A book fell off my shelf yesterday. It was a guide to the first-ever Premier League season, which was also the first year that I was aware of the existence of football. I don’t remember the old First Division, league games on ITV, Italia ‘90, Sweden ‘92. Never saw Lineker play, never saw John Barnes play well. No, actually I have one memory of Gary Lineker, and it’s of him missing – and I mean really atrociously missing – a penalty against Brazil at Wembley. That, for me, constitutes the career of England’s greatest striker since Kerry Dixon.

A younger Richard Keys, in those more innocent times when Rupert Murdoch was just a chummy little Aussie who we were all delighted wasn't Robert Maxwell. I say we. I was six, I didn't give a shit.
More trivia: one of the contributors to this book was Boyd Hilton, now the TV editor of Heat and all-round gay egg.
1. “Old Trafford. Capacity: 36,000″
2. “Of course, ticket prices are still a significant source of income. Stamford Bridge will be the most expensive ground to watch Premier League soccer – the cheapest adult seat will now cost £20″
3. “Oldham lack the financial muscle to compete with the Big Five”
4. The multiple references to Sky’s “space-age gadgetry”, culminating in:
5. “Tension will be heightened by a clock running constantly in one corner of the screen”
6. “After each match, Joe Kinnear asks his players to vote for the worst member of the side. Last season, the offender was despatched to see Uncle Vanya at the National Theatre (‘the most boring play running in London’)”
7. “There’s still plenty of quality at Tottenham. Dean Austin has the class to vie for a full-back slot in Graham Taylor’s international squad”
8. “Chelsea: Strikers: Tony Cascarino, Dennis Wise [??], Graham Stuart, Eddie Newton, Joe Allon, Andy Myers”
9. “Arsenal: Midfielders: David Hillier, Ray Parlour, Paul Davis, John Jensen, Jimmy Carter, Perry Groves”
10. Players that were still playing: Gordon Strachan, Peter Reid, Ray Wilkins, Cyrille Regis, Trevor Francis, Bryan Robson



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