RIP

Nimoy has passed, Spock will always live on
Peace and long life

Liverpool stumbled in the run up to the Premiership title in 2014, but their failure pales in comparison to Leeds United's season in 1970. Then, Leeds were one of the powerhouses of English football, dominating from the mid-60s to the 80s. These were early days, when Leeds had won the title the previous season and much was expected from them in the follow-up. Fate and FA thick-headedness conspired to end their dream of a treble, falling towards the end in the League, FA and European Cups. 

This article brings back childhood memories of players past, of times past and the familiarity and security football then accorded to a growing child deprived of counsel. The names were household then, and are worth revisiting. Many of these people have departed, as has the Britishness of the game, maybe for the good of many, but the yearning for the "good times" is still there.

Golden goal: Eddie Gray for Leeds United v Burnley (1970)

Our series remembering special goals recalls an outrageous piece of skill in the mud, even if its brilliance could not save Don Revie’s side from a marathon season ending with nothing

Eddie Gray scored two wonderful goals against Burnley: one a 40-yard lob, the other after a deliciously mazy run. Photograph: Colorsport/REX

Winning is fun; it’s true, it’s true. What a moment to remember, what a thrill to enjoy! But let’s be honest, when the bones are boiled down, there’s never much left to sink your teeth into. And just as the devil has all the best tunes, so football’s beautiful losers boast the most romantic tales.

Ask the Brazil sides of 1950 and 2014, whose biblical failures ostensibly threaten to tarnish the country’s entire World Cup haul, but in fact make the story so much better in the telling. Ask last season’s Liverpool side, whose melodramatic widescreen capitulation (dir. Douglas Sirk) will be recalled in all its bittersweet glory long after many of the club’s actual titles have been forgotten. Ask Don Revie’s Leeds United, who in season 19 … actually, there are plenty to choose from there, though one in particular stands out.

Leeds United’s 1969-70 season is perhaps the single-most astonishing campaign in the history of English football. Revie’s team had, after years of striving, finally won the league title in 1968-69. With the monkey off the club’s back, the team buoyed by confidence and the oft-maligned Revie the new manager of the year, Leeds embarked on the following season in a mood to challenge on all fronts: the league, the FA Cup, the European Cup. It would be an unprecedented assault: only one team had won the league and Cup double in the last 70 years, never mind thrown a European title into the mix. It was surely impossible. It’s to Leeds United’s credit that, for a while, the impossible looked like it was on.

Leeds were hot favourites to retain their league title, starting the season as 11-4 favourites, with Everton and Liverpool at 7-1, Wilf McGuinness’s Manchester United 8-1, and Manchester City 10-1. By beating Tottenham Hotspur and Nottingham Forest, and drawing with Arsenal, they started the season by stretching their unbeaten run in league games to 31, breaking a record held by Burnley since 1921. Leeds “give the impression at the moment that they could climb Everest without oxygen”, opined the Observer of their brisk start.

Perhaps they did but it turned out a couple of their crampons were a little loose. Leeds failed to win any of their following five league matches, losing one of them to Harry Catterick’s increasingly impressive Everton. Integration of the newly signed Allan Clarke and the emerging Peter Lorimer wasn’t a totally smooth process, and by the turn of the calendar year Leeds had drawn 10 of their 27 league matches played.

They were only a point behind leaders Everton, but that early season inability to convert one point into two would eventually cost them. Leeds swanned to the semi-finals of both the FA Cup and European Cup – their debut in Uefa’s elite continental competition was a 16-0 aggregate win over Lyn Oslo – and a mid-season surge of form took them to the top of the table by early March. But injuries and a crowded fixture list – with the World Cup in Mexico coming up, the FA insisted that the season had to be completed before April was out – conspired to jigger Leeds on all fronts.

Billy Bremner’s goal in a second FA Cup semi-final replay against Manchester United booked a Wembley trip, but it was to be the last major celebration of the season. While Leeds had been away contesting that marathon semi, Everton had overtaken them in the league, and Revie – with Bremner, Terry Cooper, Johnny Giles, Norman Hunter, Mick Jones, Paul Reaney, Gary Sprake and Eddie Gray all carrying knocks – was forced to make a decision.

