I once had my photo taken with Takeda Shingen. It wasn't the real Takeda Shingen - he died in 1573, according to Wikipedia - but rather a friendly local dressed as the legendary "daimyo" for Kōfu's annual Takeda Shingen festival. I was especially impressed with the moustache our modern Takeda Shingen had drawn on in thick black texta for historical accuracy.

Yamanashi-ken may be isolated, but it's a friendly place full of students and young families - not to mention several Takeda Shingen impersonators - so I was looking forward to making the train trip out passed Fuji-san and on to capital Kōfu. Unfortunately the apocalyptic rain  lashing Shimizu Station as I awaited the Limited Express (one assumes the "limited" refers to how infrequently the train runs) suggested a wet afternoon was in store. 

Lo and behold, the clouds parted just long enough in Kōfu to enjoy an action-packed afternoon in the congenial company of Ken Matsushima, editor of The Rising Sun News and all-round encyclopaedia on the Japanese game, as we sat down to enjoy Ventforet Kōfu's clash with Consadole Sapporo in J2.

A crowd of 11,252 packed into Kose Sports Park for Ventforet's home opener with the Hokkaido outfit - slightly less than the 13,734 fans the home side averaged in J2 last season - but no doubt the menacing clouds that hung low over the mountains kept some fans at home and in front of their TV screens.

The swirling wind blowing down off the Southern Alps made life difficult for both keepers, and no doubt it contributed to Ventforet's opener. Yohei Onishi surprised everyone - including himself - when his attempted cross from a free-kick flew straight into the top corner of Yuya Sato's goal.

If there was any doubt about Onishi's finishing ability, he dispelled it soon after with a well-taken strike, as the lively front man steadied himself following a swift counter-attack, before thumping a skidding drive across Sato and into the far corner of the goal. 

The goals were slightly harsh on a Sapporo side that looked well up for this hard-fought encounter, and following a sustained period of pressure after the restart, they pulled one goal back when defender Hiroyuki Nishijima flicked a header home on the hour mark.

Nevertheless it was the hosts who finished the stronger, and they should have added to their lead late on, only for some wayward finishing from Korean striker Kim Shin-Young and Brazilian front man Maranhao to let them down.

They may hail from one of the most isolated regions in the country, but Kōfu fans can be forgiven for dreaming of a return to the top flight, where they stunned many under the guidance of popular coach Takeshi Oki by managing to stay up in 2006.

The "swarm defence" is long gone and so too is Oki - incredibly he was dismissed when Ventforet suffered relegation in 2007 - but with fans as passionate as the Kōfu faithful, I have no doubt the mountain men will be in the mix when it comes to promotion this season.

Liverpool hammer Real Madrid. Barcelona thrash Lyon. Sporting Lisbon capitulate at Bayern Munich, while Chelsea sneak through against Juventus. Arsenal's win on penalties over Roma makes for grim viewing in Italy, as the English Premier League begins to assert its dominance over the struggling Italian game.

None of these things would probably matter in Asia, if it weren't for the fact that the Asian Football Confederation is trying to emulate the success of the UEFA Champions League with a revamped AFC Champions League of its own.

Yet in an opening round in which a crowd of 500 turned out to watch Qatar's Al Gharafa lose 3-1 to Saudi side Al Shabab - and this in a Qatar that one day hopes to host a World Cup - about the closest Asian fans came to the glamour of the European version was when the TV cameras zoomed in on former Tokyo Verdy striker Hulk as he went around for Portugese outfit Porto in their UEFA Champions League tie with Atletico Madrid.

Therein lies the problem. With so many fans in Asia absorbed in the drama that is the UEFA Champions League, it's little wonder that attendances such as the 3,156 that turned out at the 44,466-capacity Big Crown Stadium to witness South Korean outfit Ulsan Hyundai Horang-i lose 3-1 to Toyota-backed Nagoya Grampus, are the norm.

And that's only to scratch at the surface of the problem. Despite a vast increase in prize-money, it still piffles into insignificance compared to the riches on offer in Japan. So it is any wonder to see reigning J. League champions Kashima Antlers sleep-walk through a 4-1 hammering at the hands of recently-crowned K-League champions Suwon Samsung Bluewings? 

