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Tony Adams won four top-flight titles, captained Arsenal, and earned 66 caps for England (many as captain), but he told ...
10/09/2026

Tony Adams won four top-flight titles, captained Arsenal, and earned 66 caps for England (many as captain), but he told us recently that a multi-million-pound house deal he did with Liam Gallagher threatens to overshadow his footballing achievements 🎸⚽️

🎤 Speaking exclusively to FourFourTwo, the legendary former Gunners skipper opened up about selling his £4m Cotswolds estate to the Oasis frontman—and the slightly chaotic property viewing that came with it.

💥 Cannons and Domestic Disputes

🏡 Adams bought the sprawling 12,000 sq ft property near Cirencester back in 2002. Complete with eight bedrooms, seven bathrooms, a tennis court, a swimming pool, and a detached two-bedroom cottage, it was the ultimate country retreat.

👀 When Gallagher and his partner Debbie Gwyther came to view the house, Adams hoped a pair of decorative Arsenal cannons stationed near the front door might act as an icebreaker.

🗣️ "Liam’s lovely, and Debbie’s great," Adams told FFT. "She’s an Arsenal fan. Stevenage girl... They’re great Arsenal fans." The cannons, however, immediately sparked a hilarious debate between the buyers:

🗣️ "Liam went, ‘They’ve got to go.’ But Debbie said, ‘No, they’re staying here.’" There was just one catch. "I said, ‘They’re not staying,’" Adams grinned. "They were coming with me!"

🗣️ "Is That What I'm Known For Now?!"

🗞️ With Oasis' massive 2025 reunion tour taking over the headlines, news of Liam's big move to the quiet 500-person village quickly spread—forcing the singer to reassure locals on X that he would be on his best behaviour ("I come in peace... you won't even know I'm there – I’m LO FI. LG x").

😂 For Adams, though, the multi-million-pound sale has yielded a few funny moments. "I was at a do recently," Adams recalled. "We’d been talking for an hour and 10 minutes about Arsenal and addiction, and all this serious stuff. Then this 12-year-old lad comes up to me and says, ‘Oh… you sold your house to Liam Gallagher,’ and I thought, ‘Is that what I’m known for now?!’”

❤️ 30 Years of Sporting Chance

🥇 While doubling his money on a property deal with Britain's biggest rock star is impressive, Adams' true legacy extends far beyond bricks and Mortar—and even his trophy cabinet.

📚 This year marks 30 years since Adams quit alcohol. Following his best-selling book Addiction, he used the proceeds to launch the Sporting Chance clinic in 2000. More than a quarter of a century later, the charity continues to provide vital mental health and addiction support to thousands of current and former athletes.

📖 Read Nick Callow’s full, in-depth interview with Tony Adams in Issue 396 of FourFourTwo magazine, on sale September 24th.

🛒 Tony Adams’ new book, '1996: Reflections on the Year that Changed My Life', is available now.

🗣️ 'I lived with Jason Statham when I was 17 but we haven't spoke in years'🎬⚽️ Dion Dublin living with Hollywood action ...
10/09/2026

🗣️ 'I lived with Jason Statham when I was 17 but we haven't spoke in years'

🎬⚽️ Dion Dublin living with Hollywood action star Jason Statham as a 17-year-old in Great Yarmouth might just be the most absurdly brilliant crossover in football history

🛋️ Speaking exclusively to FourFourTwo, the former Aston Villa and Manchester United striker revealed how the pair shared a flat long before either made it big.

🥁🎧🏊‍♂️ Drums, DJ Sets & Diving Boards

🐥 Back when Dublin was a youth player at Norwich City, his brother was working as a DJ in Great Yarmouth—and his best mate happened to be a pre-fame Jason Statham.

🗣️ "Jason Statham was best friends with my brother, who was a DJ in Great Yarmouth when I was a young player at Norwich City, so I lived with him. Jason played the drums. My brother played bass, too, so they played in a band together." — Dion Dublin

🍏 Before becoming Hollywood's go-to on-screen hardman in Lock, Stock, Sn**ch, and The Transporter, Statham was working market stalls and competing as a high-board diver for Great Britain.

