Content

World Cup: flying the flag for France, and 31 others

by

toronto

Bill Taylor lives in Toronto, Ontario but, as a former resident of Bishop Auckland, near Toronto, Co Durham and a Sunderland fan with strong Wearside links, is a regular visitor to this site. So how is his adopted city gearing up for a distant sporting event in which it will play no part? With a smile it is unlikely to offer all the flunkeys, fixers and functionaries due in town for a G20 summit …

Toronto supports… everybody.

A few years ago, the United Nations called this the world’s most cosmopolitan city. Which is why, everywhere you look right now (including outside the little shoe store at the bottom of my street), you see the flags of all nations.

All nations that are in the World Cup, that is. It’s certainly not in honour of the G20 Summit later this month which is turning downtown Toronto into an armed fortress, with photo-passes for anyone who lives or works within the fenced-off area and a bill for security that has passed the $1 billion mark and is still climbing.

Read more

2002: screaming girls, Irish Troubles. World Cup memories (11)

by

japan


Pete Sixsmith arrives at the penultimate stage of his journey to every World Cups from 1966 to 2006. From the 2002 tournament he remembers the McCarthy-Keano spat, wailing South Korean teenagers, Tommy Sorensen’s howlers and yet another Brazilian trophy …

It’s interesting that as you get older, the more recent memories don’t stay for very long, while the more distant ones linger. When speaking to Neil Martin a couple of weeks ago, I was able to picture the goals he scored in my boyhood far more clearly than I could those of say, Tore Andre Flo or Jon Stead.

Read more

Transfer tales and kite flying

by

kite flyingOne thing you learn quite quickly, if you’re a football fan who also reads the papers, listens to the radio and watches TV, is to take transfer talk with a lorryload of salt.

We’ve heard so far that Steve Bruce still isn’t convinced by Craig Gordon, which would handily explain our supposed interest in keepers most of those who saw Gordon last season would consider inferior. Then we’re told one or two of the Big Four (or is that Five, Six or Seven now?) have their eyes on Scotland’s and our No 1. Mmm.

Read more

World Cup memories (10): around the world in 18 days

by

reggae girlz


Not really a break for Pete Sixsmith, whose series of World Cup reminiscences resumes tomorrow. But I also have reason to remember France 98. It was the year I feared I’d be keeping my head down in street battles, but ended up travelling the world …

Imagine you’ve been told at work that you’re going on a month of night shifts, and suddenly you’re given a paid holiday instead. Or that instead of representing your company at a winter conference in Skegness, the location has been switched to the Seychelles.

That was a bit like my France 98. I spent the first four months of the year or more expecting The Daily Telegraph to send me to report on hooliganism, especially any outbreaks involving England fans, or more accurately violent English criminals drawn to the location of football games. It would be an understatement to say I was not looking forward to it.

Read more

1998: France’s un-deux-trois-zéro. World Cup memories (9)

by

eiffel

It is hard to believe the players who stumbled to a dismal 1-0 defeat against China a few days ago represented the same country that swept to such an exhilarating World Cup victory in 1998. Pete Sixsmith remembers when France were the cultured giants of European football

Back to Europe for this one and to France, the homeland of Jules Rimet, Napoleon Bonaparte and Jacques Tati – and a country with proper football stadiums and a populace who knew something about the game.

Read more

World Cup: Saffron, Republica and Sunderland

by

republica 2

David Jaymes, who occasionally sends information in my direction for use at Salut! Sunderland’s folk and roots music offshoot, Salut! Live, may well be unaware that Ready To Go and Republica – whom he manages (he is not, as I suggested when first posting, their publicist) – are inseparable from the recent history of Sunderland.

Read more

1994, moody Balkans and the unbeautiful game: World Cup memories (8)

by

claudio2

And so to America. Land of the Free (as in free of football passion). Pete Sixsmith speaks with genuine affection about a country where he has travelled a lot and even worked, but which hasn’t a clue when it comes to what everyone else in the world calls football and they call soccer, at least as played by males beyond the age of about 11. But hang on, Pete: didn’t Claudio Reyna’s goals once keep us up? …


After the glories of Italia 90 came the grind of USA 94. The football wasn’t a great deal better or worse, but I thought the tournament was a shocker. Let me explain.

Read more

The World Cup: priceless memories as kickoff nears

by

crab


The French ask earnest questions about the cost of their underperforming team’s luxury World Cup accommodation. Emile Heskey completes the double whammy: selected to compete at the highest level of a game he seldom plays, then crocks a key colleague in training. Paraguay carry Sunderland’s colours in Group F. And all the time Pete Sixsmith’s series of World Cup memories yields gems from the modern history of international football …


Photo courtesy of Elliott Brown


On a weekend free of competitive football, Salut! Sunderland had a quiet time, attracting a relatively short procession of readers.

Dash off a knockabout piece about Alan Hutton and Spurs and Tottenham supporters arrive in droves. Question an Arsenal player’s attachment to the Corinthian spirit and the hit count hits the roof.

Read more

1990, Milla’s Tale and Gazza’s tears: World Cup memories (7)

by

milla

Great World Cup, shame about the football. Those slightly contradictory statements sum up Pete Sixsmith‘s verdict on Italia 90. Other thoughts from 20 years ago – England Swings, or whoever wrote it should; a booked, weeping Paul Gascoigne and skybound England penalties. Pete’s priceless series marches on and we still have the United States, France, Japan/South Korea and Germany to visit …

This was the one!! Quite simply, Italia 90 was the best World Cup I can remember, even though some of the football was dismal. It had everything: fantastic stadiums, great drama, wonderful characters, and that sense of occasion that only Italians can bring to Calcio.

Read more

1986 and handing it to Maradona: World Cup memories (6)

by

mexico

Pete Sixsmith dips into his rich memory bank once again and finds himself back in Mexico, for the 1986 World Cup. Read on to discover how one legacy of the tournament had Mr Sixsmith, as teacher turned goalkeeper, picking a World Cup ball out of the net four times …

Twenty years on from the triumph at Wembley, England set off for Mexico thinking that they had a half decent chance. Bryan Robson’s shoulder and Diego Armando Maradona’s hand put an end to that.

Read more