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ARTICLE OF THE WEEK | Bobby Gardiner looks at the importance of David de Gea and the overall importance of goalkeepers to squads, especially consistently underperforming ones, contrary to popular belief.

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17 FEBRUARY 1940 | The Arsenal Stadium Mystery opened in theatres across Britain, one of the first movies to feature football prominently. The film was directed by Thorold Dickinson and followed Inspector Anthony Slade as he attempted to solve the murder of a football player (playing for the fictional amateur side the Trojans). The movie was filmed at Highbury and a few players and staff appeared in the film, manager George Allison getting a speaking role.

Dickinson filmed an actual match between Arsenal and Brentford in 1939, which Arsenal eventually won 2-0. The Brentford players wore white shirts as their usual kit would clash with Arsenal’s; hence close-ups of the Trojans also feature them in white shirts. It was the last match for both clubs before the outbreak of the second world war.  

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Every week, The Guardian publishes The Knowledge, a round-up of fascinating football facts based on readers’ questions. Here are some interesting stories from the archives. 

name of the game

When Dijon played Monaco in 2017, Said and Dias almost played each other in a beautiful mirror image - unfortunately Said was substituted eleven minutes before Dias came on. In 1999/2000, Flavio Roma almost played against Guillermo Amor, but of course something Actually Happened when Spurs met West Ham in a case of Reid vs. Dier. 

the long game

It took Mikkael Anderson seven years to make his debut for Reading, turning out for the club in 2014 having signed in 2007. The Second World War makes the waiting time even longer - John Aston Sr signed for Manchester United’s first team in 1939, but didn’t play until 1946, while Billy Liddell debuted the same year, having joined Liverpool in 1938. Nothing, of course, compared to Argentinian goalkeeper Alejandro Saccone, who joined River Plate in 1993 and didn’t play for them for eleven years, finally enjoying his first and only game in 2004. 

a whole different game

No team has ever won the European Cup and been relegated in the same season, although the performances haven’t always been stellar. The lowest Real Madrid ever finished in La Liga having triumphed in Europe was fifth, while in England Liverpool were fifth and Chelsea sixth in their cup-winning seasons. (United, gratifyingly, were league champs in both ‘99 and ‘08). Bayern finished 10th when they won in 74/75, but Aston Villa finished one spot lower than that in 1972. The Uefa Cup slash Europa League can go just slightly under that - Internazionale in 1994 finished 13th in Serie A. 

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In the densely-populated district of Khlong Toei, Bangkok, houses are packed tightly against each other and there is little space for parks or play areas. AP Thailand, a real estate development firm, decided to turn odd-shaped vacant lots into football pitches, giving kids a chance to enjoy themselves, limits be damned. See more of the project here.

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ARTICLE OF THE WEEK | A quick, interesting history of the origin of yellow and red cards, a phenomenon that seems ubiquitous to us now but really isn’t that old an idea.

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6 FEBRUARY 1958 | 23 people died when a plane crashed in Munich on a snow-covered runway, including eight players from Manchester United. Having stopped to refuel on the way back from a 3-3 draw with Red Star Belgrade in the European Cup, the plane cancelled departure twice before committing to its final attempt. The plane was unable to stop after hitting slush and crashed into a fence, breaking apart and killing twenty people instantly. 

United players David Pegg, Tommy Taylor, Billy Whelan, Mark Jones, Geoff Bent, Eddie Colman, and captain Roger Byrne died in the crash. Duncan Edwards died two weeks later.

With much of the first team gone, United might have folded, but a makeshift team beat Sheffield Wednesday 3-0, just two weeks afterwards, and reached the FA Cup final. They eventually won the European Cup ten years later. Two members of that team, Bobby Charlton and Bill Foulkes, were survivors of the crash. Foulkes scored the goal that would send them into the final.

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Hi, I'm sure there's probably loads of things written on the topic, I wanted to get your opinion - and recs, if you have them! (I'm writing a paper that sorta kinda touches on this topic, but I'm always here to find breaks from studying lol) Do you think George Best was the first real celebrity footballer? I heard him once being compared to the Beatles and I was wondering - did he change how people perceived players? What do you think about him and his legacy (both footballing and otherwise)? :D

Hey there!! Long post under the cut:

OKAY FIRST OFF you gotta tell me all about this paper I’m dying to knowww!!! 

Secondly! I think that the transition of footballers from everyday working men to stardom is slightly more drawn-out than the explosion of Georgie, but he was definitely one of the first (if not the first) to sort of use that? And open up shops and all that when previously you’d just sort of buy a pub after you retired. Gary Imlach writes that the removal of maximum wage was the step towards football celebrities because footballers were finally being paid more than their working class counterparts. (This is entirely based on England which I’m more familiar with - of course other leagues like Italy and Colombia - see Charlie Mitten’s story - paid loads and loads and it’s possible that footballers were already celebrities in those cultures but! I digress!) So in that sense, at least money-wise, you had the break between Ordinary People and Footballers in the 50s before George. 