Eddie Gray was voted as the third greatest Leeds United player of all time by the club’s fans in 2000. Photograph: Evening Standard/Getty Images

His team were faced with an agenda that would simply not be tolerated today, and by clubs with far larger squads and sports science departments at that. Two days after overcoming Manchester United in the Cup Leeds entertained Southampton at Elland Road. Two days after that they travelled to Brian Clough’s Derby County. A further two days on and it was the visit of Jock Stein’s Celtic in the semi-finals of the European Cup. One day after that – one day! – and Leeds travelled to West Ham for a rearranged league fixture. Finally, after a luxurious two-day rest, Leeds entertained Burnley.

Including their Cup semi-final victory Leeds were to play six matches in 10 days. Little wonder the wheels came clanking off in a manner which owed a reasonable debt to the cinematic bombast of Ben Hur. Leeds were without six of their internationals against Southampton, but nevertheless deservedly went a goal up just after the hour through Lorimer. However, a ramshackle side could not hold it together and luck delivered Leeds a triple-whammy, straight in the chops: own-goals by Jackie Charlton and Terry Yorath and a penalty for what appeared to be a wholly accidental hand-ball by Terry Hibbitt. Saints became the first team to win at Elland Road in 39 matches, since Liverpool a couple of seasons before. The timing was hardly a coincidence.

Revie was at this point forced to accept the rearranged West Ham fixture. “The only conclusion to be drawn,” wrote the Guardian, “is that Leeds are willing to forgo the championship in order to strengthen their attempts for the FA and European Cups.” In reality, with the FA hell-bent on their pre-World Cup early finish, Leeds had little choice. Revie named a side of reserves for the fixture at Derby and were spanked 4-1. It was a double blow: the title was now as good as Everton’s, while the Football League were gearing up to fine Revie for his insolence, considering him in breach of a rule which stated that “each club shall play its full-strength team in all league matches unless some satisfactory reason is given”.

Revie had a comprehensive response prepared. “What is the point of employing the services of a fully qualified medical officer if you don’t take his advice? Our doctor declared that the players concerned were thoroughly tired, mentally and physically, and that, if they carried on, there was no knowing what damage might be caused. So we had no alternative but to take the steps we did. After all, the health of the players must be the first consideration of any club.

“I believe we were in with a chance of the championship until this massive congestion of fixtures. We could not have budgeted for two Cup replays with Manchester United for one thing, and in such heavy conditions. But when I saw the lads after that 120-minute battle with United in the first replay in the mud at Villa Park, I could have wept for them. They never complained but even Leeds can only take so much. I think it was then that we all realised that something would have to give.”

Leeds suffered heavy fixture congestion in 1969-70, not helped by a FA Cup semi-final replay against Manchester United. Photograph: Bob Thomas/Bob Thomas/Getty

An understandable decision, certainly a brave one. But much good it did them. What followed was an astonishing 48 hours of ill fortune. In the first leg of the European Cup semi against Celtic George Connelly’s first-minute shot, a strange half-hit spinner which threaded its way from the left-hand side of the box into the bottom-right corner of Gary Sprake’s goal, settled the match. An outrageous stroke of luck, although in fairness Celtic went on to dominate the game and ended deserved victors. Elsewhere that night, Everton were sealing the league title with a win at home to West Bromwich Albion.

The morning after the night before saw Revie, spiritually if not literally hungover, travel down to London early to cop a fine from the Football League. And in the evening, as Leeds drew 2-2 at West Ham, their right-back Reaney – who was looking forward to the FA Cup final, the second leg of the European Cup semi, and a place in England’s team at the World Cup – broke his leg. Revie had named Reaney in his starting XI only to placate the suits who had delivered the bollocking he’d received that morning.

And so to the final act of a dire week in which Leeds would play five times, losing the league, effectively losing the chance of making the European Cup final and losing one of their star players to serious injury. Revie, by way of exasperated response to this astonishing capitulation, named eight reserves in his side, a glorious two-stiff-fingered response to the powers that be.

And what a response from one of the star men he did name! In the 71st minute Peter Lorimer shot for goal. His effort was parried by Burnley’s goalkeeper Peter Mellor and picked up by Gray on the left-hand edge of the penalty area. Cue perhaps the most rococo jig in the entire history of association football, one which included two Puskas-esque pullbacks, two feints, a couple of jinks and a powerful no-backlift snapshot to score. Gray beat only (only!) four men in the sequence – Arthur Bellamy, John Angus, Eric Probert and Mike Docherty – though three of them were embarrassed twice with one, poor old Angus, sent skittering around on his impotent arsecheeks on both occasions.