A decent crowd of 14,126 turned out for the Suwon - Kashima clash - not a bad effort on a cold, midweek evening, especially since many Asian fans turn in long hours at the office. But a crowd of 23,168 fans turned out just four days earlier to watch Suwon lose to Pohang Steelers on the opening day of the K. League season. And that brings up another vexing issue.

It's a delicate one - and one that probably requires an element of the dreaded political correctness in terms of discussion - but many Asian cultures retain centuries-old superiority complexes when it comes to dealing with their neighbours. Far from viewing their teams as "underdogs" and wanting to see them do battle with regional heavyweight rivals, some Asian fans would rather pretend that their regional rivals simply didn't exist.

Gamba Osaka's 3-0 win over Chinese side Shandong Luneng might have prompted a solemn cry of "we suspected as much!" from some of the 10,312 fans on hand at Banpaku in midweek - and that in itself was a larger crowd than defending champions Gamba usually draw in Asia - but there will be many more fans in attendance when the Osakans host Jubilo Iwata in the J. League on Saturday afternoon. Best to slay a familiar foe than potentially lose face against a regional rival, it seems - and if necessary, test yourself against the best of the world at the FIFA Club World Cup.

Nevertheless, the AFC look set to persist with their "if you build it, they will come" approach. I, for one, am happy to see them do so. Speaking as an Australian, there is much for A-League sides to learn from our Asian counterparts, and the Champions League has the potential to chip away at some of the barriers that still stand tall in Asian culture - even if it is only for ninety minutes.

But clearly, popularising the AFC Champions League is going to take some time. And given the toll it takes on clubs - Kawasaki Frontale, for example, play games on March 7, 11, 14, 18 and 22 in both the J. League and Champions League in what is the opening month of their season - it's not difficult to understand why some sides might prefer to concentrate on domestic duties.

Urawa Reds must be laughing at all of this. Reaching the Champions League might be their goal, but it's the fact that they are not playing in it this season that will probably help them reach it.

It's been a difficult few years for Tsuneyasu Miyamoto. More or less frozen out at Gamba Osaka - despite captaining Japan at the time - in 2007 Miyamoto set off for Austria for a new challenge at Salzburg.

Hooking up with another ex-Japan international in the form of Alex, who joined Salzburg on a one-year loan deal from Urawa Reds, Miyamoto made a positive impression in the Austrian Bundesliga, before a series of debilitating injuries cut short his Austrian sojourn - on the pitch, at least - with Miyamoto failing to play a single game during the 2008/09 campaign.

Now one of Japan's most popular players is back in the J. League and he's back in the Kansai region... but not, as one might expect, at Gamba Osaka.

Instead the central defender has signed for Gamba's local rivals Vissel Kobe, who have a new coach in the form of Brazilian Caio Júnior and a totally remodelled squad.

Gone are key men Yoshito Okubo and Leandro - the former jetting off to the German Bundesliga to link up with Makoto Hasebe at VfL Wolfsburg, the latter having made the short journey to link up with Gamba Osaka - with Brazilians Alan Bahia and Marcel and ex-Kawasaki Frontale striker Kazuki Ganaha arriving in their stead.

Miyamoto's arrival cushions the blow for Vissel, after they failed in their bid to lure talismanic Yokohama F. Marinos defender Yuji Nakazawa away from Nissan Stadium.

Unfortunately for Omiya Ardija - who also tabled a NTT-backed mega-deal for the Japan stalwart - they are left empty-handed, with Nakazawa opting to stick it out at his beloved Marinos, despite the club's problems on and off the pitch. 

Nakazawa now looks set to link up with Japan team-mate Shunsuke Nakamura at Nissan Stadium, with Nakamura expected to leave Scottish giants Celtic when his contract expires in June.

They represent the kind of personnel that Omiya Ardija can only dream of, with the Squirrels instead having to make do with Croatian defender Mato Neretljak, signed from K-League giants Suwon Bluewings.

