Welcome to Gary James’ Football Archive

45 Years Ago: Trevor Francis Debut At Stoke

45 Years ago today (September 5, 1981) I attended my first away game. That day my parents told me we were going to Stoke v Manchester City. The reason why? It was to be the debut of new City striker Trevor Francis. This was perceived as a huge transfer at the time (don’t be fooled…

City v Coventry

It’s Manchester’s Sky Blues against Coventry’s today for the first time in the League for over 24 years. There was a time when City-Coventry games were a regular fixture so, depending on your age, it’ll be interesting to see how you feel about Coventry’s historical status. As with many clubs they found it difficult to…

Trevor Francis Arrives

On this day (4 September) in 1981 Manchester City signed Trevor Francis from Nottingham Forest. The transfer meant that the Blues were the first English side to sign three separate £1m or £1m+ players. Peter Swales often boasted of this point (and did so in an interview I did with him years later). The earlier…

Manchester City Profits

This month (September) in 1967 this article was published highlighting the profitability of Manchester City. I know this is a long time ago but for those who believe City’s profitability is a recent thing it’s worth stating that the Blues were a hugely profitable club until chairman Peter Swales took power. No time to go…

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About this Website

On this site you will find articles, posts and other material about football. Some of this material is free to access (select ‘Free Content’ from the menu above) while other material is available to those who subscribe to the site. 

The site was launched on 1 January 2021. Since then hundreds of articles, interviews (audio & written), history talks and both my PDFs of my first book (From Maine Men To Banana Citizens, published 1989 and out of print since 1990) and the 2010 edition of Manchester A Football History book (this originally cost £24.95 and has been out of print since 2012) have been posted.

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