As is usually the way with these things, a little serendipity fuelled the genius. In the build-up to the dribble, as Lorimer shot, Albert Johanneson was bundled to the ground and lay prone, clutching his knee. As a result, when Gray picked up the loose ball, he had no support nearby and so decided to go for it instead. It was something of a delicious irony that Johanneson inadvertently and indirectly influenced the goal. After starring in Leeds’ promotion season in 1963-64, and becoming the first black player to play in an FA Cup final a year later, he was edged to the periphery at Elland Road by a combination of injury, booze and the emergence of – yes, it writes itself – Gray. It proved to be Johanneson’s last appearance in a Leeds United shirt and something of a symbolic one.

Albert Johanneson, here training in front his Leeds teammates, played an indirect role in Gray’s second goal. Photograph: Evening Standard/Getty Images

Gray’s homage to Garrincha, an outrageous effort, quickly became part of Leeds United legend, though the same player had arguably scored an even better goal roughly an hour earlier, picking up a loose clearance near the centre circle on 10 minutes, turning and gently caressing a precision lob over Mellor from 40 yards. It was the player’s personal pick: dribbling was part of his everyday remit, he would argue, but manufacturing exquisite first-time shots from distance was never part of his usual repertoire. Gray’s astonishing dribble did not quite make it to the top of Revie’s chart, either. “The goal was one of the best I’ve seen since Eddie scored in an international youth tournament in 1966,” said Revie, who had clearly set the bar ludicrously high: “He beat eight men then. Today he only beat six.”

The most traumatic run of results in the history of the English game had been met with a blend of raw talent, exotic beauty and gritty defiance; how very Leeds. But while symbolically loaded, the 2-1 win was of little real consequence and would stand as the last hurrah in a season of doomed striving. In the FA Cup final Leeds came within four minutes of beating Chelsea, a team they had bulldozed 5-2 at Stamford Bridge earlier in the season, but conceded a scrappy equaliser. Celtic finished the job in the European Cup at Hampden. Then with a grim inevitability, Chelsea won the FA Cup final replay at Old Trafford, Gray’s butterfly genius crushed on Chelsea’s wheel, not least when Ian Hutchinson punched Gray in the business portion of his shorts.

And so concluded one of the most glamorous misadventures of all time. Leeds ended the season having failed on every front. English football was not quite ready for continent-wide success on this scale. Revie, with his league title bid crumbling around him, had suggested that any team landing a domestic league and Cup double plus European trophy would in effect be building “the eighth wonder of the world”; it was another 14 years before Liverpool landed a treble, another 29 before Manchester United achieved the treble. And yet Revie knew his team’s efforts had deserved at least a little something tangible.

“I’m very sick and very disappointed,” he admitted in the wake of the Cup final, just before cancelling a buffet reception for 400 people back in Leeds. “Here we are at the end of a hard season without anything to show for it. I’m sorry for my players more than for myself. They’re all absolutely dejected – you must be after going so close in three major tournaments – but they’ve got great character and they’ll be back on top next season.”

Leeds would in fact have to wait another three seasons before regaining their title but then trophies were not really the point of Revie’s team, whose repeated close shaves added to the mystique of one of English football’s most famous collectives. The grand collapse of 1969-70 was their most ill-fated odyssey of all but one destined to be remembered in a way the various successes of Everton, Chelsea, Celtic and Feyenoord will never be. It is a much better story, after all, and one embellished to perfection by Eddie Gray: a treble failure but with a signature double to die for.

• Thanks to Rob Bagchi, whose brilliant book The Unforgiven, co-authored with Paul Rogerson, is the definitive text on this most amazing of teams.

Vincent Tan just can't help himself

Malky Mackay defends Moody but new Vincent Tan revelations rock Cardiff | Football | The Guardian
Seems like Vincent Tan's messing with the club is becoming more apparent now. It's just a business to him, and there is no sentiment apart from the lure of money involved. The club is being screwed and they're just beginning to realize it. More acrimony soon....

Obituary - Manna Dey

Manna Dey, 94, the Voice of Many a Bollywood Star, Dies - NYTimes.com

There goes another great. One of the stalwarts of Old India, the likes of which will never appear again. Scrolling down the monster list of his hits, some that transcend time include:
Pyar Hua Ikrar Hua
Mera Naam Joker
Ae Bhai Zara Dekhe Chalo
and my personal favourite, Ek Chatur Naa Karke Singar, with Kishore Kumar, in a movie, Padosan, that featured the inimitable Mehmood and the captivating Asha Parekh.
Manna Dey, 1919-2013. Still lives on.

