One thing about Wilfried Zaha: at 20 he is still a bit young to be considered for ball-boy duties at Swansea City. What he isn’t, however, is too young to be the subject of a significant investment by Manchester United.

Although no figures were released either by United or the selling club Crystal Palace, it is thought upwards of £12 million will eventually exchange hands. Which could mean, in these days of inflated transfer fees, United have pulled off the bargain of the decade.

Not that United fans are going to see the player in their team’s colours anytime soon. In a very shrewd move,

Bradford’s chairman was on the radio just ahead of his team’s League Cup semi against Aston Villa last night saying that he had received only one inquiry about his manager Phil Parkinson since the victory in the first leg. You imagine his phone will be ringing hot today.

Parkinson’s ability to prepare his team for a big match has surely been noted across the game. Much has been made of the cost of his side at Valley Parade: £7,500 was all that he paid to assemble the team that has now knocked out three Premier League clubs.

About the same, it should not be forgotten, as Benito Carbone received

It is, according to football's Uncle Fester, all over at Stamford Bridge. Interviewed in the Sun this morning, Ray Wilkins suggests that the decision of Pep Guardiola to spurn Chelsea and head for Bavaria means Roman Abramovich will find it now nigh-on-impossible to recruit a decent manager.

Guardiola's refusal is the first indication that the Russian's twitchy impatience with his coaches is becoming problematic. It might be thought he has everything available to attract the top talent from across the globe: more money than Croesus, a budget to die for, a state-of-the-art training facility

At first reading it might seem there is nothing wrong with Arsenal’s letter asking for Financial Fair Play to be introduced to the Premier League.

'Live within your means' seems the minimum requirement for football clubs. Especially when the rewards from television income are now so huge, it appears madness that certain operations are able to sustain un-viable losses thanks to benefactors. And we know precisely who the Gooners are whining about.

But just ask yourself this: which of the following is a better model for football in the long term? One in which a set of owners, by dint of a

Before Christmas I went to Elland Road to watch Leeds take on Chelsea in the Capital One Cup and if such spume-flecked fury can be described as such, there was something almost poignant about the hostility the locals showed to their visitors. Back in the seventies the animosity between the two clubs was intense, reflected as much on the pitch as on the terraces: boy did those players hate each other. It was a clash of cultures as much as a reflection of the north/south divide. But it was also a rivalry stoked by this fact: both sides were pursuing the game’s big prizes. When they back then

There was a lot of hurt English pride in the reporting of FIFA's Team of 2012, which was released yesterday. Not a single English-based player was included. No Van Persie, no Silva, no Kompany, no Yaya Toure. No Rooney or Gerrard either.

The Premier League - which likes to think of itself as leading the global game - looked rather secondary in the opinion of its footballing peers, who reckoned the best XI players in the world all ply their trade in Spain.

Such a blank has happened before. In 2010 there were eight representatives of the Spanish League, three from Italy and none from England.

Outside Manchester City’s Etihad Stadium, stretching across a vast tract of empty brownfield land all the way across to the Manchester velodrome, is the site of the club’s new training complex.

At a cost of some £250 million, the 80-acre Etihad Campus encompasses all sorts of superlatives, from state of the art medical facilities to the most advanced of all-weather pitches. Construction began last September, using a local workforce and locally sourced materials, suggesting this will not only be a magnificent facility, but one rooted in its community.

But, among its dazzling array of

There are many questions to be asked about football as the New Year gets underway. Such as: if Mario Balotelli is being paid £150,000 a week for the princely return of one goal and no assists this season, where can the rest of us find an employer as generous as his?

And why did Chelsea feel the need to play in white the other day away at Norwich? Are their players no longer able to distinguish between yellow and blue? Also how long will it be before referees stop allowing their reputations to be continuously assaulted and actually apply some technology to help them in their task?

But the