The new Europe League is many things.
It’s Europe’s second best club competition. It’s the UEFA Cup. It’s the refuge of the damned, (ie, Celtic) and it’s now the proud owner of a wanky anthem.
The piece by Yohann Zveig and the Paris Opera was premiered at Friday’s Europa League draw and is “distinctive” according to the UEFA website, “giving a sense of the atmosphere that will be felt immediately before a UEFA Europa League game”.
Here at 90minutesonline I am proud to present our first exclusive interview, the focus of which is the First-team coach of League One’s Bristol Rovers- Mr Paul Trollope.
Bristol Rovers have seen steady progress over almost four years since Trollope phased out his playing career and became caretaker manager in 2005. He was soon appointed on a permanent basis as the First-team coach with the aid of Lennie Lawrence in a Director of football capacity.
Their inaugural season cemented a 12th place finish in League Two. This was followed in the 2006-07 season with a successful promotion campaign, which culminated in a 3-1 play-off triumph over Shrewsbury Town.
The 2009-10 Bundesliga season is three fixtures old, and so far it shows no signs of being any more predictable than last season's tumultuous battle. Those who take only a cursory look at the Bundesliga may be surprised to know that Bayern Munich are currently as low as 14th in the table.
Bayern had a turbulent last campaign, the great hope that came in the guise of the former German coach Jürgen Klinsmann did not work out as planned. Instead Bayern hovered around the top four and suffered from inconsistency which ultimately led to the club's board sacking the mercurial coach, even if it was a little hasty.
Not that you’d know it from watching Match of the Day, but Manchester City came perilously close to defeat at home to Wolves on Saturday.
Having watched ten minutes of highlights, Alans Shearer and Hansen put City down as a potential top four side, but the 90 minutes that I saw at the City of Manchester Stadium didn’t lend themselves to such a facile prediction.
As I wonder what to write about for my first proper 90minutesonline article, I find myself clicking through the “Sports” feeds on my Google Reader for inspiration. It becomes apparent, however, that most stories are either too ugly, too fictional or too cricket to bother reporting on. That, and professional journalists have already beaten me to it.
And so I turn my attention to Altrincham FC, from the town in which I grew up. I’ve noticed in the last week that their start to this season’s Blue Square Premier (Conference to you and I) is rather better than usual. Ten points from their first four games, and second only on goal difference, may go some way towards avoiding the usual last-day escape from relegation.