Can you survive on 4G alone?

Although this article is related to the UK's recent 4G launch nationwide, it gives a good capsule summary of the use of 4G and its limitations.

As competition increases, the cost of 4G services will come down and operators will offer shared data plans that will allow customers to combine all their smartphone and tablet mobile broadband bills on a single contract.

The arrival of 4G services in the UK may even prompt some people to consider abandoning their fixed-line services altogether. The necessity of a fast and reliable broadband internet connection is the only reason many people pay for a landline, and 4G speeds promise to match and even exceed most existing fixed-line services.

Moving house with 4G

When the time came for me to move house, and I was told that it would take several weeks for a BT engineer to install my new broadband connection, I decided to put this idea to the test, and see if I could survive for a month on 4G alone.

EE agreed to lend me an Alcatel One Touch mobile WiFi (MiFi) dongle with the ability to connect up to 10 devices, which I was able to set up in instantly when I arrived in my new flat. I was supplied with an 8GB data allowance, which costs £41 per month on a 12-month contract.

My partner and I immediately connected several devices to the MiFi and began browsing the web simultaneously. The browsing experience was extremely fast, and even when we invited visitors to connect the 4G, the level of service did not degrade.

Speed tests using Ookla revealed that the average download speed was around 20 Mbps and upload speed was around 11 Mbps. While this is slower than EE’s promised average download speed of 24- 30 Mbps, it is still faster than my previous BT connection, which provided around 9 Mbps download speeds.

As well as browsing the web and social media, we were able to watch videos on YouTube and stream music from Spotify without any interruptions for “buffering”. However, the real challenge came when we decided to stream HD video from LoveFilm Instant.

After some initial problems, where the screen seemed to stutter and we were forced to pause and refresh the page, the programme played fairly smoothly. There were a few moments where the picture became pixelated, but no more frequently than with a BT connection.

Data caps

What was really noticeable, though, was how quickly we chewed through our 8GB data allowance. A 2-hour standard-definition movie is about 1.5 GB, and a 2-hour high-definition movie is about 4 GB, so our 8 GB data allowance was gone in a flash.

If the data allowance is reached, the user is asked to buy a top-up data bundle, costing £3 for 50MB, £15 for 2GB, or £20 for 4GB. It is clear that, for heavy internet users, such as film buffs and online gamers, this could become very expensive very quickly.

EE does offer a 20GB package for £61 per month with a 12-month contract, or £51 per month with a 24-month contract. This would be a sufficient for most casual users, but film buffs and online gamers would still struggle to stay within this limit.

By contrast, O2’s largest 12-month 4G data package is 5GB for £36 per month, with top-up data bundles of 500MB for £6 and 1GB for £10. This means it would cost £156 per month for 20GB of data from O2.

Vodafone’s service is unlimited for the first three months. However, its largest 12-month 4G data package after that is 8GB for £36 per month, with top-up data bundles of 250MB for £6. This means it would cost £332 per month for 20GB of data from Vodafone.

To put those numbers in perspective, BT's 40GB Infinity package costs £30.45 per month, including line rental, while Virgin Media offers unlimited data usage starting from £22.50 per month.

“The capped data could be an issue at this stage for anyone trying to replace fixed-line broadband services with 4G,” said Matthew Howett, analyst at Ovum.

“Generally consumers don’t have a great understanding of how much data they use. Most of us don’t use as much data as we think on our phone, but the sort of things we do with fixed broadband - like streaming of catch-up TV and so on - uses quite a lot of data.”

Speed and contention

Howett said that the browsing experience using 4G is highly influenced by the number of other people using it at the same time. At the moment, EE’s network is fairly empty, so the download speeds and upload speeds are very fast, but this could change as the network becomes more congested.

Although fixed-line networks can also slow down when they become congested, "contention" is more of an issue for mobile networks, because the pipes they use to deliver the data are not as fat as those used by fixed-line.

EE recently doubled the amount of spectrum that it has allocated to 4G, and in doing so it not only doubled the speed of its 4G service, but also reduced the issue of contention. However, if every EE customer started using a MiFi dongle with 6 devices attached to it, the impact on the network would be noticeable.

Meanwhile, O2, Vodafone and Three are all limited by the amount of spectrum they won in the 4G auction earlier this year. They do not have as much spectrum set aside for 4G as EE at this stage, so their services are likely to be considerably slower, and contention could be more of an issue from day one.

