Steve Bruce has been handed the job as manager of Wigan Athletic after stalling on an offer to take over at Tranmere Rovers.
Dave Whelan, the Second Division side’s chairman, has given Bruce the job until the end of the season, but he could make the move permanent if he wins promotion ­ and the millionaire Whelan will give Bruce more money to spend in the summer than relegation-haunted Tranmere.Bruce takes over from Colin Greenall, who won only one game after taking over as caretaker following Bruce Rioch’s sacking. The former Huddersfield and Sheffield United manager will work alongside Greenall and Brendan O’Connell, while Wigan’s director of football, John Benson, will move to youth development at the Latics.”I am looking forward to the challenge of cementing our play-off position and I am looking forward to achieving Wigan Athletic’s aim of First Division status,” Bruce said. Wigan are currently fifth in the Second Division.Manchester City’s manager, Joe Royle, has banned transfer-listed Paulo Wanchope from reserve games because he is not trying hard enough.The Costa Rican striker was left out of two second-string matches in the last three days because Royle is unhappy with his attitude. Royle is still fuming at Wanchope’s performance in a game against Liverpool, when, at one stage, he stopped to tie up his boot laces in the middle of an attack.

Royle saw the game on video and has had words with Wanchope about his “display” before leaving him on the sidelines.The latest rift only brings Wanchope’s departure nearer. It has been mainly downhill since a hat-trick on his home debut last August.Football League officials have confirmed that next season’s Worthington Cup winners will be given a place in the Uefa Cup. The competition will also change its format, with the first and second rounds to be played over one leg rather than two.The Uefa Cup place was confirmed with Premier League support, and the Football League chief executive, David Burns, said: “It is without doubt the likeliest route to a lucrative European competition for the majority of Premier League clubs.”In terms of crowd interest this year’s Worthington Cup has thus far eclipsed the FA Cup, with a memorable final between Liverpool and Birmingham at the Millennium stadium in Cardiff.”The Newcastle midfielder Gary Speed has dealt a blow to the ambitions of Fulham by revealing that he has no intention of leaving St James’ Park at the end of the season.The First Division leaders were understood to be considering a £5m summer bid for the 31-year-old Welshman after failing with an earlier attempt to lure him to Craven Cottage. Newcastle insist they have had no contact with Jean Tigana’s club, but Speed, who has also been linked with Manchester City in recent weeks, is ready to commit his future to the Tynesiders after holding initial talks over a new contract.”I know nothing at all about Fulham or Manchester City, but it would not matter because I want to stay with Newcastle,” he said. “If I was to leave here it would be a downward and backward step.”I am playing for Newcastle United and am captain of my country and it does not get much better than that.

Not only that, but my family love it up here and that is very important to me, and it is another big reason why I want to stay.”Speed’s existing contract runs out at the end of next season, and although a new deal is far from being finalised, he is hopeful that the situation can be resolved in the near future.”Because my contract expires soon and I have not agreed a new deal, my future with Newcastle is a little bit uncertain, but I hope to get things sorted out soon,” he added.Speed joined Newcastle from Everton for £5.5m in February 1998 as the club’s former manager Kenny Dalglish added what he believed would be another key player to his squad. With David Batty and Rob Lee the established central-midfield partnership at that time, he was initially asked to line up wide on the left and his form in the early days of his United career suffered as a result.Dalglish’s departure in August of the same year brought Ruud Gullit to St James’ Park and, when Batty returned to Leeds just a few months later, Speed slotted into the central position he has occupied ever since to superb effect. He scored 13 goals last season, second only to the senior striker Alan Shearer, and has contributed a further six during the current campaign.The news that he wants to commit his future to the club will come as a breath of fresh air to the Magpies’ manager, Bobby Robson, who has suffered enough transfer and injury set-backs this season to last him a lifetime. However, the club’s slide down the Premiership table has added volume to the calls for Robson to be given cash in the summer and, although that is likely to happen in any case, he has always admitted that anyone of his players could be available at the right price.In his brief time at Newcastle, Robson has already sold players he did not particularly want to lose ­ Steve Howey and Alessandro Pistone to name just two ­ to fund future purchases, and that could again be an option, although Speed would not be at the top of that list.Meanwhile, United have played down reports linking them with a summer move for Southampton’s £8m-rated Latvian striker Marian Pahars.. One way to comprehend the dizzying scale of Wycombe Wanderers’ achievement in reaching Sunday’s FA Cup semi-final against Liverpool is to glance back to the 1983-84 season. Wycombe finished sixth in the semi-professional Isthmian League, and were knocked out in the second round of the Berks & Bucks Senior Cup. Liverpool, managed by Joe Fagan, won the European Cup, League Championship and League Cup.

Another context is simply the sequence of Liverpool matches this week: Manchester United, Barcelona, Wycombe. One way to comprehend the dizzying scale of Wycombe Wanderers’ achievement in reaching Sunday’s FA Cup semi-final against Liverpool is to glance back to the 1983-84 season. Wycombe finished sixth in the semi-professional Isthmian League, and were knocked out in the second round of the Berks & Bucks Senior Cup. Liverpool, managed by Joe Fagan, won the European Cup, League Championship and League Cup. Another context is simply the sequence of Liverpool matches this week: Manchester United, Barcelona, Wycombe.
The good news is it could hardly happen to a nicer club. Wycombe, entirely amateur until 1980, are in fact the only club, in the true sense of the word, left in the Football League owned and run by their members, who elect the chairman and board of directors.

Therein lies another coincidence with Barcelona, the world’s largest member-owned football club.A key architect of this and Wycombe’s remarkable progress, including their 1990 move to Adams Park from the old, sloping pitch at Loakes Park, was Brian Lee, the club’s manager from 1969-76, then chairman until he handed over to the current chairman, Ivor Beeks, in 1986. Lee, still a Wycombe director, is a football man schooled in amateur traditions, a player in his youth for Altrincham among others, and, professionally, director of the Sports Council’s training complex at Bisham Abbey.In an age in which football boardroom’s are infested by egos and financial speculators, Lee’s philosophy is a welcome, common-sense reminder of football’s enduring values. “Football is a game, a sport, and this club is still a club, a fans’ club That means something. We want people to feel part of it, share in an experience which we hope will enrich their lives.”This heartfelt summation, though, has to be dug out of Lee only after he has expounded more basic virtues of the club’s membership structure ­ the fact that it has worked.