The Topographical Dictionary of Ireland comes in two volumes and was created by Samuel Lewis in 1837 to illustrate the local history of the Country. In his writing, Lewis describes the village of Feakle in Co. Clare ‘as presenting, throughout, a succession of mountain and valley, including the extensive and …

“You Are Now Immortal Jock” Bill Shankly – Liverpool F.C. Manager On the 5th of July 1975 in the early hours of the morning a Mercedes car heading North through Lockerbie on the A74 collided with another car driving the wrong way on the motorway. On impact the driver of …

On an autumnal day in 1985 Martin Tyler then ITV football correspondent sat in the offices of The South Bank Television Centre staring out at the river Thames. Tyler was awaiting the arrival of a young footballer to take him for a stroll across the road to Waterloo Bridge for …

In February 1985 BBC presenter Janice Long stood in Elstree Studios and announced to the watching public ‘Okay! If you have taste, you will appreciate that ‘Meat is Murder’ is the best album around at the minute… The Smiths’. As the Top of the Pops cameraman turned to the stage, …

In his kitchen at Bellefield Avenue, West Derby then Liverpool manager Bill Shankly had a vision, one which would carry a psychological impact on every opposition. The vision was ‘all red’, a red for danger, a red for power, a red for football domination. In the dressing room at Melwood, …

In the Autumn of 1979, the Prati district of Rome was still reeling from the assassination of journalist Carmine Pecorelli. Pecorelli, a maverick journalist had drawn connections between Aldo Moro’s kidnapping, then President of the Christian Democratic Party, and possible involvement by then Italian Prime Minister Giulio Andreotti. The militant …

A music scholar once wrote, the art of song writing can be broken down into three essential building blocks: ‘Lyrics, Chords and Melody’. Over the decades the music charts have been infiltrated on occasion by footballers, we think of Paul Gascoigne crowing about ‘the Fog on the Tyne’, Chris Waddle …

“I had prayed to God that this thing was fiction.” – Colonel William Wilson, a combat veteran who investigated the massacre at My Lai. Between the 4-14 November 1967, eight national football teams battled to be champions of The South Vietnam Independence Cup in war-torn Saigon. Against the backdrop of …

On the 18th of April 1995, Eric Cantona welcomed twelve young football hopefuls to the indoor gym at the Cliff Training Centre, Salford. The children were aged between nine and eleven years old and came from local clubs and schools in the Salford area. The coaching programme devised by Cantona …

In the summer of 1986, Graeme Souness came home to Glasgow from Italy and was unveiled as the new Glasgow Rangers player/manager. Flanked by Chairman David Murray and Chief Executive David Holmes in the aptly named ‘Blue Room’, revolution was in the air. With English Clubs banned from Europe due …