Also moving to Japan are a plethora of Koreans, with ex-Pohang Steelers midfielder Park Won-Jae one of many to have inked a J. League deal, as he likewise moves to Saitama to line up at Omiya Ardija next season.

Speaking of next season, there are now less than 50 days until the 2009 campaign kicks off! I know because I checked the handy countdown clock over at the S-Pulse UK Ultras site, which saves me the laborious task of figuring these things out in my head.

The 2009 version of the J. League looks like it will be bigger and better than ever.

Tsuneyasu Miyamoto is back. Soon enough, the football will be too.

"Which one of you bitches wants to dance?

Hey, you know when you're doing the usual sort of threesome thing you do of a weekend and, you know, the moonlight's bouncing of your heads and your arses and everything... does that not get a bit confusing?

Right, look, this is you, okay... tra la la la la la la la la la la la laaaaa la la!

Millwall, that's the one. Do you know this chant? Er, Millwall, Millwall you're really dreadful and all your girlfriends are unfulfilled and alienated."

*Whack*

So goes cantankerous bookshop owner Bernard Black's encounter with a trio of Millwall-supporting skinheads in the TV-comedy "Black Books," when Bernard is attempting to get out of doing his taxes by somehow injuring himself.

I have no idea if Millwall's reputation for thuggery is still deserved. Quite frankly I don't even know which division they're in. The last I heard of Millwall their fans were seemingly running amok in Budapest in a UEFA Cup tie against Ferencváros, but as that was a few seasons ago I have no idea whether things have calmed down since then.

One thing I know is that there is not that much to like about Kashiwa Reysol. Their hardcore supporters are a bunch of wannabe hooligans and their football team is not much better. So I was delighted when Shimizu S-Pulse beat Kashiwa Reysol 3-2 at a balmy Nihondaira Stadium last night.

It was a most un-Japanese of fixtures. It got off to an inauspicious start for your's truly, when I stumbled into the ground five minutes after kick-off. I'd like to think there was a more noble cause for my tardiness, but the truth is that I was scoffing down a ham-and-cheese sandwich on the lounge at home, warily eyeing the clock in the knowledge that as every minute passed there was an increasing likelihood that I was about to miss something important. It didn't help that I dropped into the convenience store to buy a couple of beers that I polished off en route.

By the time I arrived, S-Pulse were leading 1-0 thanks to Shinji Okazaki's goal. They made it two when Takuma Edamura stooped to head home at the far post just ten minutes in. Reysol pulled a goal back through Minoru Suganuma - who seemed to react by booting a water bottle into the stand behind the goal... didn't Eddy Bosnar get suspended for that just the other day? - before Kashiwa drew level before half-time from the spot. Now, I might not have had the best of views being about 90 metres away from the action, and it probably doesn't help that I hate Kashiwa Reysol, but from where I was standing it looked as though Reysol striker Franca simply slipped over in the steamy conditions, rather than being pulled down by Keisuke Iwashita. Whatever, the ex-Bayer Leverkusen striker coolly converted the spot-kick as the two teams were locked at 2-2 at the break.

For some reason that I didn't quite catch there was a fireworks display at half-time, and with the wind blowing down from the hills and across the ground, Nihondaira took on an eerie feel as smoke billowed across the pitch. It may or may not have contributed to Shinji Okazaki's second goal - he stuck out a foot to deflect a thunderous cross-come-shot passed Takanori Sugeno, and thereafter the match descended into a kick-fest, with the worst culprit Reysol substitute Alex. He was booting things left, right and centre... and none of them seemed to be the ball. It was hardly surprising when he earned himself a second yellow card for almost snapping off Keisuke Iwashita's leg, and despite the fact that Iwashita appeared to be suffering a near-death experience on the pitch, it didn't stop the mouthy Franca from accusing Iwashita of play-acting, as he tried to lift the prone S-Pulse defender back to his feet.

In the end the victory was wildly celebrated by S-Pulse fans, as it lifts Shimizu above local rivals Jubilo Iwata and into fourteenth place in the standings. It shut Reysol's travelling support up as well, and all the juvenile jibes about Shimizu's family-friendly atmosphere will have meant nothing for the Reysol fans on their long trip back to Chiba. A great night out for S-Pulse fans, then, although I must apologise to Millwall, who surely don't play the kind of anti-football on display from Kashiwa in this one.

