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• Uefa’s conference calls will set out strategy on Wednesday
• Talks continue about extending player contracts

Senior executives contemplating how to steer football through the unprecedented crisis of Covid-19 are now talking about June being optimistic as a potential time to restart the season rather than the previous hope of having 30 June as a date to conclude it.

At conference call meetings of Europe’s 55 national football associations along with Uefa on Wednesday, and in England between the PFA, Premier League and EFL, questions about extending players’ contracts across the summer, and the cost of that, will be central.

• United come from 2-0 down to reach first final since 1968
• Share your thoughts below or enjoy our other retro MBMs

9.35pm BST

Here’s Michael Walker’s report on an historic night in Turin. Thanks for your company, see you in Barcelona!

Related: United soar over final hurdle

9.34pm BST

Even Terry Venables, in the ITV studio, can’t contain his excitement: he rubs his hands together with unbridled glee, and looks like he’s about to belt out a few bars of “Glory Glory Man United”. It’s infectious stuff, and even though United have been the team everyone hates in the last five years, I suspect the manner of this victory will generate enormous goodwill around the country. (Except in Leeds, Liverpool, etc.)

• Aston Villa keeper recalls ‘endless minutes of fear’
• Reina in ‘worst moments of my life’
• Coronavirus – latest updates
• See all our coronavirus coverage

The Aston Villa goalkeeper Pepe Reina has revealed he endured “endless minutes of fear” after contracting coronavirus symptoms that left him unable to breathe. The 37-year-old said he was on the mend after “the worst moments of my life”.

Reina, on loan at Villa from Napoli, told Corriere dello Sport: “It is only now that I am winning the battle against coronavirus.” He began to feel unwell nearly two weeks ago.

• Mayor asks 10 clubs in capital to assist coronavirus fight
  
• Help sought from ‘team doctors, physios and paramedics’
  

The mayor of London has written to every Premier League and Championship club in the capital asking they provide assistance to the NHS in “unprecedented times” amid the fight against coronavirus.

In a letter sent this week, Sadiq Khan asked clubs to provide help in three key areas – access to medical staff, access to stadium facilities and accommodation for NHS workers living away from their families as well as for health and care workers who need easy access to field hospitals.

Former prodigy is running classes to help wannabe footballers develop skills and resilience, and says he is happy at last

On this spot of land, a couple of minutes off the M25 and surrounded by stables, Sonny Pike can see his past fade over the horizon while the future glistens more brightly than ever. It was a few metres from here, on a plot owned by his mother-in-law, that Pike lived in a mobile home during the early 2010s.

Life had been tough, sometimes nightmarish, for a long time but there was light in the form of his now-wife, Rosie, and the birth of their daughter. Freya’s arrival was, he says, “when I started pulling my finger out” and the period since has brought a journey he struggles to comprehend.

• Tottenham reduce wages of 550 non-playing staff by 20%
• Spurs chairman was paid £4m plus £3m bonus in 2018-19
• Coronavirus – latest updates | See all our coronavirus coverage
  

Daniel Levy has called on Premier League managers and players to help English football deal with the financial problems caused by the coronavirus pandemic by accepting lower pay after revealing Tottenham have reduced the wages of their 550 non-football staff by 20%, in some cases by placing them on furlough.

The move came as accounts for the year to 30 June 2019 showed that Levy earned £4m – up from £3m in 2017-18 – as chairman plus a deferred bonus of £3m for the new stadium being completed.

• Schneiderlin and Tosun among players recovering from injuries
• Everton’s director of medical services doing one-on-one sessions
• Coronavirus – latest updates | See all our coronavirus coverage

Everton have arranged for Morgan Schneiderlin to see his knee surgeon on Zoom next week as part of their strategy for treating injured players during the coronavirus lockdown.

While players across the world follow individual and group training routines at home to keep fit during the crisis, the challenges facing those recovering from injury are more complex. Everton have three first-team players who are not receiving the hands-on treatment they would expect during rehabilitation from long-term injuries – Schneiderlin, Cenk Tosun and Jean-Philippe Gbamin. But, thanks to video communication services such as Skype and Zoom, the club have been able to manage their recoveries and, in Schneiderlin’s case, arrange a check-up with the specialist who operated on his torn meniscus last month.

• National League North and South also affected
• Fixtures were initially postponed until 3 April

The National League, National League North and National League South competitions have been suspended indefinitely.

The season was halted on 16 March after the Football Association advised “all grassroots football in England is postponed for the foreseeable future” owing to the coronavirus outbreak, with matches initially scheduled to restart on 3 April. But after a meeting of its board on Tuesday, a statement from the National League confirmed fixtures will be suspended indefinitely.

