Next a terrific guest contribution from Nick Johnson, who you'll remember from his articles in the Fulham Review.

For most Premier League clubs mere survival is the name of the game. While all but a select few know that sooner or later the axe will fall, the risk is generally higher for newly promoted teams.

A Nigerian player that burst onto the Serie A scene in 1999 has finally turned his back on European football after twelve years of trying to establish himself. Here's Paul Grech with the story of Hugo Enyinnaya.

"I'm going to be rich!" was the typically honest reply of Antonio Cassano when asked what went through his mind after scoring a fantastic goal against Inter as a 17 year old, upon making his first start for Bari in 1999.

Last week, in the wake of England's heroic (cough) win against Spain at Wembley in what can only be described as the friendly international to end all friendly internationals, we took a look at a few matches from their past in which the national team had managed to pluck a result from somewhere against a decent team, but failed to capitalise upon it.

It was only from my Facebook feed that I came to know today's significance.
Twelve years ago today, Singapore football mourned the loss of one of its best players - Borhan Abu Samah aka "Russian Tank".
Known for his tough and uncompromising tackles during his days, the former Lion, who once ply his professional trade with the great Pahang side in the Malaysian League that featured the likes of Fandi Ahmad, V Sundramoorthy, Dollah Salleh and Zainal Abidin Hassan, succumbed to liver cancer that ended his life at the age of 34.

The year is 2018, Italy is a nation in chaos, shaken to it's foundations by the leaking of documents proving that for the past twelve years Leonardo Araujo has been single-handedly running the FIGC. The national team, under the stewardship of the controversial yet well-liked coach Massimiliano Allegri, has embarked in a state of disorder to Russia, as a result of their dramatic securation of qualification for the World Cup on a windy december night in Zagreb, courtesy of a late goal scored by Azzurri icon Alberto Paloschi.

He shoots, he scores! Or, if you happened to be Fernando Torres yesterday afternoon, you didn't. There are several reasons why a Premier League match which had, as they say, a little bit of everything, will most likely remembered for one moment of aberration, some connected to the eye-watering amount of money that Chelsea played for said player, others through a sense of a relief that it effectively ended much chance of a tight finish to a match that Manchester United should have long since wrapped up, but most for reasons of good, old fashioned schadenfreude.

Was there a picture after the game of President Obama screaming and throwing furniture around while his wife and children looked on horrified?
No? That was just in my house? Okay.
Looking at the US after the game really gave me an insight on how China felt twelve years ago. I thought Hope Solo was going to kill someone, and then we saw her getting consoled by fans - presumably relatives, but if not, that's not surprising.

Head and shoulders above the rest: U.S. forward Abby Wambach scores the latest goal in a game in Women's World Cup history and sends the quarterfinal against Brazil to penalty kicks in Germany (AP Photo).

It was quite simply, one of the most enthralling, drama-filled, soccer games I've ever seen.

Okay, yeah, Real Madrid. I can see that. AC Milan...they're in the conversation, no question.
But other than that, we pretty much saw the two most annoying teams Europe had to offer. And, therefore, the world, because Europe would never dream of there being a category in soccer they didn't dominate.

It has been a wretched season for St Albans City. Twenty-five years at the sixth level of the English pyramid -one of which, the 2006/07 season had been spent a division higher in the Blue Square Premier came to a crashing halt this season in a fog of humiliation, as they were docked ten points for financial irregularities and finished well adrift at the foot of the Blue Square South.

By Chris Wright

"I'm getting too old for this sh*t!"

It looks like Arsene Wenger has taken the bait and reacted to the claims made by Joan Laporta yesterday, in which the ex-Barca president told anyone who would listen that his former club would see the signing of Arsenal captain Cesc Fabregas as 'justice' after the Gunners 'fished' him from their youth ranks back in 2003.

Following on from yesterday's article looking at Barcelona's hypocrisy, it's worth looking at Arsene Wenger's reply to comments made by Barcelona's ex-president Joan Laporta and current VP Javier Faus about Cesc Fabregas.

While Faus was only talking about how much money they have available for transfers, Laporta went a step further, talking about a sense of 'entitlement' with Fabregas "It's an issue of justice, we now want to recover them," he said.

Just how damaging will it ultimately be for the game of soccer in the United States that we won't get a front row seat to the corruption circus of FIFA almost 12 years from now? Not all that much. I know that MLS and the USSF were looking forward to pounding the mainstream with the World Cup promotional bludgeon for the next twelve years, but I'm glad they won't get to do that for a couple of reasons.