Drawbacks

While my experience proved that it is possible to live on 4G alone - albeit expensively - it is easy to see how users could run into difficulties fairly quickly. There is no way to connect to the MiFi device using a cable, so anything that is not WiFi-enabled cannot be used.

There is also a limit on the number of devices that can connect to the MiFi at one time, so large families or households with multiple devices may suffer. This could become more of a problem as the houses themselves become connected, with lights, heating and appliances all needing an internet connection.

Due to restrictions on the amount of spectrum used for 4G, the difference between peak and off-peak broadband speeds could be more pronounced, as the operators will have to employ traffic management techniques.

Moreover, some mobile operators might block access to certain applications, such as Skype, or make users pay a premium to access those services, so it is important to check whether there are any applications that cannot be used over the network.

Finally, it is worth noting that not having a landline means having to pay premium rates for 0800 and 0845 numbers, which can become very expensive if you are moving house. Ofcom has said it wants to eradicate 0845 and 0800 call charges from mobile phones. However, the changes will not be implemented until the start of 2015 at the earliest.

Rural broadband opportunity

In spite of these drawbacks, mobile operators have a fantastic opportunity to replace broadband in areas where fixed-line broadband coverage is very poor.

EE claims that its 4G service will cover 98 per cent of the population by the end of 2014, while O2 has an obligation to provide 98 per cent of the population with a 2Mbps service by 2017, as part of the terms of the 4G auction.

EE has so far focused on towns and cities, and other operators are expected to do the same when they roll out their 4G services, in order to attract as many subscribers as possible. However, EE has been trialling its 4G broadband service in rural parts of Cumbria, and Three has also expressed a desire to serve rural areas of the UK.

When 4G does roll out across the countryside, it is likely to offer a better service than fixed-line in many areas, where people still struggle to get 2Mbps. In these cases 4G could be a good option for consumers, as long as mobile operators bring the prices down.

"Our 4G footprint will pretty closely match our 2G footprint and, as such, there will be data services brought to parts of rural Britain where people have never had mobile data services before," said Paul Ceely, head of network strategy at EE.

"I don’t think we would advocate shifting entire regions of fixed onto mobile. If you’ve got access to superfast broadband in your area, then we’d probably advocate that you continue to use that. But in those areas where it’s hard to get fixed, people should give it due consideration."

Ceely added 4G could also be a good option for individuals who do not want a long-term contract commitment, like university students or other people who are only living in a certain place for a short amount of time.

"We have a number of examples of businesses benefitting too – a construction company that used to have to wait an average of 30 days for broadband installation when they arrived at a site, but now they can set up the moment they arrive because they take mobile broadband from EE," he added.

4G or not 4G?

The question is not so much whether it is possible to live on 4G, but whether it is really a practical solution. This experiment would currently be impossible for 40 per cent of the population, and the 60 per cent that does have access to 4G mobile broadband needs to think carefully about the implications of abandoning fixed line.

Connectivity is an increasingly important part of our lives, and we are less and less willing to accept limitations on our online activity. As the internet has evolved, fixed-line operators have adapted their networks to meet consumer needs, but mobile networks were never built to carry vast quantities of data, and this continues to be a problem for operators.

The prohibitively high cost of large 4G data packages is part of the fallout from this, and it is hard to see how mobile operators will bring down prices without imposing more limitations on their networks - particularly while the national rollout is underway.

Once 4G is established, however, and operators are forced to differentiate on more than just coverage, then 4G may become a truly viable replacement for fixed-line services.

© Copyright of Telegraph Media Group Limited 2013

Throw away your trainers

Sportswear fans of the world unite, and throw away your trainers!

Not only is this fashionable footwear hideous, it may even be damaging to run in, according to Northumbria University sports scientist Dr Mick Wilkinson

A sports scientist has claimed that flexible, flat shoes are better for you than more expensive, cushioned trainers 

By Harry Mount

The biggest disaster in the history of footwear was the development of ethylene-vinyl acetate, or EVA. EVA is the squidgy cushioning – formed by millions of microscopic air bubbles – slapped on to running shoes in the Seventies. Suddenly, we went from elegant plimsolls and Dunlop Green Flash (as worn by Fred Perry in the Thirties) to the most unflattering shoes ever invented. The gaudy dinghies at the end of our legs got even bigger in 1979, with the insertion of the air bubble into the heel of the “Nike Air” model.