Our cartoonist envisages Julian Fellowes being commissioned to reboot the end of the season

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• Take a look through David’s archive of cartoons

Aston Villa captain must ensure off-pitch conduct does not stop him from reaching the heights his talent puts within reach

Jack Grealish probably was not the only 24-year-old to ignore the government lockdown last weekend in order to go socialising, but he was the only one to do so almost immediately after lecturing hundreds of thousands of followers on social media about the importance of staying at home to keep people safe. His demonstration of a do-as-I-say-not-as-I-do attitude has led many people to rail that he is unfit to continue captaining Aston Villa, though others might suggest it marks him out as a future prime minister.

Grealish did a hypocritical and dangerous thing and his apology was not altogether satisfying, since his account of “what happened at the weekend” did not include any explanation as to how his Range Rover came to collide with several motionless vehicles. It would have been useful to hear his version of events given so many other people are offering theirs, real or imagined. It will be interesting to see what West Midlands police make of the matter. Maybe they will confirm reports that the player faces no charges. So far they have declined to do so.

Football’s history is pockmarked with weird, unique and shocking kits. See how much you can remember about them

• Football kits: 30 of the weirdest – in pictures

When did Barcelona air this homage to Sunny Delight?

2008-09

2010-11

2012-13

2014-15

When did Liverpool offend the public with this away kit?

2012-13

2013-14

2014-15

2015-16

When did Coventry release this oddity?

1979-80

1980-81

1981-82

1982-83

At which tournament did Mexico goalkeeper Jorge Campos wear this outrageous kit?

Italia 90

1991 Copa América

1993 Copa América

World Cup 94

Derby County took the button down approach several steps too far in which year?

1938

1949

1959

1965

Which team released this half-and-half horror show that looks like a paint chart in 1998-99?

1860 Munich

VfL Bochum

Union Berlin

Wolfsburg

In which season did Stoke kit designers decide to hurt our eyes with this font?

1992-93

1996-97

1998-99

1999-2000

At which Africa Cup of Nations did Cameroon go sleeveless?

2000

2002

2004

2006

Which German club released this special edition Oktoberfest kit in 2014? It's hard to fathom, but they actually wore those lederhosen-inspired shorts in a real match against Ingolstadt.

Hamburg

1860 Munich

Fortuna Düsseldorf

Schalke

What were the Spanish club CD Guijuelo paying tribute to with this busy effort?

The local marble factory

Jamón Ibérico

A supporter who dresses flamboyantly at every game

Liverpool's home kit of 1988-89

10 and above.

You're the best!

9 and above.

Stellar work.

7 and above.

Well done. You know all about horrible kits don't you? How's your dress sense?

5 and above.

Well, at least you're not as terrible as these kits

3 and above.

Go and have a good long look at yourself in the mirror

0 and above.

Really? How is that possible?

1 and above.

Go home and forget this ever happened.

• Bookmaker let customers bet on FC Eskilstuna game
• ‘People all over the world got in contact,’ says chairman
  

A friendly between two lower league sides in Sweden had to be cancelled on Monday after at least one bookmaker offered customers the opportunity to place money on the game.

In Sweden gatherings of no more than 50 people are still allowed to take place and seventh-tier Eskilstuna FC and eighth-tier Näshulta GoIF were hoping to get 90 minutes under their belts, but they were forced to postpone after “people from all over the world” started to contact players and coaching staff of the two teams.

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When all this is over, we will have learned to practise kindness and become more generous towards our fellow man. The flatmate you’ve spent the last 12 weeks in isolation with who leaves the oven on overnight and never flushes? He’s only doing his best. The neighbours who’ve turned every evening of the last three months into some 90s nu-metal lockdown party? They just like what they like. The guy in Sainsbury’s who took the final box of Burford Browns? At least they’re going to a good home. Imagine it! A frictionless society based on patience and willingness to tolerate each other’s strengths and weaknesses. There’s one problem: that would mean imagining life without the France national team. Because at this time of empathy and shared fears it’s heartening, in some way, to know that in some places life goes on.

Bernard Wilson suggests a way to get round the problems caused by the coronavirus-related shutdown of English football

• Coronavirus – latest updates
• See all our coronavirus coverage

It hardly matters in the grand scheme of things but, in anticipation of a row on the subject once life gets back on track, may I make a suggestion about the incomplete football season dilemma (Non-league clubs lobby FA over decision to void season’s results, 30 March).

In the autumn (hopefully), two months could be dedicated to the remaining games of the 2019-20 season, and on the basis of those results football could proceed with a “half-season” for 2020-21. By this I mean divide each division in half, based on the final tables for 2019-20, so that the prizes and forfeits are played for, in the case of the Premier League, over a season of 18 games.

• Working groups set up on 17 March and will report back
• Player contracts beyond 30 June one possible sticking point

All of Europe’s 55 national football associations will hold a video conference with Uefa on Wednesday to discuss the latest proposals for how the 2019‑20 season’s leagues and cups may be concluded given the depth of the Covid-19 crisis.

