Premier League Chairmen, players and their agents are no doubt celebrating the new TV deal that gives the PL a combined £3 billion from Sky and BT for three years, starting in 2013. What about the rest of us? Good news? Although Sky can easily soak up the cost from its millions of subscribers, I…

This is the list of fines dished out by Uefa at Euro 2012. Spot the odd one out. Croatia fined: €80,000 for the setting-off and throwing of fireworks, and the improper conduct of supporters (racist chants, racist symbols) at the Group C match against Italy on 14 June €30,000  for the setting off and throwing…

As Red & White Holdings get closer to 30% of Arsenal shares, here’s a summary of shares traded on Plus Markets for the last 18 months, including the current month to date. This shouldn’t be taken as an indication of the total number of shares traded, as many purchases are done off-market, including the huge…

England are rubbish at penalties and have lost 6 out of 7 shootouts in major competitions, as well as 1 out of 1 in some minor competition. This isn’t just bad luck. There is good evidence that countries that do better in shootouts are those whose populations have a more collectivist nature, whereas we English…

You remember my “Which Premier League Club Should You Support?” graphic, right? As featured in The Sun and Sovsport, and on a million Facebook walls. Anyway, the concept applies equally well to the Euros, I feel. And thus I will be flogging it as long as I can, in every sense. So here’s the Euro…

This is the latest in my series of blogs on the subject of “What the hell is Alisher Usmanov up to?” I could ask him I suppose, but where’s the fun in that? I’ve written several pieces on Arsenal ownership and in particular the effect of Alisher Usmanov on the ownership dynamic, and I like…

No, I’m not referring to the new purple and black monstrosity of an away kit, that might still grow on me. But following a Twitter conversation earlier, I dug out these pictures from the Arsenal programme from the match against Everton at Highbury on 8 April 1989. The front cover shows Perry Groves in action…

Arsenal have had a bigger stadium than Highbury for a few years, but this hasn’t translated into a bigger atmosphere. It was ‘the library’ at the old ground, but we have a crowd over 20,000 bigger now, so what’s the reason? In my opinion the biggest loss of atmosphere was when every match became all-ticket.…

As the Daily Telegraph are now reporting, the Premier League have tightened up their rules to make it clear that a shareholder with a 30% stake in a club is not entitled to any privileges, and conversely does not have any special responsibilities, provided there is already a majority owner. The League held their annual…

As everyone knows, Tottenham fans are generally insanely jealous of Arsenal and not much given to logic or reasoning. This is especially true of Totts fans who write websites. One thing all their websites seem to have is a list of alleged “Famous Spurs Supporters”. Most of them are Z-listers (eg “Icelandic TV newsreader”). They…