Almanack

Cover points

THERE can be no more traditional publication in sport than this column's namesake Wisden Cricketers' Almanack. So readers will understand the shock and amazement in cricketing circles as word seeped out that the cover of this year's volume, to be published next month, will not be the time- honoured shade of golden yellow, but pink.

Almanack (this one) lost no time in contacting Matthew Engel, editor of the other one. We bowled him an easy one. Was Wisden originally yellow, we inquired, or was it another colour? 'Erm. What makes you ask?' Then a googly. Well, we're told that Wisden sent out a pink Christmas card this year . . . 'Yes. Er . . . Yes, this is true. Er . . . I think it's fair to say that I did say to a small group of friends that I was planning to change the cover to pink.' Good grief. 'On the grounds,' he hurriedly went on, 'that when I didn't they would think I was a thoroughly sound fellow.' What a cunning blighter: a verbal reverse sweep.

Engel claims there would have been a precedent for such a drastic choice of colour. 'I did discover,' he said, 'that the 1864 cover - the first - was, it appears, salmon pink. I feel vindicated.'

Engel is proud of one change he will definitely be introducing: a laminated paper for the cover so that often-consulted volumes will not crumple so easily. But enough of this medium-pace stuff. A final bouncer. What colour will this unscuffable cover be? 'You'll have to wait and see,' chuckled the editor

Wales's glam slam

THE last time Wales won the Grand Slam was 16 years ago. The players were rewarded with a trip to Buckingham Palace, but little else. In 1988, when they won the Triple Crown, the players were given souvenir cut-glass decanters and a lunch with their wives at the South Wales Police rugby club.

The present team will expect a little more if they beat England in two weeks' time and win the Grand Slam. Robert Norster, the Welsh manager, conceded that the matter was under consideration. 'We certainly do not want the players to think about rewards at this stage,' he said. 'We want them to focus only on their game at Twickenham. If we win, and I emphasise the if, I expect we shall organise something for the players along the lines of what Australia did for their men, a commemorative fund-raising dinner and a brochure with its attendant sponsorships.'

That would provide (via a trust fund, of course) the long-term support that players dream of. But it seems the Welsh coaches, Alan Davies and Gareth Jenkins, will not be involved. 'The coaches will not be included,' Davies said, 'which may be one of the reasons why Geoff Cooke has packed it in. The only benefit a coach gets is when you win - and then it is only satisfaction. Our family and business lives and our holidays are tremendously disrupted and yet we are not accorded the same status as the players.' It certainly seems a shame that the men responsible for inspiring a team should not be able to share the rewards. Is it too late for this to change?

THE quiz element in a promotion directed at Norwich fans by the Norwich and Peterborough Building Society, the club's sponsor, could be a tad more demanding. To have the chance of winning a free ticket to watch their team, a tour of the ground and a signed match ball, Canaries fans must answer this: 'What is the name of Norwich City's new manager? (a) John Deehan? (b) John Dunham? (c) John Faulkner?'

Joao must know it's time to go

LAST week Uefa, the governing body of European football, fired a warning shot across the creaking bows of Joao Havelange. The president of Fifa, Uefa's world counterpart, has upset many of the sport's grandees in his quest for a sixth term of office at the age of 78. 'Uefa is no longer willing,' a statement declared, 'to follow the malicious campaign which is currently being staged in the press by the Fifa president. The situation . . . has become unacceptable for football as a whole.'

Uefa's intervention may mean that the result of the presidential election, which takes place just before the World Cup, is not a foregone conclusion. The issue is not just Havelange's age, but also his increasingly autocratic management style. He incensed many by banning Pele from the World Cup draw in Las Vegas for making allegations that the Brazilian soccer federation is corrupt (its president, by the way, happens to be Havelange's son-in-law).

Havelange is painfully aware that he is under attack: 'The

Anglo-Saxons have lost control of Fifa, the IOC and other organisations and now they are playing dirty to try and get them back,' he said in New York recently. 'What have I done to the English? Is it my fault that they didn't qualify for the World Cup?' It is difficult to see why Joao should have such a thing about the English. Perhaps he is confused about the origins of the Fifa vice-president David Will, one of the candidates for his job, who hails from Brechin.

Havelange once suspected that Joseph Blatter, Fifa's general secretary, was plotting against him, but after a meeting in Zurich the president declared: 'He has denied any conspiracy against me and has sworn loyalty.'

It all smacks of the bunker mentality. Robert S Robins of Tulane University, co-author of When Illness Strikes The Leader, recognises the symptoms. 'When people have powerful positions in government,' Dr Robins tells Almanack, 'or at General Motors, or the Olympics, the world begins to confirm their own delusions. Grandiosity is exaggerated. Also, there's a tendency towards paranoia. People often do conspire against them, but there's a tendency to over-react.'

Why are elderly leaders so reluctant to step down? 'We are talking of a person,' Dr Robins said, 'who does not want to recognise that his life is coming to an end, and goes through various manoeuvres to deny that. It's common in business, in sports, in universities, all over. For some people quitting their job is like suicide - they don't want to do it.'

In such a context Joao's stubbornness becomes a little easier to understand. But isn't it ironic that he suspects an Anglo-Saxon conspiracy, given the Chinese-style gerontocracy in command at Lancaster Gate?

(Photograph omitted)