With Britain, Italy, Spain, France, Switzerland (where Uefa is based) and other European countries in much stricter shutdown conditions than even a fortnight ago when Uefa postponed this summer’s European Championship, the 30 June date suggested for concluding the season now looks even more improbable.

• West Ham insist they have priority over other events
• Club do not want to play at stadium converted for athletics

The prospect of the Anniversary Games taking place at the London Stadium in July is in further doubt after West Ham indicated they could force UK Athletics to reschedule its flagship event if the Premier League season is extended because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The new head of UKA, Joanna Coates, has called on West Ham to waive their tenancy rights if there is a fixture clash, and the London Legacy Development Corporation urged the club to compromise. But West Ham have responded strongly to suggestions they could have to play matches in front of retracted stands and an athletics track.

• Move applies to all non-first-team staff amid coronavirus
• Saudi-led consortium tries to push on with takeover plans
• Coronavirus – latest updates | See all our coronavirus coverage

As talk of a £340m Saudi Arabian takeover was revived, Newcastle became the first Premier League club to put all non-first-team staff on furlough.

Employees received emails from the managing director, Lee Charnley, on Monday explaining that football’s enforced shutdown dictated they would need to apply to the government’s coronavirus job retention scheme, which allows staff to claim 80% of their wages, to a maximum of £2,500 per month.

After beating Liverpool in an FA Cup semi-final and Juventus in a Cup Winners’ Cup semi-final, Arsenal failed at the last

By Steven Pye for That 1980s Sports Blog

The date is 12 May 1979, Arsenal are playing their 59th game of the season and Graham Rix is preparing to strike the ball. It is the 89th minute of the FA Cup final at Wembley and the club’s whole season is in danger of falling at the last, leaving them with nothing to show for all their efforts. Rix swings his left foot, sends a cross to the far post and Alan Sunderland puts the ball into the Manchester United net to score the winner.

Fast forward 368 days to 14 May 1980 and Arsenal are playing their 68th match of the season and Rix is again preparing to strike the ball. Arsenal have already played 90 minutes in the FA Cup final and 120 minutes in a Cup Winners’ Cup final. Again they are in danger of winning nothing. Rix swings his left foot.

West Ham’s win was all the more memorable because their talented group of youngsters were soon to be broken up

They moved the ball quickly and gracefully, the three kids at the heart of West Ham’s midfield. There was no hint of any fear, no sign of Michael Carrick, Joe Cole and Frank Lampard shrinking.

They took the ball in difficult areas and it was impossible not to admire how they determined they were to seize the moment against Manchester United, who would exit the FA Cup after Fabien Barthez’s foolhardy decision to impersonate a man hailing a cab allowed Paolo Di Canio to steal a famous win.

Big Phil chats about his tussles with England, winning the World Cup with Brazil, Ronaldinho’s cross, the 7-1, why it did not work for him at Chelsea and why he loves English fans

By Joshua Law for Yellow & Green Football

Ask any of the footballers who have ever been managed by Luiz Felipe Scolari and they will all say the same thing: Felipão is not to be messed with. But, on a sunny morning in São Paulo, behind his aviator sunglasses and neatly trimmed moustache, he looks relaxed and content. Well he might. We are talking before the coronavirus pandemic shook the world and Scolari has been kicking back at home. “I’ve been on the beach for two months, every day,” he says. “It’s the first time I’ve been able to do that in 50 years.”

Scolari has been out of work since being sacked by Palmeiras in September and has been spending time in his native Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil’s southernmost state, to plan his next steps and mull over the last half century. There is rather a lot to reflect on. As a manager he has worked in eight countries and been to three World Cups. There was a winner’s medal in 2002 and two more semi-final appearances, the second of which we will come to later.

Alanyaspor defender on Turkish football, how he stays out of ‘a dark place’ and what the world can learn from coronavirus crisis

“I scored the winner and I didn’t even celebrate,” Steven Caulker says of his goal in Alanyaspor’s behind-closed-doors victory over Gaziantep. It was one of the final games before the Super Lig was suspended in Turkey, one of the last countries to take the decision amid the coronavirus outbreak.

Atmospheres in Turkey are known for being boisterous and vociferous, and the absence of supporters was a reminder of what makes football the game it is. With and without fans it has been a successful season for Alanyaspor, who sit sixth in the table and lead their cup semi-final against Antalyaspor 1-0 heading into the second leg at home. The club has never won major honours in its 72-year history.

Scheduling football before restrictions end would be a nightmare as telling fans not to attend matches will not keep them away

England has hosted only a handful of senior competitive behind-closed-doors football fixtures and anyone who considers them a suitable and workable solution to the problems now facing sport could probably do with a reminder about how the previous ones went down, starting with the first. This, at least, is a chapter of British sporting history that anyone can be forgiven for forgetting, since it took place 105 years ago.