It was a lazy headline writer's dream overnight as the J. League continued its haemoraging of big-name Brazilian strikers, with Hulk leaving a club that most people in Europe have never heard of (Tokyo Verdy) to join a club that most people in Europe forget won the UEFA Champions League in 2004 (FC Porto).

Practically every single online news outlet across the globe greeted the signing with the news that Porto had signed "the incredible Hulk," although perhaps the most incredible thing about the bustling Brazilian was his penchant for spectacular tantrums.

After running the Urawa Reds defence ragged in Verdy's recent 3-2 loss to the Reds at Saitama Stadium, Hulk was incensed at his 73rd minute substitution by coach Tetsuji Hashiratani. Cue his usual outburst, which resulted in Hulk returning to Brazil - apparently to oversee the birth of his child, at least according to Tokyo Verdy.

Now the much-travelled striker has lobbed up at FC Porto, and the ex-European champions will do well to rein in the giant striker's combustible temperament. After joining Kawasaki Frontale in 2005, Hulk was loaned out to Second Division club Consadole Sapporo where he blasted home 25 goals in 38 league games. With Sapporo unable to meet Hulk's hefty wage demands the burly Brazilian then found himself at Tokyo Verdy, whom he fired back to the top flight with an even more impressive 37 goals in 42 games. Some 62 goals in two seasons in J2 was enough to prompt Kawasaki to recall Hulk for the 2008 season, but after playing just three games he was promptly sold to Tokyo Verdy, with Kawasaki officials claiming that Hulk had had a negative impact on the Frontale dressing room.

Now the 22-year-old will be hoping to make his mark on European football, but with Verdy having hardly missed the Brazilian in their most recent 2-1 win over Kashiwa Reysol - in which ex-Torino striker Masashi Oguro turned in an impressive performance alongside strike partner Kazuki Hiramoto, Hulk may need to buckle down as he seeks to have an impact in Portugal.

Liga Deportiva Universitaria's remarkable penalty shoot-out victory over Brazilian giants Fluminense in the recent Copa Libertadores final will cause headaches in Japan. That's because as continental club champions, LDU Quito have won through to face the likes of English champions Manchester United and Mexican outfit Pachuca at the 2008 FIFA Club World Cup.

The 2009 and 2010 editions of the FIFA Club World Cup will be played in Dubai, and critics suggest that FIFA's desire to move the tournament away from Japan stems partly from a lack of local support. All three of the Club World Cup finals played at Yokohama International Stadium have drawn capacity crowds, yet the match-ups in those finals have been as follows;

Liverpool vs Sao Paulo

Barcelona vs Internacional

AC Milan vs Boca Juniors

To suggest that South American football is well regarded in Japan is true only to an extent. Certainly the J. League borrowed heavily from aspects of Brazilian and Argentinian football culture when Japan kicked-off its professional football league, and the biggest Brazilian and Argentinian teams are popular in Japan. Boca Juniors were well supported at last year's Club World Cup, but that was partly because current Urawa striker Naohiro Takahara once played for Boca, albeit briefly.

That fact that Liga de Quito have now booked their place in this year's Club World Cup will cause headaches for tournament organisers. Enticing local fans to the preliminary rounds of the competition was already a hard-sell, but FIFA have at least been able to rely on one European and one South American giant to sell tickets to semi-final fixtures. Now Liga de Quito will throw a spanner in the works, with the Ecuadorian club unheard of in Japanese football circles.

A Fluminense victory in the Copa Libertadores final would have been welcomed with open arms, given that Flu's powerful striker Washington scored 64 goals in just 85 J. League games for Tokyo Verdy and Urawa Reds. "Washington Returns" would have been the banner headline of the day, with the Japanese public no doubt keen to bask in the globe-trotting striker's reflected glory.

