When Erich Honecker took charge of the German Democratic Republic in 1971, diplomatic and sporting relations between East and West Germany improved but Stasi Head Erich Mielke warned (according to Prof. Dennis):

“that détente (the relaxation of Cold War hostilities) was a Trojan Horse of imperialism. His ministry went to great lengths to curtail contacts between football fans on both sides of the Wall, contending that the West was using football as part of its political-ideological subversion of East German youth.”

Mielke increased blanket surveillance in professional sport to prevent stars defecting to the West and to protect the secrets of the state doping programme. Therefore several of those inside the world of GDR sport were recruited as Inoffizielle Mitarbeiter (essentially confidential informants).

The East German national team had its biggest successes between 1974 and 1976, as they beat rivals and eventual winners West Germany 0-1 in the group stages of the 1974 World Cup. They also won the Olympic Gold in 1976. But then further controversy would occur. Until 1978, corruption in GDR football was not that widespread, despite frequent relocations and name changes. Stasi-sponsored Dynamo Dresden had won the league three years in a row between 1976-78, having recovered from the severe weakening caused in 1954 by the formation of BFC Dynamo.

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On Friday, there was a very rare occurrence in German football. A Berlin Derby. The two teams, Union Berlin and Hertha Berlin had only met twice before in the last twenty years. The Bundesliga 2 game ended 1-1 and with the 21st anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall coming up soon, it seems fitting that these two sides which formed a close relationship despite being based on opposing sides shared the spoils here.

Hertha Berlin were playing in the Oberliga Berlin (1945-63), the top division in West Berlin in the years after the end of the Second World War. Hertha were quite successful, accumulating the most points during the 18 year-long existence of the Oberliga Berlin, meaning they were chosen to be the Berlin representative of the newly formed Bundesliga in 1963.

There were a few major talking points such as their suspension for the duration of the 1949-50 season for taking on a number of players and a coach from Dresden club SG Friedrichstadt who had fled East Germany, but generally they were a successful side. On the other hand, Union Berlin finished second in the Oberliga Berlin in that same season to qualify for the national final rounds.

But Cold War tensions were escalating, leading to Soviet authorities to deny FC Union the chance to travel and take part. This led to a split in the club, as most players and coaches fled to West Berlin to form Sport-Club Union 06 Berlin. Along with other sides in East Berlin, what remained of Union Berlin was forced to join the new DDR-Oberliga under Soviet rule.

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Diego Buonanotte has confounded all expectations in acquiring a career in professional footballer. Nicknamed ‘El Enano’ (meaning ‘the dwarf’ in Spanish), he is even shorter than Sebastian Giovinco, the Italian playmaker who once set the bar for overcoming physical limitations to play in modern football. Giovinco is 5ft 4½, Buonanotte is a mere 5ft 2.

The River Plate playmaker has a dazzling left foot, has a decent burst of pace and is known for his trickery and passing ability. He represents the youth development philosophy that has served countries like Argentina and Spain so well, with technique taking priority over physical strength. It seems unfathomable that a British equivalent could ever carve out a path into professional football.

‘El Enano’ burst onto the scene in 2007, rescuing a mid-table River Plate against Superclásico rivals Boca Juniors with a man-of-the-match performance in the 3-3 draw. He finished that season with a highly promising 11 goals and two assists in 31 appearances as River won the 07/08 Clausura championship, the club’s first league title in four years.

Interest from European clubs inevitably followed, but the vice-president Mario Israel ended any possibility of a move, declaring the impish playmaker not for sale. Buonanotte was set to stay for one more year, but the new season saw River struggle for consistency and the player himself only scored 4 times in 38 appearances. But the summer saw Buonanotte take part in the Beijing Olympics as Argentina successfully defended the Gold medal they won in Athens four years previously.

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LiberoFootball’s Greg Cross with another hilarious extract from his imagining of Phil Brown’s diary:

(06/09/2010) The Year of Our Lord, 2010.

‘The Midlands. The Black Country. Brooding. Damp. Dark. I’m Phil. Phil Brown. Title winning Phil Brown (’Most Orange Middle-aged Man, Humberside Orangina Awards, 2008-10′). I’m here, here at Villa Park to meet Randy Lerner. A man. A great man. A man with a name so very close to my nickname at Hull Polytechnic. Bastards.