In March 1915 Bradford City, one of two Bradford clubs in the First Division at the time, met Norwich City of the Southern League in the third round of the FA Cup. They first played in Yorkshire, drawing 1-1 after extra time, and when the match was replayed the following weekend at The Nest, then Norwich’s home ground, it finished goalless. A second replay was thus required, and arranged for a neutral venue – Lincoln City volunteered – but with a caveat.

Pelé’s daughter on how she came to make a documentary on women’s football, racism in Brazil and the fight for equality

“There are no words,” says Kely Nascimento-DeLuca, the eldest daughter of Pelé, when I ask about her journey from women’s football novice to documentary maker on the subject. “I’ve always been very into football. I love football. It’s like Christmas, every game in Brazil. It’s hard to explain the feeling, the electricity during a game.”

Sitting in a cafe in downtown Manhattan, Nascimento-DeLuca is buzzing. Following this interview she will head off to celebrate with her co-director Justin Noto, having just dropped off the footage for Warriors of a Beautiful Game, their feature-length documentary on women’s football, at Rock Paper Scissors, the editors of the acclaimed Netflix documentary Icarus among many other productions.

With the sporting calendar on hold during the coronavirus pandemic, football stars around the world are challenging each other to perform tricks with loo roll as part of the #stayathomechallenge to encourage fans to practise social distancing

Gary Neville has announced that two hotels he co-owns with former Manchester United teammate Ryan Giggs will close to the public from Sunday and be made available to NHS staff free of charge. Hotel Football and The Stock Exchange, both in Manchester, will remain fully staffed to offer accommodation to health workers who cannot live with their families due to the coronavirus pandemic. 'The whole of our industry needs to show solidarity, not just for our staff in these uncertain times but obviously for those who need the accommodation most in the coming months,' Neville said. 'It will operate free of charge and our staff will operate the hotels as normal.'

Euro 2020 has been postponed to 2021 as a result of the coronavirus crisis. The tournament was due to have been held this year from 12 June to 12 July across 12 countries, including England, Scotland and the Republic of Ireland

With Italy in lockdown and Serie A suspended due to the coronavirus pandemic, Napoli asked quarantined fans on Twitter to gather on their balconies and sing 'Un Giorno All'Improvviso', the song popularised during their 2016 title challenge.

This is how Naples responded

• Virgil van Dijk fears coronavirus could see title won in empty stadium
• Orderly, dour, cowed: how my beloved Italy is changed by coronavirus

The coronavirus outbreak has caused huge disruption to football around the world, with leagues suspended, some players under quarantine and matches played behind closed doors. Here's how players and fans coped over an unprecedented weekend.

• Questions abound but resolutions unclear for football’s shutdown
• Ezequiel Garay among five Valencia staff found to be positive for coronavirus

• Watford manager ‘totally underwhelmed’ by PM’s handling
• Pearson wary of fan fears of attending football amid outbreak

Nigel Pearson has hit out at Boris Johnson over a “lack of leadership” in the prime minister’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic, that has seen sport around the world postponed, cancelled or retreating behind closed doors.

The Watford manager referenced Johnson’s press conference on Thursday in saying: “I don’t think we had any great leadership last night, listening to the prime minister. I was totally underwhelmed by the lack of leadership and clear message.

• Maurizio Sarri also agrees to reduction in pay
• Club will save €90m as Serie A suspension stretches on
  

The Juventus players and manager have reached an agreement over a wage reduction that will save the club €90m (£81m), it was announced on Saturday. Maurizio Sarri and his players will take what amounts to a four-month pay cut to help the Italian champions during the coronavirus crisis.

The agreement comes at a time when leading clubs around Europe have had to slash wage bills because of the dramatic impact of matches being postponed or played behind closed doors due to the spread of the virus.

• Belarusian Premier League has signed 10 new TV rights deals
• 94 cases of coronavirus reported in the country

With professional football at a virtual standstill around the globe, fans in need of their weekly fix are turning to the Belarusian Premier League to fill the void as it carries on with matches despite the coronavirus outbreak.

The league, one of Europe’s least glamorous competitions whose teams rarely reach the Champions League group stage, is drawing foreign fans’ attention and a string of new broadcast deals.

We watched in horror as football continued elsewhere despite the coronavirus monster that has united us as never before

• Coronavirus – latest updates
• See all our coronavirus coverage

A few days ago it felt as if the light was finally switched off and since then we have been living in the dark: stopped in our tracks and scared of the silence that has engulfed us. The only sound breaking the silence is that of the ambulances, too many of them, and every single one a punch in our collective gut.

I normally report on the transfer market for the Guardian but at the moment I am not writing about that. Which player is on the move is not important at a time like this, but I would still like to share my experiences of what we have been through here in Italy in the past few weeks.