Liga de Quito will inspire no such headlines in Japan. Manchester United will invariably prove the biggest drawcard at the tournament - although the fake jersey sellers outside the National Stadium in Tokyo will groan in disbelief should Cristiano Ronaldo choose to move on, but even if a Japanese team manages to make it through to the semi-finals of the tournament, the prospect of a half-empty National Stadium looms large for what is supposedly a showpiece FIFA tournament.

It's a funny old league, the J-League. Whether it's players labelling their coach "an idiot" in front of the press, referees sending off the wrong bemused player or top teams choking badly at already relegated clubs, there's rarely a dull moment in the Japanese game.

The same could be said of the 2.Bundesliga - a league I know well having watched many a Fortuna Köln game in that division, before die Fortunen died a slow, agonising death. One club that has managed to avoid a similar fate is eastern German side FC Carl Zeiss Jena, and by all accounts the second-from-bottom strugglers are on the verge of signing one Naoya Kikuchi.

It would be safe to say that 2007 wasn't quite Kikuchi's year. The midfielder was enjoying a solid, if unspectacular start to the new J-League season when word came through of an indiscretion that was set to cost the former Japan under-22 international his job.

In a turn of events that left even the most hardened J-League watcher shaking their head in disbelief (or maybe chuckling ever so slightly), Kikuchi was involved in one of the most bizarre sex scandals ever conceived.

It seems that one afternoon the young midfielder was particularly taken with a certain schoolgirl who happened to be passing him by. The two apparently locked eyes, and next thing you know they were getting jiggy with it in the back seat of Kikuchi's car. For some reason, Kikuchi attempted to pay the young lady in question the token sum of 10,000 yen after the deed was done. But his indiscretion was to cost him a lot more than that.

Kikuchi, in his infinite wisdom, inadvertently left his wallet in the front basket of the schoolgirl's bicycle, and left. The schoolgirl, being an upstanding, albeit amorous citizen of the world, dutifully handed the wallet in to local police, claiming that she had found it on the ground. The police took one look inside the wallet and promptly declared her a thief.

Evidently not wanting to take the fall for a crime that she had not committed, the schoolgirl confessed that she had had sex in the back seat of the car with the owner of the wallet. But this wasn't your average case of a star-struck teenage fan. She'd never even heard of Naoya Kikuchi!

The police had certainly heard of Naoya Kikuchi. They charged him with having sex with a minor - the schoolgirl was just 15, and Kikuchi was immediately sacked by his club side Jubilo Iwata. Claiming that his team's image had been tarnished, Jubilo Chairman Hiroshi Ukon even took a pay-cut - and fined several other members of his staff, for allowing Kikuchi to bring the club into disrepute.

The morality of Kikuchi's shenanighans aside - and let's not forget that it takes two to tango, he certainly took quite a fall for a few minutes worth of summertime fun. Ironically had he bothered to drive his femme fatale across prefectural borders to Kanagawa-ken, he wouldn't have even committed a crime! He just so happened to be committing a crime in his native Shizuoka Prefecture.

After being slapped with a year-long domestic ban, it looks like the erstwhile Jubilo star will be resurrecting his career at the Ernst-Abbe-Sportfeld in Jena. I'm sure that the locals will take to him if he can help steer the struggling outfit to safety. But for everyone's sake, let's just hope the Jena training ground isn't located next to a school!

I read an interesting article over at the Kicker Magazin website yesterday about the transfer of Urawa Reds midfielder Makoto Hasebe to German Bundesliga side VfL Wolfsburg. Hasebe has been a lynchpin of the Urawa side for the past two seasons, but with his contract having expired, the 23-year-old has decided to try his luck in Europe.

According to Wolfsburg coach Felix Magath, Hasebe has been on the club's radar for some two years now. Magath claimed that the club's scouts had been interested in Hasebe since early 2006. But I wonder.

Certainly Hasebe did well enough to attract the attention of at least one European club, with Serie A strugglers Siena widely linked with the out-of-contract Reds star towards the end of 2007. Their interest came to naught though, with the Tuscans instead signing Brazilian goalkeeper Artur Moraes and soon-to-be Socceroo striker Richard Porta during the January transfer window.