Here. Here at Villa Park. Waiting with me are Houllier. Gerard Houllier. Bloody front of the man. The bloody cheeky get of a man who signed Sean Dundee and Bruno Cheyrou when me and Sam, Big, lovely, cuddly Sam, when were after them at Bolton. We got short shrift from Houllier when we offered him some black pudding and our favourite whippet. OBE, he has a bloody OBE?! What for, for almost killing the North’s most prestigious club. I’ll beat him to the job, beat that French cheese-eating, wine glugging pensioner.

Oh aye, who’s next to him in t’waiting area? Blimey, it’s only Southgate. Gareth bloody Pizza Hut-whoring-penalty-like-my-granny Southgate. What’s he doing here? ITV not paying enough for him to talk shite, bollocks and shite next to that cockney Irishman and that daft Brummie with a face like shrink-wrapping? Blimey, if he’s the competition, then Big Phil is back in the big time. No more ‘Talk of the Terrace’ with Kelly and Nat, no more ‘Match of the Day Two’ with Colin ‘call me Coz’ Murray. Call you Coz?! No my lad, but it begins with a ‘C’. Southgate. Will you heck my lad.

Crivens! There’s a last man. A third man. An Orson bleddin’ Welles. Thin. Reed-like. Imposing mind. Imposing like Big Sam during our old 9am shower; often after me and him have wrestled like Alan Bates and Oliver Reed in front of the lads, usually over who’s putting the cones out and telling Campo to hoof it down t’line to Big Kev…those were t’days. By heck, this guy looks like a challenger. The Simba to my Poomba. I can’t quite make him out. Can’t quite make out his chiseled features in the shadows, those dingy, dark and hanging shadows, behind the potted yucca plant in the corner. A light, a gap, and I can see him…whispy white hair…studious hair…a cleanly shaven face…sharp, crisp eyes…well polished Kickers, the same Kickers I saw in Brantano, but which Big Sam had told me, ‘No, no our Phil, get them Hush Puppies, they’re champion’…oh shite…he’s got George’s latest pin-stripe effort too…I’m finished. I can’t compete. I can’t complete. But wait, wait…it’s Pardew, bloody Alan Pardew, who couldn’t win a game with the Harlem Globetrotters. Result!

Hours later. A call. The usual. The usual, daily; ‘We’re sorry Phil, but we felt there was a better man for the job’ call, I tell my cheeky scamp sons that I was waiting for a more important call so get off the line, which, sure enough, came shortly after. The bastards are going for Houllier. I call back Coz and book myself in next to Ian Dowie on ‘Match of the Day Two’ next Sunday. The same Ian Dowie who stole my beloved Hull. I’ll be waiting for him…’

A week or two ago, Inter Milan were clear title favourites. They had just replaced Real Madrid-bound Jose Mourinho with Rafael Benitez (and after the fiasco near the end of his tenure at Liverpool, he has not been given any control over transfers). But then they lost convincingly to Atletico Madrid in Monaco, before failing to score in the 0-0 draw with Bologna (for the first time in 19 games in that fixture). It seemed a world away from last season’s treble-winning side.

Meanwhile, AC Milan were apparently facing liquidity problems, so much so that they asked Genoa to buy Kevin-Prince Boeteng before loaning him for the season. Juventus spent heavily once again but wholesale changes will lead to a team full of players who are unfamiliar with each other’s style. Roma are also in an ongoing financial struggle, despite using future CL television income to sign top target Nicolas Burdisso, the Inter defender. Still, it seemed Inter would stroll to a sixth successive title despite a sluggish start.

That is until showman Silvio Berlusconi decided that he wanted a share of the limelight once again. The Italy Prime Minister has been under pressure from fans for tightening spending in recent years, despite spending roughly $1.5 billion on the club since taking over in 1986. His new financial policy at the club paralleled with the country tightening its own belt during the recession, for he could not spend lavishly when the country he runs has to make cuts.

