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“Arsenal have signed a new keeper, Kepa,” noted John Marsden last week. “Are there any other examples of players with a name so similar to their position?”
While we can’t find a player named Left Back, there is a former Anderlecht defender by the name of Mark De Man (which, admittedly, is an on-pitch instruction not a role). The Belgium international earned five caps for his country and retired in 2012 with a spell at third-division KSK Hasselt, having rejected the chance to make the move to Kilmarnock. “I have two children and my wife has a good job. I did not want to move to Scotland on my own,” said De Man.
It’s not too much of a stretch to say that legendary Italian midfielders Sandro Mazzola and his father, Valentino Mazzola, were both mezzalas. Valentino is regarded by some as the best Italian player of all time. Captain of the Azzurri and Torino – and the symbol of the Grande Torino side that dominated Serie A in the late 1940s, Valentino died at 30 in the Superga air disaster in 1949. His son, Sandro was a one-club man with Inter and was a key part of the Grande Internazionale team that seemed unbeatable in the 1960s.
The story of how Sandro signed with Inter is directly linked to his father’s death. “One day Benito Lorenzi, the Inter forward who played with my father in the Italy team and was a very close friend of his, came to my house,” Sandro told Gazzetta Dello Sport. “He asked my mother to let me go to Milan to become the team’s mascot. Giuseppe Meazza was also greatly affected by the Superga disaster and went out of his way to help my brother and me. The two of us would put on the full Inter kit, walk out with the players and stay by the side of the pitch during the matches. Even as mascots we were on bonuses and we used to get 10,000 lire for a win and 5,000 for a draw. It was a lot of money for our family.” The gesture later convinced Sandro that Inter were the team for him. With nearly 500 club appearances for the Nerazzurri between 1963-74, Sandro – known as ‘Il Baffo’ owing to his trademark moustache – was an attacking creative midfielder linking the wingers and forwards and played in three World Cups for Italy, won the 1968 European Championship and finished second in the 1971 Ballon d’Or rankings.
Dave Adams reminds us of former Portsmouth attacker John Utaka, the club’s record signing when he joined from Rennes in July 2007 for £7m. The striker did little to justify his £80,000-a-week salary, which was a huge burden for a debt-ridden club that was threatened with administration and placed under a transfer embargo.
“Lennart Wing, the great Swedish wing-half as an obvious starting point alongside the Wycombe full-back Fin Back (who gets extra points for his initials matching his role),” suggests Richard Wilson. “A far less obvious player would be Vuk Strikovic, who nominative determinism of course demands that he play up front. At 23, he has 36 goals in 131 Montenegrin league games.”
“Buried in a Reddit thread, we found this post by someone named ZedGenius. In Greek the syllables ‘-akis’ are an endearing way of saying a name and it has the meaning of ‘small’, like ‘-inho’ does in Portuguese, with which I assume more people are familiar with. For example, Giorgos, becomes Giorgakis, and is usually a name that’s used for kids named Giorgos. Similarly, Giannis would become Giannakis. Now that this is out of the way, the player I wanted to mention is Michalis Bakakis, who plays as a right back (Back-akis, which if you were to translate it would give you something of the sorts of’ ‘small back man’).”
“The best I can offer is my team Farnborough, formerly Farnborough Town, having a winger called Phil Wingfield,” emails Matthew Wilkie. “Also playing at Kingstonian, he literally took to the field on the wing.”
“Michael Wright played at right back for Villa, mainly in the 70s,” writes Glyn Berrington. We finish with a brief segue into the world of American Football, courtesy of David Dyte: “It’s the wrong type of football, but Chuck Long played quarterback for the University of Iowa, then for the Lions and Rams in the NFL. I can’t think of a better match of name and position.”
Champion of future champions
“A previous Knowledge noted that Liverpool’s 2004-05 side beat the joint-fewest reigning league champions en route to winning the Champions League. One thing that struck me, though, was that they did beat three champions-to-be: Olympiakos, Juventus and Chelsea. What is the most a team has managed on the way to becoming champions of Europe?” asks Ravi Hiranand.
