turn, the idea is to critically evaluate the teams and players before honouring one player for his performances during the tournaments.
The 1950s
Three tournaments were held in the fifties, Brazil hosting Uruguay's second win (1950), Switzerland West Germany's first (1954) and Sweden providing the base for our first glimpse of Pele (1958).

We hear a lot about the decline and fall of western civilization these days, but moral outrage at the behaviour of footballers is nothing new and, indeed, players at the World Cup finals this summer will have to go a long way to outdo the most serious incidents of player-on-player violence in the history of the tournament.

Ivory Coast & Chelsea striker Didier Drogba was injured in a World cup warm up match against fellow finalists Japan. The match was part of the preparation for the finals in the training camp in Switzerland.

Drogba who has the expectation of a nation weighing on his shoulders not has an injured elbow.

The World Cup In An Hour - History for busy people
A new iPhone / iPad app The World Cup In An Hour has been published. It summarises the history of the FIFA World Cup in just sixty minutes of reading.
As you watch the World Cup this year read the compelling stories of World Cups gone by, from the start in 1930 to today.

It is very early in the season to be throwing around footballing clichés like "do-or-die", "make-or-break" and "win-or-bust" but Tottenham's Champions League tie with Young Boys of Berne can be described as all three.
At stake over two legs is a place in the group stages of the prestigious competition, promising riches, glamour and glory to all those clubs who make it.

BSC Young Boys 3 Tottenham Hotspur 2 - UEFA Champions League, Play-Off, 1st Leg
Duke Berchtold V of Zähringen founded the city of Bern on the River Aare in 1191 and allegedly named it after a bear he had killed. It was made an Imperial Free City by the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick II in 1218 after Berthold died without an heir.

After the glamour of Tuesday night's European jaunt, it's the seedier side of this Champions League lark today, with our travel-weary heroes heading up north for a fixture that is not quite ideal. Still, if we are to progress in Europe we will need to get used to this business of returning to Premiership fare with a trip to less than entirely salubrious locations.

English club Tottenham will look to avoid being victims of the biggest upset of the UEFA Champions League playoffs when it takes on Young Boys Berne in the second leg of their series at White Hart Lane.

Young Boys posted a surprising 3-2 victory in the first leg, putting the pressure on Tottenham to show the form that helped Spurs finish fourth in the Premier League last season.

English club Tottenham will look to avoid being victims of the biggest upset of the UEFA Champions League playoffs when it takes on Young Boys Berne in the second leg of their series at White Hart Lane.

Young Boys posted a surprising 3-2 victory in the first leg, putting the pressure on Tottenham to show the form that helped Spurs finish fourth in the Premier League last season.

An incident in Thursday morning's Champions League playoff tie between Tottenham and Young Boys of Berne perfectly illustrated the utter fatuity of UEFA's "five officials" experiment, which has been extended to their premier club competition this year.
Ten eyes are better than six, the argument goes, especially when deciding on contentious decisions in and around the box.

By CARL ELDRIDGE Bill Gallas is poised to cross the big divide and join that lot and for me they are getting a class act but a flawed version given his sulky manner and tendency to throw tantrums.

Harold Redknapp clearly thinks he has another year of Premier League football in him but AW doesn't (or he does but was unwilling to pay the going rate).

FC Twente 3 Tottenham 3
The suggestion that Harry Redknapp 'wings it' when it comes to tactics has been thrown around the press and various forums recently, no doubt due to our Keystone Cops defending and rampant European goalscoring. The idea that he sends Spurs out with little tactical instruction and ample encouragement to 'f*cking run about a bit' has been growing in popularity and Tuesday's 3-3 draw away at FC Twente has been used to illuminate the theory.