🗣️ "The Jason I knew back then was a very nice, very fun guy. There was a big leisure complex on the sea front at Great Yarmouth so J used to go down sometimes and do his practice on the high board... I think he's deserved everything he’s achieved."

🎬 "Dion Dublin, Action Hero!"

🎞️ While Statham eventually headed to Los Angeles and Dublin went on to win Premier League titles, cap England four times, and host Homes Under The Hammer, the former Villa marksman admits he wouldn't mind trying his hand at blockbusters next.

🗣️ "Would I fancy moving to Hollywood to follow in Jason Statham’s footsteps? The property is too expensive! But I’d love to go out there and give it a go. Imagine that. Dion Dublin, action hero! I’d throw my hat in the ring if they’d give us a job."

Como 1907 make their Champions League debut tonight, to celebrate, they have dropped a 'Sticker Collection' four-piece l...
10/09/2026

Como 1907 make their Champions League debut tonight, to celebrate, they have dropped a 'Sticker Collection' four-piece lifestyle capsule in collaboration with Adidas. 🇮🇹👕

💡 The Concept: Wearable History

🎟️ The collection revolves around a simple, nostalgic premise: football history lives in the small items supporters hold onto—an old match ticket, a worn season card, or a faded laptop sticker.

👕 Designers embedded vintage fragments of Como’s past directly into Adidas lifestyle silhouettes, turning matchday nostalgia into modern streetwear.

🗣️ "The most interesting parts of a club’s identity are often the things that were never designed to become important... Over time those things become part of the language of the club." — Rhuigi Villaseñor

🔬 The Details

The graphics reference real moments from the archives. Among the patch designs layered onto the garments is an exact replica of a match ticket from Bologna vs Como at the Stadio Renato Dall’Ara on April 2, 1983—the day Roberto Galia scored to secure a famous 1-0 away win.

🤌 Other details pull directly from iconic Curva graphics and historical membership cards spanning several generations of the club.

💊 The Capsule

🔵 Como Sticker Jacket (€285): A blue adidas jacket covered in layered Como 1907 heritage patches.

🔵 Como Sticker T-Shirt - Blue (€89): Heavyweight cotton tee featuring a curated selection of supporter-culture patches.

🔴 Como Sticker T-Shirt - Red (€89): A bolder graphic treatment rooted in classic terrace culture.

🟠 Como Sticker T-Shirt - Orange (€89): A vibrant colourway blending vintage club references.

🛒 The collection is available now via the official Como 1907 online store and local retail locations.

👇 Read more about Como's journey to the Champions League with Cesc Fabregas below

09/09/2026

This José x Bellingham link up is scary 🥶

⚠️ Forget right-backs in midfield—Chelsea’s issues are systemic, and Arsenal laid out the blueprint for the rest of the ...
08/09/2026

⚠️ Forget right-backs in midfield—Chelsea’s issues are systemic, and Arsenal laid out the blueprint for the rest of the Premier League to exploit it.

Why Xabi Alonso’s 3-4-3 has a massive structural problem 👇

🧠 The Misdirection of Personnel
Much has been made of Alonso’s experiment using natural right-backs in central midfield. But focussing strictly on personnel masks a deeper, structural flaw.
It isn't about who is playing there—it’s about the 3-4-3 system itself.

📊 The Fatal Flaw: A 5-on-2 Overload
By default, a 3-4-3 leaves just two central midfielders. In theory, wide players or dropping attackers balance this out. In practice, top sides tear it apart.

😡 Mikel Arteta exploited this relentlessly:
Kai Havertz dropped deep off the frontline.
Riccardo Calafiori inverted constantly from left-back. The result? A 5-v-2 numerical advantage for Arsenal in central areas.

🎯 How It Decided the Game
Arsenal swarmed Chelsea's engine room both in transition and set possession:

1. Havertz dropped into the vast space behind Chelsea's two midfielders to initiate key moves.
2. Calafiori made interior runs to drag defenders away.
3. Ødegaard & Havertz found complete freedom in the half-spaces. This overload directly created the space for Arsenal's winning goal.