That Hasebe chose to sign for a Bundesliga side comes as no surprise, given that his former coach at Urawa is none-other-than 1990 World Cup winner Guido Buchwald. Indeed, Hasebe's best season with Urawa came when the Reds lifted the J-League title under Buchwald in 2006. Yet I can't help but feel that the decision to sign Hasebe is as much an attempt to lift Wolfsburg's global profile, as it is one designed to strengthen their midfield.

Coach Magath has claimed that he envisages Hasebe to be a defensive midfielder in a two-man shield in front of the back four. Yet Wolfsburg already have two defensive midfielders in the form of Christian Gentner and Brazilian international Josué. The highly experienced Guinean Pablo Thiam is also standing in Hasebe's way.

Should Hasebe wish to break into the Wolfsburg starting eleven, then he'll invariably need to work on his physical strength. The 1.77 metre-midfielder was repeatedly knocked off the ball when Urawa came up against Milan in the recent FIFA Club World Cup, and he'll no longer have the intuitive Keita Suzuki by his side to clean up his mistakes. Indeed it's a wonder that no European clubs have made a more concerted effort to sign Suzuki, given that he's so clearly the most influential player in the Urawa line-up.

Of course pre-judging Hasebe's European career before a ball has even been kicked is hardly fair. It's just that history is not on his side. Of the Japanese players who have gone before him, only the exceptional Shunsuke Nakamura has shone in European football. Naohiro Takahara scored eleven league goals for Eintracht Frankfurt last season, only to up-and-leave for Urawa as soon as Frankfurt brought in some competition up front.

Mitsuo Ogasawara is perhaps a better example. He played over 200 games for Kashima Antlers, yet played just six times while on loan at Italian club Messina. He then returned to Kashima midway through the 2007 J-League season and promptly fired the Ibaraki club to the J-League title.

To suggest that Hasebe won't be the only foreign player at Wolfsburg would be an understatement, given that he becomes the SIXTEENTH different nationality at the club this season. But he'll need to adjust to the language and the food quick-smart. He'll also have to adjust from playing in a side that is perennially challenging for the league title, to one that is conceivably battling against relegation this season.

Perhaps the 2008-09 season is a more realistic timeline for Hasebe to break in to the Wolfsburg team. By then Christian Gentner could possibly return to VfB Stuttgart - who loaned him to Wolfsburg, while Pablo Thiam's contract is set to expire. Wolfburg's financial position will also play a role, given that the club spent a whopping 30 million euros on players last summer, and are so far yet to see any tangible returns. Wolfsburg won't be in Europe next season, but at the very least, Makoto Hasebe will hope to be.

For me, football and music go hand in hand. I've always loved both equally and have always lamented the fact that I'm rubbish at both. Still, I've spent a lot of good times watching games and watching bands and occasionally boring those around me with my inane opinions on either topic.

You can imagine my excitement, then, any time I discover bands that actually like football. One of my favourites is legendary Swiss band The Vanilla Muffins. Yesterday I was listening to their classic record "Ultra Fine Day," when I remembered that I interviewed their drummer Eddie for a 'zine I used to write called Drink, Drank,Tuck.

That was back in 2004 and since then the band have unfortunately disbanded (for health reasons) and morphed in to a new band. Anyway, I've still got the interview with Eddie sitting around in my inbox and even though it's way out of date, I thought I'd share it with you fine folks here!

Do you know many Australian bands? Do The Vanilla Muffins have plans to tour Down Under some time in the future?

I really love Rose Tattoo and AC/DC and of course I know Midnight Oil and Men At Work cos they had big hits over here but I hardly know any punk or Oi band from Australia, shame on me. We would really like to play some gigs in your country but first I guess we have to find a millionaire to buy us the plane tickets .

How would you compare the Swiss punk scene to the rest of the continent? What kind of reception do you receive in the French and Italian-speaking parts of Switzerland?

It's a small small scene here in Switzerland compared with the one in Germany for example. Also we haven't a big echo here in Switzerland cos nobody seem to know Vanilla Muffins over here. Maybe that's because we only played once in our country.

Do you think that more people are in to Oi! and Streetpunk in Europe than they are in the United States and possibly Australia?

