Scandinavian icons

How did your move to Southampton come about in 1996? I was scoring loads of goals in Norway and I went to Southampton on trial for a few days. They liked what they saw. It was a dream come true: every

O wen Hargreaves is one of English football’s most curious cases. The son of a Welsh mother and an English father, he was born in Canada before moving to Bayern Munich as a teenager. There, he broke i

Your mum Janice scored goals for England at the unofficial World Cup in Mexico in 1971, in front of huge crowds. When did you become aware of her football pedigree? I was maybe seven when she got out

Who were your heroes, growing up? Being a footballer is the dream for many boys and girls – I was no different. My dad used to work near Loftus Road, so despite having Arsenal and Palace fans in the f

When the Chernobyl nuclear disaster happened in April 1986, I was nine years old. I’d just had a trial with Dynamo Kyiv, and it had gone well, but everything changed. In the first few days following t

ON THE FIRST SUNDAY NIGHT IN APRIL, DRUMS ARE beating and horns are blaring in a boisterous Chase Stadium in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., as Lionel Messi and his Inter Miami teammates make a humdrum regular