Raúl was 33 when he left Real Madrid for Schalke but he had not lost his competitive streak or his goalscoring touch

By Jason Humphreys for Englische Woche

In the closing minutes of Schalke’s pre-season friendly against Qatari club Al Sadd, a 13-year-old boy held up the fourth official’s board. On it was an illuminated number seven. As is tradition in Germany, the stadium announcer proclaimed the substitution by saying the number and allowing the fans to chant the name of the player. The crowd duly obliged and the name “Rauuuul” rung around the ground. The 36-year-old left the field, saluted the crowd and embraced the young boy on the sideline – his eldest son, Jorge.

This was Raúl’s last game for Schalke, played against the team he had agreed to join next. He played a half for each team, scoring two goals against his new employers in the process. This was his final farewell to a club that had taken him to their hearts, and one that had found a place in his.

The former president, who died of coronavirus at the weekend, said he would always have that night in Amsterdam in 1998 but two years later he was out

Not long after the 1998 European Cup final, Real Madrid’s president Lorenzo Sanz took a copy of the sports newspaper AS, framed it and hung it in his toilet. The front page ran with the headline “King of Kings”. In the photo, Sanz holds the trophy sitting on the shoulders of two players: Clarence Seedorf and his son Fernando. “How could I ever forget?” he said once. “Every morning, when I wake up and do what I have to do, I see it.”

No one else could forget it either, even if Sanz came to feel his work had not been recognised, deliberately written out of the club’s history. On Sunday morning, after he became the latest victim of coronavirus in a country where more than 1,700 have died, that moment dominates memories of him, the 76-year-old’s role fully embraced at last. This time, AS’s cover calls him “the man of the séptima [the seventh]”. Marca bids “farewell to the man who recovered the European Cup for Real Madrid”.

• FFA investigating alcohol-related incident in Sydney
  
• All Whites’ Tim Payne ‘incredibly embarrassed’
  

Wellington player Tim Payne has issued a tearful apology for a joyriding incident during the team’s A-League quarantine period in Sydney which will have legal ramifications.

Football Federation Australia and Phoenix management are investigating the alcohol-related incident in which Payne and teammate Oliver Sail drove a golf buggy beyond the team’s remote Sydney facility, where they were undergoing 14 days of self-isolation.

Football feels insignificant with Italy in lockdown, but if the season is scrapped it will carry echoes of 1915 for Lazio

It is the fate of Lazio supporters, according to the Italian voice actor Pino Insegno, to “suffer even in those moments when we were not supposed to”. The Biancocelesti were enjoying one of their finest seasons prior to the coronavirus outbreak, sitting one point off the top of Serie A at the moment when games were suspended. They are undefeated in the league since September, and beat the leaders, Juventus, twice in December.

Football, as Insegno was quick to remind listeners to the Roman station Radiosei last week, is of secondary importance at a time when Italy is on lockdown. “We need to stay home, and that’s it,” he continued. “We have not lived through a moment like this since the war.” Still, it is a curious quirk of fate that Lazio – champions of Italy just twice in their history – were denied a shot at a title on the only previous occasion when football was suspended mid-season on the peninsula.

Footballers train at home as stadiums, schools and parks sit empty. There are army vehicles on the streets. This is real, even if it remains surreal

Sevilla midfielder Óliver Torres was at home making dinner when the match he had looked forward to more than any other was supposed to be kicking off, a “magic moment” that didn’t arrive. Across the city that hosts the biggest, noisiest derby there is, the Real Betis goalkeeper Joel Robles was preparing food and bed for his daughter, who is six months old. For 90 minutes, they like to say, the whole of Seville stops. This time it stopped for much longer, and so did the rest of Spain. How much longer, no one knows.

Torres and Robles were due to face each other on Sunday night, but the Sánchez Pizjuán stood empty and so did the streets, bar the occasional police car passing to ensure no-one was out. The country was on lockdown because of coronavirus. There was effectively a curfew only this one was all hours and so they, like everyone else, were stuck at home. Betis striker Borja Iglesias and Sevilla defender Sergio Reguilón, though, did face each other: from their sofas, online and on Fifa, they played the derby. Broadcast live, Betis won and Borja scored, which was convenient.

• Former Brazil playmaker excels in prison futsal
• Ronaldinho accused of using fake Paraguayan passport

Football in South America is all but shut down as the Covid-19 outbreak spreads across the continent, but one Brazilian star is still making his mark on the game. Ronaldinho, whose last professional game came in 2015 for Fluminese, scored five goals this weekend and set up another six. Admittedly he did this from a Paraguayan jail, but such details are trivial during a global crisis.

As first reported by the Paraguayan newspaper La Nación, Ronaldinho was taken into custody in the country’s capital, Asunción, on 6 March. He and his brother had allegedly used fake Paraguayan passports and IDs, although his lawyer maintains that his client did not know the documents were falsified, as they were given to him by a local sponsor.