I guess Germany is No. 1 in Oi and streetrock scenes worldwide, the U.S. seem to have a growning scene too but I have no idea what's happening Down Under.

If The Vanilla Muffins could share the stage with any three current bands in the world, what bands would they be and why?

I personally would like to share the stage with KISS, AC/DC and Motörhead. KISS for American Showtime and their all time hits, AC/DC for just being AC/DC and haven't changed their sound for 30 years (go for the next 30!) and Motörhead as my favourite band after the Ramones have retired.

Your latest album is "The Drug Is Football." You met at the St. Jakob-Parkstadion in Basel. And you’ve written numerous songs about your love for the red-and-blues of FC Basel. Just how important a role does football play in your music?

Football is one of the most important things in life, at least in my life (specially after those incredible 3 weeks of the EURO 2004 in Portugal, what a wonderful world it could be!), and so it plays also a very important role in our music. Of course some of our songs are about other things than football, not many but there are a few hehe.

FC Basel are the team to beat in Switzerland these days and their UEFA Champions League exploits of 2002 have given them a real European profile. Where do you think this sudden success has come from?

The team has improved much the last 3-4 years, thanx to Christian Gross the trainer, and with the (financial) participation of new persons (Gigi Oeri the new female club owner) in the club FC Basel finally could affort some players that brought more class into the team and with effort and of course a little bit of luck we could win some big games.

FC Basel will try again this summer to get into the Champions League but the teams to beat this time have names like Manchester United, Real Madrid or Juventus Turin, so all football gods have to be on our side again.

How do you rate the new St. Jakob-Parkstadion? What do you think of a standing-terrace being reintroduced in the Muttenzerkurve?

I really like the new stadium, I also think you can compare it to other international stadiums (you can't say that about many Swiss stadiums hehe). It's packed almost every match so it's really hard to get some tickets but I heard the stadion will be enlarged from now 33000 seats to around 41000 seats for the EURO 2008 (in Austria and Switzerland).

It's a much better feeling to stand during 90 minutes instead of sitting and jumping up every 10 seconds to see what has happened on the touchline but after some troubles with some idiots (throwing things) they have seated the whole Muttenzerkurve, in the same way as if every "Super League" match would be a Champions League match.

What about the current standard of Swiss football? Do you see any other clubs challenging the big three of FC Basel, Grasshoppers and Young Boys in the near future?

Before a new season starts there are always the usual "suspects" to fight for the crown, FC Basel, Grasshoppers (thought they played a really poor season and I hope the next one will be the same hehe), Young Boys (also try to get into the CL this summer) and FC Zürich. This time maybe Servette FC will be a big one too, they have found a new financier and are now buying new players like other people collect beer bottles.

All in all the standard of Swiss football, compared with the international leagues, is more or less poor.

How would you compare the Swiss national team that has qualified for the 2004 European Football Championships, with the team from Euro ‘96?

Before the EURO 2004 got started I hoped for some goals and for reaching maybe the quarter finals, now I'm a wiser man hehe. Switzerland exactly shot one goal, like in '96, so they kept their poor standard. At least it was a goal out of the game and not a penalty like in '96, that's the positive thing about Switzerland at the EURO 04.

Switzerland is co-hosting Euro 2008 with alpine neighbours Austria. Will The Vanilla Muffins be doing shows that summer or will it be strictly a time for football?

That's a long time to go now so i can't say anything but as usually it will be strictly a time for football like most of the time of every year.

The Vanilla Muffins

Back when I was a teenager, the Special Broadcasting Service of Australia, or the "Soccer Broadcasting Station" as it was jokingly referred to, used to screen a one hour highlights package called Italian Soccer. Back then European football imposed a three foreigner rule, which didn't stop AC Milan from adding the likes of French striker Jean Pierre-Papin and Croatian maestro Zvonimir Boban to their masterful Dutch trio of Marco Van Basten, Ruud Gullit and Frank Rijkaard.