But you’re right in that George was really the first, like, Huge Celebrity of British Football. Not necessarily celebrity in a famous sense, since I mean Pele was famous before George, but celebrity in the sense that we know them now, I think? Known both on and off the pitch, doing adverts and all that kind of thing. Media frenzies and fangirls etc. You can read chapters 5 and 6 of Duncan Hamilton’s Immortal for more information but it sounds like he really knew how to get his way around the media, doing things like opening boutiques and wearing sombreros. (Yes, you’re right! He was called ‘El Beatle’ and this was given to him after United beat Benfica 5-1 in Europe and he came back wearing that sombrero. Harry Gregg was all ‘good players don’t need a gimmick’ which shows you the other side of the celebrity/player dichotomy.)

I think a part of it also came from Beatlemania and how the whole landscape of media recognition and culture was changing, so to think about the explosion of football celebrities you have to think about the wider context as well. (George tried hard to fit into that - for example his boutique was aimed at ‘the Mod shop for the extrovert male’ and his story is very much tied up in that era.)

Even then I’m not sure if it changed how people perceived players - I mean, his name is the only real Big One that stands out from that period, and if you think about the others, like Sir Bobby, he was still living ye olde family lyfe. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say that George made the transition from player to celebrity possible? 

And even then George wasn’t a full on egomaniac - he was still quiet and kind and sometimes you get the impression that he wasn’t even all that keen on this bunch of shenanigans. Of course this is a very romantic view from a Manchester United fan but I like to think that he was really the most comfortable just playing for us. His legacy is - complicated, but it definitely paved the ground for future stars to burst onto the scene in both senses - think comparisons with Giggsy (football) and Becks (non-football). 

Hm. Maybe celebrity culture is something that can be traced alongside the history of television? For me the real explosion of celebrity culture in football happens when the Premier League begins and that’s all about tv rights etc. And then suddenly you have megastars doing all sorts. (But again as a United fan I basically ignore the 70s and 80s so you might want to ask…*grits teeth* Ian Rush or someone.) But I’m not sure what the scope of your paper is so maybe this isn’t as interesting!

Recs wise - on footballing in the 50s and 60s, I’ve just finished two books that were really helpful because I’d never really stepped into that era before. The Football Man by Arthur Hopcraft is a contemporary account and he did interview Best, which was really interesting. My Father and Other Working Class Football Heroes by Gary Imlach is slightly earlier than Best but gives you a great overview of the change in maximum wage, retain and transfer etc. Immortal by Duncan Hamilton is my go-to George book but Blessed, his own book, is definitely something you’d want to look at as well. I haven’t finished Standing on the Shoulders of Giants by Soren Frank but it’s a cultural history of United and I just flicked through and there’s this bit where he compares Jackson Pollock to Best, which sounds interesting! 

Acacacacademia… Sadly I have lost all my journal access upon graduation but this looks super interesting and up your alley. Honestly, Soccer and Society is great for social history of football and there’re probably tons of things in there. Look at this! And this! Pls….if you have access…. download for meee 

I also just googled and Sport, Media, Culture: Global and Local Dimensions sounds vaguely tangential and interesting, plus MUTV ran a documentary called El Beatle that might be nice if you want to have a watch. And the Independent had this.

Hope this helps or was at least interesting!

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Every week, The Guardian publishes The Knowledge, a round-up of fascinating football facts based on readers’ questions. Here are some interesting stories from the archives.

head bone’s connected to the...

If you ever needed to know the highest scoring match where all goals scored were headers, look no further. Internationals wise, England’s 3-0 thump of Scotland were all headers. Leicester City beat Derby County 4-0 in 1998 with no-brainers - one of them, fairly, was Emile Heskey - but none can hold a candle to Oxford United, who in their 6-0 hammering of Shrewsbury in 1996 did it with their heads (not shoulders, knees and toes).

back bone’s connected to the... 

Sometimes, even when you're at home, they'll take the shirt off your back. UEFA used to have a rule where the home team would change kit in the event of a clash in the Champions' League. Arsenal fell afoul of this when they hosted Sparta Prague and had to wear their third kit, but ended up changing it at half time because it was too similar to Sparta's maroon. Reading also had to change to their away kit despite playing at home because of a clash against Stevenage's, Cork City and Dundalk both changed shirts at half time because of heavy rain, but it's to Witton Albion that the award goes, as they lost to Grantham Town having worn three shirts in 90 minutes.

hand bone’s connected to the...

Goalkeepers can come in handy on both sides of the pitch, especially before 1912, where rules allowed goalkeepers to handle the ball all the way to the halfway line. Somewhat more recently, both Jose Luis Chilavert and Jorg Butt have scored and saved a penalty in the same game - Chilavert in 1999 against Independiente, while Butt scored and saved one in Hamburg’s 3-1 victory over Schalke. Butt even ended up top-scorer with nine goals for that season. Interestingly enough, Niall Quinn, as striker, had already scored for Manchester City against Derby in 1991. Without a goalkeeper on the bench and with Tony Coton sent off, Quinn stepped in between the posts - and promptly made a penalty save against Dean Saunders. 