Tottenham and Manchester City are among the clubs who would probably make very different decisions if they could reset the Premier League as if it were Football Manager

The season must be completed. The season must be abandoned now. As the arguments gabble on, only occasionally acknowledging their own hypothetical nature given how little we know about how the virus will proceed, how long the lockdown may last and whether there may be a second wave of infections when it is lifted, it’s tempting t o dip into another hypothetical. What if this were like a game of Football Manager? What if we could quit without saving and go back and start again last summer? What would Premier League clubs, given their time over, do differently?

Let’s start with the obvious one: Tottenham’s decision to sack Mauricio Pochettino and replace him with José Mourinho. Once a path has been embarked on, there is perhaps some logic in pursuing it to its conclusion, but would Daniel Levy really take that road again? Tottenham are without a win in their past six games. They’ve gone out of the FA Cup and Champions League. They’re seven points adrift of fourth. They’ve kept three clean sheets in 26 games under Mourinho. For Spurs, this season has been a shambles.

Second series of Sunderland ‘Til I Die starts on Wednesday and if an Old Etonian proves entertaining, the fans are the real stars

A BBC film crew working on a Sir David Attenborough wildlife documentary once sparked controversy by rescuing several penguins trapped in a ravine from certain death. Their life-saving intervention prompted an absorbing debate on ethics and whether observers tasked with recording what was unfolding in front of them had done the right thing by flying in the face of natural selection and giving the subjects of their film a literal dig-out.

The second series of Sunderland ‘Til I Die, due to drop on Netflix on Wednesday, features a fascinating episode centred around last season’s January transfer deadline day following the club’s ignominious drop to League One after back-to-back relegations. Having been powerless to stop Josh Maja leaving for Bordeaux for little more than a pittance, the club’s owner, Stewart Donald, finds himself trapped in a highly stressful game of brinkmanship with the hierarchy at Wigan as he tries to sign a replacement striker in Will Grigg.

The game’s wealthier end is doing what it can in the coronavirus crisis but the precarious financial reality for too many lower-league clubs also plain to see

“What is football without a crowd?” Pep Guardiola asked a couple of weeks ago, just before it became plain that crowds of any kind now had to be avoided.

The short answer is not very much. Football has probably only just realised how much of its appeal lay in its ability to attract and entertain large numbers of people packed close together. Football stadiums are designed to accommodate crowds, to facilitate companionship; up and down the country those large edifices now standing empty and silent are powerful reminders that the human urge to congregate and commune is what has been suspended indefinitely.

Consider also the distinct lack of appetite for any sort of behind-closed-doors conclusion to the various loose ends of the season. No one is really going to do that, surely? It is hard to imagine anything more likely to demonstrate that football’s imperatives and emergencies are utterly disposable when set against the present difficulties in the real world. As an industry with crowd-pleasing as its raison d’etre, football is just going to have to wait until crowds can make a reappearance, however long that might take.

Related: 'It's horrible': Halesowen halted with promotion and Wembley in sight

Fill in the gaps for Motson, Drury, Coleman, Gray and Tyldesley

• More quizzes: sliding doors, globetrotters, stadiums and keepers

Pop

Shot

Go

Crack

Hibbert

Wright

Gravesen

Unsworth

Disrobed

Emptied

Exposed

Undressed

Curtains

History

Certain

Five

Belter

Strike

Hit

Rocket

Nasri

Kompany

Silva

Balotelli

Batista

Valdano

Pasculli

Butcher

Extraordinary

Incredible

Inconceivable

Unbelievable

Miss

Own goal

Dive

Penalty

Boring, monotonous, dull and lifeless

Stupid, appalling, disgusting and disgraceful

Exhilarating, exciting, arousing and arresting

Decrepit, despicable, dishonourable and degrading

Sailor of seven seas

Delivery from the Amazon

Neapolitan from up Vesuvius

Greek from Mount Olympus

Gifted ginger goal-grabber

Hard little professional

God-given genius

Rather determined chap

11 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is magnificent.

12 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is magnificent.

2 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

3 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

4 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

5 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

6 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

7 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is magnificent.

8 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is magnificent.

9 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is magnificent.

10 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is magnificent.

0 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

1 and above.

Oh, you have to say that is not magnificent.

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With the usual big fat clanging caveat that none of it really matters, except to a worrying number of football fans to whom it appears to matter a very great deal indeed, debate over whether or not the current Premier League season should be played out to a conclusion continues to simmer like the blood pressure of a Solihull resident who wakes up to find their parked car has been hit by a Range Rover overnight.

• Scotland crash out of Argentina ‘78 in bittersweet style
• World Cup Moments: Scotland’s 1978 rollercoaster
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4.56pm GMT

A defiant final roar from our “born winner”! A couple of drops remain of his signature optimism. There’ll be a couple of drops of malt downed tonight, that’s for sure, both in Mendoza and back home. Goodbye, Argentina ‘78, we hardly knew ye. This campaign will surely go down in legend as one of the most reckless, hopeless, needlessly farcical failures in the entire history of the World Cup. Sent homeward, tae think again. Again. But hey, at least you can’t say it was boring. And maybe we’ll look back at all this carry-on with fondness given time. After all, who knows what other horrors may supersede it years to come?