He sensed the frustration in the fans and acted fast. He sent his right-hand man Adriano Galliani to Barcelona to acquire Zlatan Ibrahimovic. Suddenly the liquidity problems vanished as Galliani struck a deal that brought the outrageous asking price of €50m down to a season-long loan with a view to a €24m move next summer (with Ibra even taking a pay cut).

It was reminiscent of how he managed to sign (albeit out-of-form and overweight) Ronaldinho for a known-down price of £14.5m in 2008 (down from Manchester City’s offer of £25.5m). But in Ibrahimovic’s case, Galliani had signed a player at the top of his game. Then to send disgruntled Milan fans into paradise, a deal for Manchester City’s want-away Robinho was completed on transfer deadline day.

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LiberoFootball’s Greg Cross’ take on former Hull City manager Phil Brown’s diary:

 (01/09/2010) The Year of Our Lord, 2010.

 ‘Sunday, bloody Sunday. Change. Change and loss. I’m not doing my usual read of the Hull and East Riding Newspaper, not reflecting on a glorious win for my Tigers, not digesting a hard earned draw with my heroic striped boys. Not also am I preparing a water-tight, Ironside case against that bastard hooligan Cesc. Cesc bleeding Fabregas. Cesc bloody Fabregas; that bastard who wore a hoody. Wore a hoody and jeans. Wore a hoody and jeans and trainers. Wore a hoody and jeans and trainers and a leather jacket and went on to that pitch in that bloody London and assualted my boys and my staff and got away with it.

 No. No. I am southwards bound to that bloody London where I have to go to keep the wolves from the door. The wolves my Tigers used to scare away. The Tigers that used to keep me at the ‘Sunny-Humber-side-up’ tanning salon. The Tigers that kept my whippet, my beloved whippet; Little Sam, in Diamonte collars. Little Sam. Little Sam, cutting a lonely figure of a dog, a dog with a string collar, especially since Roary the Tiger bought the last one from t’Hull City store. Pushed in t’queue too, the stripey sod.

No. No. I am going to bloody London to appear on Match of the day Two. To bloody London to talk football to Colin Murray. Colin bleeding Murray, who, when the football is on the V/T, is showing Lee bloody Dixon his Liverpool FC boxers and telling him what he’d do if he were with Stan Collymore, Sky Sports News’s finest dolly birds and a packet of chocolate fingers. Well, professionals eh? Not in my day. Not with Jimmy. Not with Saint. Probably with Greavsie mind. Well, I’d tell that jumped up chump Murray that I’ve seen him with Big Stan on Five’s excuse for a football platform, and I’d assure him he’d be on t’crumb duty with a Dyson. Colin Murray, to football what Arsene bleeding Wenger is to chivalry - he didn’t shake my hand, that arrogant bastard. I don’t care what the TV ‘evidence’ showed.

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Germany’s football league system, the Bundesliga, holds the best attendance records in European football. The fans are as passionate and loud as any in the world. And this season, the decibel count will rise higher still because of one little side from Hamburg. Yes, St Pauli – the club from the town’s red-light district – have been promoted after an eight-year absence from the German top flight.

In 2006, St Pauli were in the German third division, where the average league attendance was roughly 2,000 – yet the club’s Millerntor-Stadion regularly pulled in crowds of 15,000. So what was so special about this small side, which always seemed to be in the shadow of its neighbour, SV Hamburg?

Principally, the club’s cult status derives from the extent to which it has represented the underdog. Initially the fanbase consisted of local dock workers, but this changed in the 1960s when immigrants arrived, followed soon after by students, leading to an eclectic mix of cultures.

The left-wing politics for which the club is now renowned first came to light during the 1980s when the Hafenstraße area of St Pauli was up for redevelopment. The local government was attempting to evict residents so the building could undergo demolition and reconstruction instead of repairs (subsequently found to be the cheaper option by an official report). In a massive protest, students, intellectuals and other political activists squatted on the property and their left-wing politics were gradually embraced by the growing, local fanbase of a previously conservative club. The skull and crossbones flag flown by protesting punks even became the unofficial emblem of the club.

To read more, go to Spiked.

It’s a good time to be involved in soccer in the United States (and before you scoff, the etymology of the word is British, not American).