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Liverpool-based photographer Michael Kirkham travelled through poorer parts of the UK, photographing makeshift goalposts used by kids for kickabouts. His project, Urban Goals, means to capture the neglect and social inequality of many of these places, yet recognise the hope that football brings. You can find more of his work here.

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ARTICLE OF THE WEEK | While women’s football is on the rise, the history of women’s football isn’t talked about enough. Anushree Nande picks up the story of Lily Parr, the first female household name of football. Spotted while playing for St. Helens Ladies, Parr ended up playing in a women’s league formed for morale during WWI. She scored 34 goals in her debut season, and was the first woman to be inducted in the Football Hall of Fame, in 2002.

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30 JANUARY 1937 | A strange coincidence occurred in the English leagues, as the home sides went undefeated in all 35 FA Cup and Football League matches. Of the 16 FA Cup matches that day, Derby, Preston North End, Everton, Arsenal, Blackburn, Blackpool, Millwall, and Exeter beat all of their opponents, while the rest of the matches were draws, including the Third Division South Luton Town holding League champions Sunderland to a 2-2 draw. The most lopsided result went to Blackpool, who won 6-0 against Bradford Park Avenue. 

Of the four matches that went to replays, though, the visiting teams won three of them, with only Sunderland as the home team beating Luton 3-1. Sunderland went on to beat Preston North End in the final.

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Every week, The Guardian publishes The Knowledge, a round-up of fascinating football facts based on readers’ questions. Here are some interesting stories from the archives.

the third men

Sometimes... matches that are played... are worse. The FA Cup third-place playoff existed between 1970 and 1974, and then after 1975 were never played again. The first two years were held on the eve of the cup final, in London, but given most of the teams' fans couldn't be bothered to come down and watch - 1971 saw 5,000 turn up for Stoke-Everton - the FA chose to shift it to pre-season instead. The third year was hosted at Birmingham's ground, where they triumphed over Stoke in the FA Cup's first penalty shootout. When in 1974 only 4,432 people bothered to come to Leicester-Burnley, the FA decided that not even the third place prize of a tankard was enough to sustain interest.

two close for comfort

Most people are already unhappy when their rivals exist, let alone when their stadiums are back-to-back with each other. But those do exist, like MTK Budapest and BKV Elore, who basically share a street. Dundee United's Tannadice and Dundee's Dens Park, the British league's closest grounds, are slightly further apart, as are Nigeria's national stadium Surulere and the Teslim Balogun stadium, although you can stand on the bridge between them and see into both. In Buenos Aires, the Estádio Juan Domingo Perón and the Estadio Libertadores de América are right next to each other, but the most impressive is Blackpool's Squires Gate FC and Wren Rovers, who have only a boundary wall along the length of one touchline to distinguish them.

sixes and sevens

The football lexicon doesn't always make sense, and phrases like sixes and sevens can be pretty obscure - unless you're wordorigins.org, who explains that it's a phrase from gambling and first appears in Troylus, written by Chaucer in 1374. The original phrase was 'set upon six and seven', and refers to betting your entire fortune on one dice throw. While originally meaning carelessness, it's come to mean confusion, disorder, and disagreement. The plural form came about in the 1800s, and now it's most commonly used to describe terrible defending.

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Shirsho Dasgupta examines the way that camera angles and photos used in football coverage – particularly pictures that zoom in on individuals – mirror our view of the world.

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ARTICLE OF THE WEEK | Sam Griswold reflects on the strangeness of lexicon and why language can make the same sport completely different in this short, delightful piece.

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28 JANUARY 1900 | The German Football Association was founded in Leipzig. The first German football club, the Dresden English Football Club, was actually formed in 1874, but it was only in 1900 that enough clubs felt the need to introduce a national organisation, including establishing a national championship and a national team. In 1900, representatives of 86 different clubs met in Leipzig to vote on the creation of a new national association. Out of a total of 84 votes cast, the final tally was 62 in favor and 22 against and the Deutscher Fußball-Bund was born.

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Every week, The Guardian publishes The Knowledge, a round-up of fascinating football facts based on readers’ questions. Here are some interesting stories from the archives.

we built this city

As footballing cities go, there are some venerable success stories and some best forgotten. Bristol has two clubs that combine for a pedigree of 212 years, and yet in all that time have only won three football league trophies and one Welsh Club. Stoke-on-Trent aren’t much better - of 290 years between Stoke City and Port Vale, they’ve won one League Cup (the tinpot trophy of the first division) and four Football League Trophies (the tinpot trophy of the third and fourth tiers). 

cut you down to size

If you ever needed to know what the biggest height difference between goalscorers was, the Guardian has you covered. Stoke vs. Rochdale saw Peter Crouch and Joe Allen score, the difference between them being 33cm. Crouch is predictably the centre of all English records, towering 36cm above his fellow goalscorers Aaron Lennon and Shaun Wright-Phillips, one at Tottenham and two for England. However, 2.04m tall Norwegian Tor Hogne Aarøy scored alongside his 1.61m teammate Makai Fukai for Jef United in Japan, setting the record at a whopping 43cm.

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The New York Times charts the development of the official world cup ball all the way from its inception till its last installment in 2014.