My least favourite game: our writers pick out their worst football matches

The last train back from Hull to London leaves at about 6.20pm. Sitting in the KC Stadium media lounge on a chilly night, I was unaware of this. And so, despite a headlong dash to the station, I missed it. This was an age before hotels had been invented, and in any case I was new to this business and unwilling to test the company expense account. So I took a train to Doncaster, marched straight to the bus station, and waited. And waited some more. Until 4am in fact, when a National Express coach to London finally rolled in. I finally arrived home at 9am. The game? Hull 0-0 Blackburn. Phil Brown moaned about the referee. Sam Allardyce chastised one of his players for not going down in the area. I wrote 300 words. It’s a ridiculous job, really. Jonathan Liew

While working in my first UK football journalism job, I managed to convince the editor I was the right man to send to Euro 2000. It was my first (and, as it turned out, last) major tournament and my excitement levels were high. One of the games I had been given was Sweden v Turkey in Eindhoven. Both sides had lost their opening games (to Belgium and Italy) so it felt like a must-win game for both –but what followed was nothing short of abysmal. I wasn’t the only one left bemused by the terrible fare on offer. “Sweden v Turkey has finished 0-0 in a game that wasn’t even worth that,” Lasse Granqvist said on Swedish radio. “This game was not worthy of being in a European Championship, with such low entertainment value … Did I say entertainment? I apologise for using that word here, because that is abusing the meaning of that word.” Marcus Christenson

Craig Levein maintains his problem stemmed from the leaking of team information by disgruntled players. That, had it not