📉 The Possession Problem
Alonso’s peak Bayer Leverkusen side averaged 62.1% possession. At Chelsea, they currently rank 19th in the Premier League for possession at a staggering 36.3%. When a team can't control the central zone, they can't control the match—regardless of state or opposition.

⚽ The Modern Tactical Landscape
When Antonio Conte won the title with a 3-4-3 in 2016/17, he had N'Golo Kanté (essentially two players in one) playing in a league before structural high-pressing and positional play became standard. In 2026, against hyper-orchestrated, fluid midfields, an isolated pivot simply cannot survive.

💡 The Takeaway
Chelsea were competitive, but Arsenal revealed the template. Surrounding Chelsea’s central two with dropping forwards and inverting full-backs completely neutralises their buildup. Unless Alonso adapts the structure, playing two right-backs in the middle is just papering over the cracks.

Read the full analysis by Alex Keble ⤵️

🍽️ 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗶𝘀𝗵𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗪𝗵𝗼 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱The story of Joe Gaetjens—the dishwashing striker who knocked England out of the ...
08/09/2026

🍽️ 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗗𝗶𝘀𝗵𝘄𝗮𝘀𝗵𝗲𝗿 𝗪𝗵𝗼 𝗦𝗵𝗼𝗰𝗸𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗪𝗼𝗿𝗹𝗱

The story of Joe Gaetjens—the dishwashing striker who knocked England out of the 1950 World Cup before meeting a tragic end in Haiti 🧵 👇

📆 June 29, 1950. Belo Horizonte, Brazil. A broad-grinned Larry ‘Joe’ Gaetjens is carried shoulder-high by local fans. The USA have just beaten England 1-0 in one of the biggest World Cup upsets in history, thanks to Gaetjens' legendary header.

🇭🇹 Gaetjens wasn’t even a US citizen. He arrived in New York from Haiti in 1947 on an accountancy scholarship, washing dishes in a German restaurant to make ends meet. He asked his boss to help him find a football team.

🗣️ “I hope you play soccer better than you wash dishes,” his boss told him. He was sent for a trial at Brookhattan in the semi-pro American Soccer League.

⚽️ Gaetjens topped the ASL scoring charts in 1950—even though Brookhattan finished bottom.

🤝 His selection for the USA’s 1950 World Cup squad was still a massive surprise. He hadn’t played in the qualifiers or warm-ups, but impressed in a trial match in St Louis just before the team departed for Brazil.

🚘 At the time, US soccer was thoroughly grassroots. Players worked 40-hour weeks as PE teachers or funeral directors, training twice a week in local parks using car headlights to see in the dark.

🏆 While tournament debutants England entered as 3-1 favourites, the Americans were 500-1 outsiders.

⭐️ England boasted stars like Tom Finney, Billy Wright, and Stan Mortensen. They expected a walkover.

⚽️ Instead, 38 minutes in, Walter Bahr fired a shot from 25 yards. Gaetjens threw himself at it, deflecting the ball past the English keeper while falling face-down in the mud.

😮 England pressed furiously in the second half—hitting the woodwork, having a rugby-tackle foul on Mortensen given outside the box, and seeing a header cleared off the line—but the Americans held firm for a historic 1-0 win.

🇫🇷 While the victory became sports lore, Gaetjens’ life took a dark turn. He never became a US citizen or played for the USA again, later moving to France before returning home to Haiti.

🚨 In 1964, after retiring to run a dry-cleaning business, he was arrested by Haiti’s secret police under the regime of dictator François 'Papa Doc' Duvalier. Although Gaetjens was non-political, his family had opposed the dictatorship.

☠️ Gaetjens was last seen alive two days later in Haiti’s notorious Fort Dimanche prison, where thousands were murdered. His body was never found.

✍️ Alex Leith

🗣️ "No, it’s not my wish to become the president of Liberia"💰 "If I was a selfish man who kept all his money to himself,...
08/09/2026

🗣️ "No, it’s not my wish to become the president of Liberia"

💰 "If I was a selfish man who kept all his money to himself, I may be a millionaire by now..."

⏪ Thirty years ago, in March 1996, FourFourTwo sat down with newly crowned Ballon d’Or winner George Weah.