4.50pm GMT

A word with Ally MacLeod, who makes sure we get the top line of his message. “It’s just one of those things.” He says this six times in a five-minute press conference. “As manager you must take the blame. I told my kids to save up to see us defend the World Cup in Spain but it’s not to be. When we were 3-1 up, I looked at the clock and saw there was 20 minutes and realised it might be in our hands. But you get a bit elated when it’s like that and you get caught. It’s just one of those things. If we’d played like that from the beginning, we would have won the competition.”

Plus: prolific single-season penalty scorers, unusual ways to decide a tournament and more

• Mail us your questions or tweet @TheKnowledge_GU

“With the increase in games with no spectators because of the coronavirus outbreak, have there been instances in the past of teams using loudspeakers, cardboard cutouts of fans, or similar effects to try and replicate the atmosphere of a full stadium?” wonders Christopher Sato.

“Sadly, my lot (Boro) tried this during Steve McClaren’s race to try to pep up the atmosphere for our Uefa Cup run,” writes Garry Brogden. “They put out a casting call for people to go down and record a few chants one day – about 12 people turned up, including an acquaintance from a Middlesbrough online forum. They duly recorded a few of the current chants.

I was in the stadium to see Luis Suárez break Ghanaian hearts with his handball. It was cheating, but also an understandable act of self-sacrifice

Almost a decade on, the 2010 World Cup is recalled as a tournament of low-scoring matches, played out amid the distracting honk of vuvuzelas. As is usually the case, the host country showed its best and most welcoming side, rendering happy memories to visitors only to leave a disappointing legacy for South Africa itself.

Every tournament, though, will throw up at least one segue of incredible drama, of unlikely and since-forgotten heroes, skulduggery and adrenaline-surging plot twists. The rest of the quarter-final between Ghana and Uruguay was decent enough. The climax to the 120 minutes made the night unforgettable.

Keep up with the top scorers in European football’s leading five leagues, updated throughout the season

19 Jamie Vardy (Leicester)

17 Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang (Arsenal)

16 Sergio Agüero (Manchester City)
16 Mohamed Salah (Liverpool)

15 Danny Ings (Southampton)

14 Marcus Rashford (Manchester United)
14 Sadio Mané (Liverpool)

13 Tammy Abraham (Chelsea)
13 Dominic Calvert-Lewin (Everton)
13 Raúl Jiménez (Wolves)

A Van Basten-esque chest and volley – with the midfielder’s weaker foot – was a masterclass of instinct and execution

“Wow! Bloody hell!” exclaims Pajtim Kasami as he watches back his volley for Fulham against Crystal Palace six years later. It is the goal the Switzerland international’s time in England will be remembered for.

Full-back Sascha Riether was situated just inside his own half when he saw Kasami make his run. Riether chipped the ball to the edge of the box, where the midfielder controlled it with his chest before immediately volleying, while still on the move, over Julián Speroni and into the top corner from the right-hand side of the area. It was Van Basten-esque in terms of its execution – with his weaker foot – but with the added joy of intelligence to sprint into position and control it perfectly.

Related: Golden Goal: Steve McManaman for Liverpool v Celtic (1997)

The latest in a Guardian Print Shop series featuring classic sports images. This shot of the legendary Diego Maradona was taken by Mark Leech in 1987

When Diego Armando Maradona joined Napoli in 1984, 70,000 people flocked to see him arrive at the San Paolo stadium, scarcely able to believe that one of the greatest footballers alive had chosen to join an unsuccessful side from an impoverished part of Italy. Maradona would eventually gift unprecedented riches to Napoli, leading them to a first Scuddeto in their history in 1987, among other achievements, and was dubbed the ‘God of Naples’. This beautiful picture distils the euphoria of that period and recognises Maradona as the leader of his adopted people. However, the good times didn’t last. Asif Kapadia’s riveting 2019 documentary, constructed from over 500 hours of never-before-seen footage, recounted how Maradona became conflicted by his involvement with the mafia. A 15-month punishment for using cocaine and the scandal of fathering a baby, whom he refused to acknowledge as his own, ultimately saw him exiled from Napoli in disgrace. Maradona wasn’t God after all; he was human.

Clubs across the continent from FC Sion to Dinamo Zagreb are facing standoffs with their playing staff as they look to contend with the coronavirus crisis

As clubs across Europe move to reduce or defer their footballers’ salaries, one thing is crystal clear. There will be no comfortable, one size fits all solution to an issue that faces almost everyone: the need to save money during the coronavirus crisis in an industry that, taking the continent as a whole, pays out 64% of its revenue in wages.