Milan, of course, famously went through the 1991-92 Serie A season unbeaten - the only time in history a club has picked up the Scudetto without losing a single league game. Their 4-0 demolition of Barcelona in the European Cup Final a couple of years later was a masterclass lead by that Montengrin magician Dejan Savicevic and French enforcer Marcel Desailly. Of course at their heart Milan have always had a core of superb Italian players, with the likes of Franco Baresi, Roberto Donadoni and Daniele Massaro losing nothing in comparison with their colourful continental counterparts.

Contrast that with today's Milan team, and the differences are stark. Milan have always had interesting goalkeepers - Sebastiano Rossi at times looked as mad as a march hare, but in a 240 game career for the club, he was solid, if unspectacular between the posts. Compare that with Brazilian goalkeeper Dida, who when not making school-boy errors in goal, is busy feigning life-threatening injuries if he feels a cool breeze. His understudy Zeljko Kalac inspires about as much confidence as an umbrella made of tissue paper in a cyclone - big "Spider" has never been the same goalkeeper after his personal nightmare in Stuttgart.

Where Milan once had a central defensive pairing of Franco Baresi and Alessandro Costacurta, these days the Rossoneri are marshalled by ex-Lazio captain Alessandro Nesta and whichever interchangeable centre back is fit that particular week. Paolo Maldini has been a superb servant to the club but should probably be coaching Milan's under-15 team by now, and in the likes of Kakha Kaladze, Daniele Bonera and Dario Simic, Milan seem to be employing the rule of quantity over quality.Gone too are the days when Milan brought young players up through the ranks - their four fullbacks in Massimo Oddo, Giuseppe Favalli, Cafu, and Marek Jankulovski were all established stars when they were bought from Lazio, Roma and Udinese respectively.

In midfield the Montenegrin magic of Dejan Savicevic has seemingly been replaced by a system of "reliable mediocrity." Massimo Ambrosini is the type of player who is made captain of a team because there would otherwise be no use for him a starting eleven, whilst "playmaker" Andrea Pirlo is a personality free-zone. Gennaro Gattuso has been trading for years off the ability to deliver withering glances and the occasional rash tackle, and it's only in the ageless Clarence Seedorf and the irrepressible Kaka - who surely deserves a better stage, that Milan possess any real quality.

Up front Milan's striking options are, to put it mildly, limited. Their number one striker is a 34 year old Pippo Inzaghi who looks at times as if he might benefit from the use of a wheelchair. Alberto Gilardino - an eighteen million pound signing from Parma, must surely be one of the biggest wastes of money in European football. And by signing Ronaldo, Milan have signalled their intent to assemble an all-star line-up of faded has-beens - what price Michael Owen becomes the next to join Milan's "Tour de Nostalgia?"

It's ironic that the reigning European champions should be facing a so-called "must-win" clash with those giants of European football Shakhtar Donetsk at the San Siro tonight. It would be even more ironic if Italian hotshot Cristiano Lucarelli fired Shakhtar to victory, but perhaps the biggest irony of all is that Milan are the reigning European champions in the first place!

Their victorious 2006-07 campaign was practically a clinic in efficiency. They won only three games in a group that contained veritable European heavyweights Lille, AEK Athens and Anderlecht, before requiring extra-time to eek passed a technically limited Celtic 1-0 on aggregate in the Round of 16. They were marginally more impressive in seeing off Bayern in the quarter-finals, but lost the first-leg of their semi-final to Manchester United, thanks in no part from some typically catastrophic Dida goalkeeping. Their best performance of the tournament was a 3-0 hammering of United in the return leg of that tie, and they used all their catenaccio nous to see off Liverpool in a final that was marred by crowd trouble at the Olympic Stadium in Athens.

One would hope that this year's competition is not marred by similar disturbances. With the likes of Ronaldinho and Lionel Messi lighting up the Nou Camp, Cesc Fabregas and company leading a revolution at Arsenal and the usual cast of gritty eastern European scrappers like Shakhtar, Dynamo Kyiv, CSKA Moskva and Steaua Bucharest all capable of throwing up an upset or two along the way, one might similarly hope that this year's Champions League is not marred by the presence of the bore-fest that is Milan's 2007 vintage for any longer than is necessary.