In July a record 24.3million American viewers watched the World Cup final between Holland and Spain (the previous record was set only two weeks before when USA faced Ghana in the last 16). Then, following the tournament, an array of big-name players arrived on American shores to play for various Major League Soccer (MLS) sides: Thierry Henry, Rafael Marquez, Nery Castillo, Alvaro Fernandez, Blaise N’Kufo and even Rooney (John Rooney, the brother of the Manchester United striker, is on trial at Seattle Sounders).

Cynics may point out that this list of big names is another step in the MLS reverting back to the financially reckless behaviour of its predecessor, the North American Soccer League (NASL), which ran from 1968 to 1984 and allowed players such as Pele, Franz Beckenbauer, Carlos Alberto and George Best to earn large sums in the twilight of their glittering careers for sides such as the Washington Diplomats and the New York Cosmos. But the MLS, formed in 1996, is very unlikely to become a retirement home for Europe’s best footballers due to the requirement for all franchises to have their own youth development initiatives. To read more, go to Spiked.

“He is considered a retard, but we are the retarded ones – because we think, we rationalise. Next to him, next to the prodigious instantaneity of his reflexes, we are luggards, bovines, hippopotamuses”, Nelson Rodrigues, playwright.

When Manuel Francisco dos Santos was born on the 28^th of October 1933, the midwife noticed that his left leg was curved outward (it was six centimetres shorter than the right leg during his career) and his right leg curved inward. In the modern game, this Brazilian genius would have been shunned for lacking the physique of an athlete. Not that he thought football should be taken seriously.

He was born in the idyllic town of Pau Grande, 40km from Rio. Nicknamed Garrincha or little wren by his elder sister Rosa, his carefree attitude made sure the name stuck. He had a natural talent for football but little else. He could accelerate brilliantly his ability to change direction whilst dribbling was unrivalled in the town. He was kept on at the local textile factory where he started work aged fourteen just so he could play for the company’s football team. He was an awful employee, lazy and unambitious.

But when he took to the pitch, no-one cared. His ability to constantly humiliate his marker totally compensated for the lack of a work ethic. He would have remained an amateur, had he not been taken reluctantly to trials at the big sides. He was turned away by Vasco Da Gama and Fluminense, because he hadn’t brought any boots, while he left his trial at the latter earlier to catch the last train home.

It changed in a trial for Botafogo, he was placed on the wing against Nilton Santos, a member of the Brazil squad. He dribbled past the international defender as if it was a kickabout back in Pau Grande, nutmegging him in one dribble. He won a contract and promptly scored a hat-trick on his full debut for Botafogo.

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Fixtures that were once seemed eternal at the Santiago Bernabeu are now changing. One such is the absence of any silverware when under the presidency of Florentino Perez, but that could change now with the arrival of Jose Mourinho. Similarly, the arrival of the Portuguese tactician has seen the departure of Madrid legends Raul Gonzalez and Guti, something one could not have envisaged any time soon.

Raul has signed for perennial German underachievers Schalke 04, while Guti has signed a deal at Turkish side Besiktas. The Madrid Sports Daily Marca naturally claimed this transfer of Madrid’s record goalscorer as a victory for Cristiano Ronaldo, who could now change from CR9 to his original CR7 at Manchester United. Naturally, the one million CR9 shirts sold since the arrival of the perma-tanned superstar in Madrid will not be an obstacle to this.

Guti’s departure, on the other hand, will not be met with as much sadness, but instead fans will feel regret for what might have been. The Spanish playmaker may have won as much silverware as his captain Raul, but with the outrageous technique he was blessed with, there lacked a work-rate. In fact, in his final seasons, a number of goals conceded by Real could be traced back to a sloppy pass or a lack of tracking back by the Spanish midfielder. Despite this, there were flashes of genius, such as the back-heeled assist for Karim Benzema to tap the ball into an empty net, which broke a 20-year winless streak at Deportivo’s La Riazor stadium.

The sacking of Coach Manuel Pellegrini was entirely expected, given the hounding his every move was met with by Marca, practically the propaganda arm of Florentino Perez. Mourinho has been declared as some sort of deity by the same paper for instilling rules that are seen as the norm at most professional sports teams. Mourinho is now charge of the most successful club in European football, facing a formidable Barcelona side in his bid for glory.

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