Falling from grace

Six Premier League football clubs had announced their intention to join a European Super League, from which it would be impossible to be relegated, before changing their minds. When were they last relegated from anything?

— Manchester United were relegated from the top tier of English football in 1974, and promoted back the following season.

— Manchester City were relegated to the third tier in 1998, climbed back to the second in 1999 and the Premiership in 2000. They were relegated again in 2001, and promoted again the following year.

— Liverpool were relegated to the old Second Division in 1954, and promoted to the First in 1962.

— Chelsea were relegated for a season to the Second Division in 1988.

— Arsenal were last relegated in 1913. They never won promotion, but were voted into the First Division after the Great War.

— Spurs were last relegated in 1977.

The old gang

And who’d be in the Premier League now if relegation had not existed in the Football League since it was founded in 1885?

— Accrington; Aston Villa; Blackburn Rovers; Bolton Wanderers; Burnley; Derby County; Everton; Notts County; Preston North End; Stoke; West Bromwich Albion; Wolverhampton Wanderers.

Variety show

Those confusing Covid virus variants in full.

Cases confirmed in Britain on 14 April

B117 (Kent) | 209,492

B117 with E484K mutation | 43

B1351 (South African) | 600

P1 (first Brazilian variant, detected in Tokyo but traced to Manaus) | 40

P2 (second Brazilian variant) | 59

B1617 (India) | 77

The history book on the shelf

Bjorn Ulvaeus of Abba claimed the UK jurors gave his group nul points in the 1974 Eurovision Song Contest because they saw it as a threat to the UK entry. But was Britain alone?

Points given to Abba’s ‘Waterloo’ in 1974

Belgium, Greece, Italy, Monaco, UK | 0

Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain, Yugoslavia | 1

West Germany, Israel, Norway | 2

Netherlands | 3

Finland, Switzerland | 5

Under the rules that year every country had ten jury members, each of whom could give one point to one song, so the maximum number of votes any country could have given Abba was 10.

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