💔 At £6 million from PSG, the Milan striker was already proving to be football's bargain of the decade. But behind the thunderous goals, the world-class flair, and the seamless pairing with Roberto Baggio lay an extraordinary, heartbreaking reality: Weah was single-handedly bankrolling an entire nation's footballing survival while his family was trapped in the horrors of the Liberian Civil War.

👑 From flying his teammates across Europe out of his own pocket to taking on Arsène Wenger's fatherly advice, here is King George in his own words from 1996 👇

ON BANKROLLING THE LIBERIAN NATIONAL TEAM
🎤 FFT: After helping Liberia qualify for their first-ever Africa Cup of Nations, what do you tell those who label you a one-man team?

🗣️ WEAH: "It’s not true. Maybe they say so because I single-handedly sponsor the team without receiving assistance from the government or any other person. I’ve committed my personal funds because I want Liberia’s global image, which has been badly dented by the civil war, to be repaired through football.

🗣️ "I buy all the playing gear and return international air fares for some of the country’s European-based players. I also pay match bonuses to my less financially endowed teammates... It’s been a big responsibility that has run into tens of thousands of dollars."

ON THE ANGUISH OF THE LIBERIAN CIVIL WAR
🎤 FFT: The civil war was raging while you were playing for Monaco and PSG. Did knowing what was happening at home affect you?

🗣️ WEAH: "It had a very adverse effect on me. I didn’t know whether my parents were dead or alive, as it was impossible to call Liberia at the time.

"Unfortunately, people found it difficult to understand the torment that I was going through — Europeans find it very difficult to appreciate what we Africans go through when we think about home. As far as they are concerned, we’ve been paid to do a job and we just have to do it. But if they were in my shoes, they would have been in a worse mental state than me."

ON WORKING WITH ARSÈNE WENGER
🎤 FFT: How was it when you first moved to Europe to play for Monaco?

🗣️ WEAH: "It wasn’t so easy. I had to readjust to the cold European weather and the business-like attitude to football, which is absent in Africa. I was very lucky to have met Arsène Wenger. His coaching contributed to what I’ve become today. He treated me as if I was his own son."

ON LIFE IN MILAN & ROBERTO BAGGIO
🎤 FFT: What is it like to be playing upfront next to Roberto Baggio?

🗣️ WEAH: "It’s very rewarding. He’s an intelligent player with virtually no technical faults. When we play together, we have a good working relationship. I’m trying to learn new tricks from him as well."

🎤 FFT: Are you affected by any temptations from the glitzy lifestyle in Italy — the fast cars, trendy clothes and gorgeous women?

🗣️ WEAH: "I’m not into any of those mundane things. Business is business – I’m in Milan to play football. Well, I must confess that I like good clothes and pick out the occasional good pair of shoes, but that’s it. The job comes first."

ON BEING A MILLIONAIRE
🎤 FFT: Many believe you must be a millionaire in any currency to be able to sponsor both your national team and a domestic Liberian club...

🗣️ WEAH: "[Laughs] A millionaire? I wish I was a millionaire! A large part of what I earn goes to people who are in need. As long as hunger is far away from my door, I’m happy. I would estimate that I’ve spent close to 20 per cent of my earnings in European football on my extended family, my friends and fellow Liberians that I don’t even know.

"Perhaps if I was a mean and selfish man who keeps all of his money to himself, then I may be a millionaire by now!"

ON POLITICS & THE PRESIDENCY
🎤 FFT: Do you have the widely rumoured ambition to become the President of Liberia when you leave football?

🗣️ WEAH: "No, it’s not my wish to become the president of Liberia. My mission is simply to use football to make Liberia known in a good light all over the world. I know what it means to carry such a responsibility.

"I do hope that true democracy comes to Africa, so that its citizens can speak freely about what they do or don’t like about their various governments."

👇 Read the full interview below

08/09/2026

Have Man City future-proofed their midfield? 🔮

👑 The Champions League group stage kicks off tonight - so it's only right we drop our predictions 🔮 Leave yours below! ...
08/09/2026

👑 The Champions League group stage kicks off tonight - so it's only right we drop our predictions 🔮 Leave yours below!

07/09/2026

Is Elliot Anderson really worth 116m? 🤔

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