What I firmly believe I should have been is a football commentator or journalist. As a young boy in the front room of my parent’s council home, I would formulate my own football matches, using Eighth Army green soldiers and Africa Korps German soldiers as my players; a small white Lego piece as my football. My imagination took flight; my games received their own personal commentary – and these forms of personalised football matches were so much more realistic than the finger-flicking Subbuteo football game that was in its heyday. In my teens I possessed a photographic memory, a vast knowledge of British and international football. It is this passion and knowledge that I hope to put into practice as I recall the successes and failures; the joyous moments and the disasters; the ‘heads in the sand’ attitude of British football, fortunately counteracted by the astute, open-to-all-ideas management and coaching staff, in particular at Liverpool FC. The extraordinary revival by Liverpool in April 2019, overturning a 3-0 defeat at the Nou Camp against Barcelona, winning 4-0 at Anfield to reach the 2019 Champions League Final acted as a catalyst for my coverage of British teams in the three European competitions, the almost forgotten Cup Winner’s Cup (played in by the teams who won their main domestic cup competition – the FA Cup in England), the UEFA Cup, now the Europa League, and the European Cup, now the Champions League. It’s a story of adventure, discovery, of tragic loss, of triumph, and as in life, the hard reality that sometimes we’re just not good enough. “1961 EUROPEAN CUP WINNERS CUP FINAL Fiorentina 4 v 1 Glasgow Rangers (aggregate score) Ist Leg: Rangers 0 v 2 Fiorentina (Glasgow, 80,000) 2nd Leg Fiorentina 2 v 1 Rangers (Stadio Communale, Florence, 50,000) The first final was a two-legged affair, played in Glasgow and Florence. To reach the final, Rangers defeated the Hungarians Ferencváros 5-4 on aggregate, and the West Germans Borussia Möenchengladbach by a staggering 11-0 aggregate margin. In the semi-finals, Rangers overcame a strong English rival in Wolverhampton Wanderers by three goals to one over two legs to reach their first ever European final.”