“Real Madrid, five in 1999-00”, succinctly answers Knowledge regular Dirk Maas. “They beat 1999-00 Greek champions Olympiakos in the first group stage, 1999-00 Ukrainian champions Dynamo Kyiv and 2000 Norwegian champions Rosenborg in the second group stage, 1999-00 English champions Manchester United in the quarter-finals and 1999-00 German champions Bayern Munich in the semi-finals.
“In 1975-76, Bayern Munich almost had a perfect record in beating 1975-76 champions on their way to their 1975-76 European Cup triumph. They beat Jeunesse Esch in the first round, Benfica in the quarter-finals, Real Madrid in the semi-finals and Saint-Étienne in the final. Bayern eliminated Malmö FF in the round of 16, thanks to a 2-0 victory on 5 November 1975. Malmö became 1975 Allsvenskan champions a month earlier, on 5 October, so Bayern just missed out on beating solely 1975 and 1975-76 champions.”
Knowledge archive
“What is the hottest English league or cup game on record?” asked Mike Dunn in 2018.
“In our era of climate change, the answer is probably last week, but I think I know the game that was most affected,” perspires Andy Wright, before letting us in on a remarkable saga of woe. “Bizarrely, it took place in Manchester.
“On 1 September 1906, in City’s first game of the season (home to Woolwich Arsenal), the temperature was reported as being ‘over 90F in the shade and too hot for sunbathing’. How much above 90F is anyone’s guess, but even that is 32.2C in today’s money. On 35 mins, City’s Irvine Thornley left the pitch with sunstroke. Before half-time, he was joined by teammate Jimmy Conlin, who had started the game with a handkerchief tied on his head. City began the second half 0-2 down and with nine men, but in the 50th minute Conlin, plus handkerchief, returned to set up George Dorsett to make it 1-2. That was as good as it got for City, and before long they were reduced to eight men, losing their scorer and Bob Grieve to heat exhaustion.
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“The ref consulted his linesmen, but they agreed there was no just cause for abandoning the game. Woolwich scored two more to win 4-1, by which time City’s Tommy Kelso and James Buchan had also retired, so they finished the game with five fit men and the plucky Conlin. The Daily Mail reported that Arsenal were clearly the fitter and better-prepared team, and chose not to take advantage of their opponents’ misfortune.”
UPDATE: Brentford’s 4-0 win over Manchester United in August 2022 is certainly a contender to beat that day in 1906. On a sweltering day on which Thomas Frank remarkably opted for dark trousers, temperatures soared to 35C as Erik ten Hag’s side wilted in west London.
Can you help?
“Five clubs from the Premier League won major competitions in 2024-25; Liverpool (Premier League), Crystal Palace (FA Cup), Newcastle United (League Cup), Tottenham (Europa League), Chelsea (Conference League and Club World Cup). Has this ever happened before in England or indeed elsewhere in Europe?” asks Dan Almond.
“Paris FC’s promotion means that Paris will have its first Ligue 1 derby since 1978-79. Is there any European city that has had a longer gap between top-flight derbies?” queries Steve Whittaker from Frankfurt (which hasn’t had a top-flight derby in the Bundesliga era).
“I came across a scenario for European qualification when I was playing an old Football Manager game. Managing a mid-table side, I was going to the FA Cup final against Manchester United, who were vying for European contention. I was also facing them on the last matchday of the league season, where I realised that it was better for me to intentionally lose to help them qualify for Europe, guaranteeing me a European place regardless of the Cup final result. Has such a scenario ever happened, where a team intentionally losing would guarantee them continental qualification?” writes Luke Levy.
“In commentary for the England Euro 2025 game it was mentioned that Vivianne Miedema has now scored 100 goals for the Netherlands, none of which have come from the penalty spot,” notes Tim Spargo. “Who are the highest scorers (internationally, domestically, Premier League etc) whose tally includes no penalties?”
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