The modern trainer – outsized, brightly coloured, smelly – is the polar opposite of the beautiful shoe. Now, the one supposed merit of this form of athletic footwear – that it’s good for the health of the running human body – has been officially attacked.

Dr Mick Wilkinson, a Northumbria University sports scientist, told the British Science Festival in Newcastle this week that flexible, flat shoes are better for you than more expensive, cushioned trainers. Feet are meant to land on their front part when you’re running; trainers with cushioned heels force you to land on the heel, causing a sharper shock and adding extra strain to joints such as the knee. Already, in America, barefoot running has become popular, as people realise that humans are designed to run long distances without having to wrap their feet in the scientific equivalent of cotton wool.

It’s too much to hope for that children – and their parents – will immediately ditch their stinking, lurid trainers. The trainer is too embedded in modern fashion for that. But still, here’s hoping that there’ll be a gradual return to the slimmer, prettier gym shoe, which dominated sports from the late 19th century until the dreaded introduction of EVA.

The gym shoe, or plimsoll, was the result of another invention: the adaptation of vulcanised rubber to footwear. Under vulcanisation, natural rubber loses its stickiness, as well as its brittleness when cold and its softness when warm. In the 1870s, John Dunlop’s Liverpool Rubber Company patented a way of sticking rubber to canvas, and the gym shoe was born.

It assumed different incarnations on either side of the Atlantic. In America, it became known in the 1880s as the sneaker – thought to derive from the silence of the rubber sole. Keds was one of the first companies, in 1917, to sell the sneaker on a mass scale. In the same year, Converse launched its own All Stars basketball shoe.

Over here, as early as the 1890s we had the J W Foster – later to become Reebok – running shoe, the first to include spikes. In Germany, in 1925, Adi Dassler – father of the Adidas brand – dreamt up a whole range of running shoes, with customised varieties of spikes.

For all their early popularity, running shoes then were used for exactly that – running. The idea that you might wear them with a suit – as Paul McCartney and bolshy teenagers do at formal occasions – would have been an outrageous demolition of the Chinese wall between formal clothes and sportswear.

The Americans were the first to break down this wall. In the Twenties, American boys started to wear Converse off the baseball field in imitation of their heroes. By the Fifties, sneakers were a mass-market item for American teenagers, not least thanks to the almost complete absence of school uniform – in 1957, 600 million pairs a year were sold.

We lagged behind – not just in terms of consumption, but also acceptability at formal gatherings. As late as the Eighties, Peter Cook was refused entry to his favourite casino because of his shoes. When offered alternative footwear, he said, “What? Play without my lucky trainers? You must be joking.”

The first classic “trainer” – the 1968 Gola training shoe, thought to have provided the origin of the word – would not have been allowed in many restaurants, let alone casinos. Then, in the Seventies, barriers to sportswear in non-sporting scenarios collapsed. Look at a photograph of the typical British family on the beach in the Sixties, and compare it to the Eighties. We began to look like a nation of retired sportsmen, who had given up exercise and turned our attention to chips, but held on to our old kit.

By this stage, the conditions were perfect for the creation of hideous sportswear. In 1977, Jim Fixx, the inventor of jogging, wrote his bestseller, The Complete Book of Running. Dress codes collapsed: Woody Allen wore trainers to the ballet; Dustin Hoffman sported a pair as the Watergate journalist, Carl Bernstein, in the 1976 film, All the President’s Men. And podiatrists were recruited by trainer manufacturers to start bulking out shoes with all that supposedly health-protecting sponge.

Britain’s feet gave in without a battle, swayed by the trainer’s popularity with rappers, and lucrative endorsements by sports stars. In the mid-Eighties, I remember buying a pair in Pembrokeshire, and being told by the salesman that they were “excellent for school – and disco”. The idea that I might use them for neither, but to play football in, hadn’t occurred to him.

Over the past 30 years, that attitude has come to dominate the British wardrobe. But maybe, just maybe, these latest revelations will reverse the trend. Sportswear fans of the world, unite, and throw away your trainers! Your knees will thank you, and a nation’s dress sense will recover some of its dignity.

Hidden iPhone features that will be enabled by iOS 7 - Telegraph

As is usual with Apple, these changes immensely enhance functionality. Apple has learned from Samsung and some of these seem very similar with the the GS3/4.
Hidden iPhone features that will be enabled by iOS 7 - Telegraph