That figure, Uefa’s latest, is accurate up to 2018 and will certainly have risen. It is no wonder that, with income streams compromised indefinitely, clubs at all levels are seeking new arrangements. Goodwill – and an understanding that no two situations are the same when dealing with governments, leagues, clubs and even individuals – is essential and the positive stories are offset by examples of clubs being, at best, ham-fisted in their attempts to force through cuts.

I was a ballboy that night and even though Jean-Marie Pfaff tried to waste time by miscontrolling my perfectly weighted passes Everton sent Bayern packing

When Søren Lerby sauntered into the Goodison cauldron without shin pads even my 13-year-old eyes could see it was a reckless act. Nearly 35 years on, the artful Bayern Munich midfielder’s decision can now be dismissed as the quaint machismo of a bygone age.

It was 24 April 1985, the night Howard Kendall’s Everton came of age to blow away the West German giants and reach the European Cup Winners’ Cup final. Somehow Lerby survived unscathed. Not so Bayern’s red shield of invincibility.

With football on hold we select some of the highlights of the top-flight campaign until now – and the biggest flop

Jordan Henderson’s influence deserves acclaim but Sadio Mané is remarkably consistent and reaches heights that his captain cannot. The temptation for players who can do it all is to overdo it, but Mané is too smart for that. He is the purest epitome of this Liverpool team because he is supremely efficient. Sometimes that means doing something as simple as running on to a long pass by Virgil van Dijk and slotting the ball past the keeper in the way he did for the winning goal against Bournemouth in Liverpool’s last domestic game before the suspension of the Premier League; and sometimes it means producing supernatural flourishes like his stoppage-time headed winning goal at Aston Villa or the touch that enabled him to take down a pass by Henderson while pirouetting past a defender before ramming the ball into the net against Norwich. Having the athleticism and skill to play as he does is rare; having the presence of mind to use those gifts with such effectively and selflessly is rarer still.

Chelsea, Barcelona, Ajax, Benfica and Bayern Munich are all expecting to welcome new players onboard this summer

By Martin Laurence for WhoScored

With football quite rightly postponed amid the coronavirus pandemic, there is so much up in the air. Leagues will need to be restructured drastically when the 2019-20 season resumes. There is also the issue of expiring contracts, with clubs potentially offering short-term extensions to players who would otherwise leave before the season concludes. Some players have already signed pre-contract deals with other clubs and are due to make their moves in June.

Whatever happens, with so much uncertainty over the summer transfer window, those teams who had secured new signatures in preparation for the next campaign will be pleased to have done so. Here are five notable signings and the roles they will play for their new clubs when football eventually returns.

Eidur Gudjohnsen’s son, the new Paul Pogba and Barça’s Ansu Fati are among our 60 most talented players in the world born in 2002. Check the progress of our 2018 picks | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014

^{Photographs by DZfoot, BackpagePix, Club Atlético Belgrano, EFE, EPA, Getty Images, Uwe Gruen/Hoffenheim, AMA/Getty Images, Rex/Shutterstock, Zuma Press/PA, FIFA, Tigres, Damir Krajac/CROPIX, Alamy, Daniel Reyes/Ecuafutbol, Reuters, Atromitos, Imago/PA, fotoBERNAMA, New Straits Times, José Alonso Paredes Sánchez, Agencja Gazeta, David Price/Arsenal FC/Getty, AP, Asian Football Confederation, Danubio FC and Championat Asia}

The Guardian selects the best young players at each club born between 1 September 2002 and 31 August 2003, an age band known as first-year scholars. Check the progress of class of 2018 | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014

_{Photographs by David Price/Arsenal/Getty Images, Neville Williams/Aston Villa/Getty Images, AFC Bournemouth, Paul Hazlewood/BHAFC, Paul Dennis/TGS/Shutterstock, Clive Howes/Chelsea/Getty Images, Danny Loo/PPAUK, Emma Simpson/Everton/Getty Images, Nick Taylor/Liverpool/Getty Images, Manchester City/Getty Images, Ash Donelon/Manchester United/Getty Images, Jason Dawson/Jasonpix, James Wilson/Sportimage, Simon Bellis/Sportimage, Robin Jones/Digital South/Southampton FC, Tottenham Hotspur/Getty Images, Alan Cozzi/Watford, Arfa Griffiths/West Ham United and Sam Bagnall/AMA}

From Rashford to Tielemans, we check in on how our initial Next Generation players have got on before the 2019 ones are announced this week

• Harley Willard: what happened next to one 2014 selection?

In 2014 we decided that it would be interesting to pick the best young players from each Premier League club – as well as 40 from around the world – and follow them for five years to see how they progressed.

The idea was to try to get a sense of how difficult it is to become a professional footballer despite being one of the best in that country at the age of 16 or 17.