ROY Hodgson today made an amazing return to Inter Milan as coach until the end of the season. The move has been slammed in Italy as making Inter the laughing stock of Italian football. Hodgson left the Italian giants in 1997 to join Blackburn Rovers after
A fan's-eye view from Turf Moor, with Stephen Cummings "WE never win at Stoke. Never. Hell will freeze over, pigs will fly and Blackburn Rovers will be able to defend a 3-1 lead away from home before Burnley win at Stoke." So said your correspondent in
I'M A very keen collector of autographs of the older ex-Blackburn Rovers footballers and I wonder whether any of your readers could help me. I have quite an extensive collection, but I would love to obtain autographs of the following: William Hughes,
A SCHOOLBOY has died after losing a long battle against leukaemia. Eight-year-old Daniel Taylor died in his father Walter's arms at Derian House Children's Hospice, Chorley, on Saturday. Daniel underwent a bone marrow transplant last summer and his family
A fan's-eye view from Ewood Park, with Phil Lloyd I'VE HAD this great idea. I was thinking about the amount of decent sport on the BBC (very little) and the quality of its sitcoms (very poor). Why not, I thought, a sitcom about football? I'd base it on
Where are they now? Pete Oliver meets former Turf Moor star Colin Waldron IT'S hard to imagine at the moment that a move from Chelsea to Burnley would be the making of a player's career. But that's the route a youthful Colin Waldron took to establish
POLICE are launching a high profile anti-racism operation amid fears that neo-Nazi terrorists could strike in East Lancashire. The nail bombings in London have sparked off fears that local Asian communities, including in Burnley and Pendle, could be the
Families of Autistic Children Working Together meet United Reformed Church Hall, King Street, Great Harwood, 7.30pm. AGM. Parkinson's Disease Society meet Temple Street Resource Centre, Burnley, 7.30pm. "World of Baking." Royal Naval Association meet
RESIDENTS who live near a planned high technology farm in the Ribble Valley have stepped up their campaign to persuade the council to halt the scheme. Bashall Eaves farmer Barry Barnes wants to amalgamate his two farms at Withgill, increase his livestock
IT LOOKS like an eyesore. A blot on the landscape, even. But a redundant old hospital water tower in the Ribble Valley is up for sale as a potential dream home with stunning views. All you need is about £150,000 to buy it, and a flair for tackling a home
COACHLOADS of East Lancashire workers joined more than 2,000 British Aerospace employees for a mass lobby of Parliament to protest over feared job losses. About 200 staff from Samlesbury and Preston joined 11 shop stewards from Blackburn Royal Ordnance
HUNDREDS of satellite viewers are breaking the law by using pirate viewing cards which have flooded into the country in the last few weeks. American-based counterfeit gangs using high-technology copying equipment have targeted Lancashire with the cut-price
LABOUR are forecast to lose up to 1,500 seats nationwide in next week's local government elections - and for Tory leader William Hague's sake, they better had. For just as his party seems prepared to put its foot on the bottom rung of a revival with gains
IT WOULD have made a better finish to The Great Escape - although Steve McQueen wouldn't have got up much speed round the Cemetery snooker table on his motorbike. At nine o'clock the Borough were well on their way to the Darwen Hotels League championship
THE 'Leleka' Fund is an officially registered charity helping Ukrainian children and improving their health. Our organisation has a new project, 'Clean Air,' the main aim of which is organising recovery trips for children who live in the areas contaminated
HASLINGDEN professional Brad McNamara has launched a stinging attack on the new Lancashire League rules. The Australian all-rounder, who has returned to Bentgate for a third spell as pro, claims the new bonus points system rewards sides for mediocrity
HOWEVER Tory leader William Hague intends to alter the structure of the House of Lords or even the present plans of the Labour Party for a shake-up, I do not think it will change the fact that hereditary peers, self-appointed, unelected members, will
A DRUG addict burglar has gone to jail for four years for breaking into two homes. Thomas Linford, 30, went out house breaking to try and give his family a better Christmas and raided one property while the occupant had gone out for only a short period
A BURNLEY credit union has won crucial support in its bid to continue giving low-cost easy-to-pay loans to its members. The national conference of the Association of British Credit Unions voted to support a motion put by Brunlea Community Credit Union
A LABOUR boss today called for an inquiry into proxy votes in the Daneshouse area of Burnley after it was revealed that up to a third of the local electorate will register their votes at next week's council elections - without turning up at polling booths
MATT Jansen has made a remarkable recovery from a cartilage operation, returning to training just 18 days after surgery. And, while Blackburn Rovers boss Brian Kidd stresses he will not take any unnecessary risks, it does raise the prospect of Jansen
THE DISTRESSED sister of a man who died an hour after he was attacked in a pub says his killer could still be walking free. Police say the death of roofer Harold Johnson is still being investigated as a potential murder and they want people with information
YOUNG Rossendale readers have a chance to hit the literacy jackpot at Asda Stores, Rawtenstall. The store has 8,000 vouchers to give away to schools from its Walker Crisps promotion. The vouchers can be exchanged for books and the lucky winning school
BLACKBURN Rovers signed up 18 new players - but only for the day. Club sponsors CIS sent 18 of its top sales representatives and managers from around the country to the club's Brockhall training ground. They took part in a training session with Terry
MORE and more schools are signing up for our NIE Sport Extra project designed to boost skills in literacy and numeracy through our sports linked material. Bowland High School, Grindleton, joined the scheme last week and teachers are already finding it
THE Prince's Trust Volunteers is one of a clutch of organisations set up under the guidance of Prince Charles with a broad aim of helping Britain's young people achieve their full potential. PERRY GOURLEY looks at how the scheme operates in East Lancashire
INTEREST rate falls by Bank of England Governor Eddie George and his monetary policy team are helping boost demand for businesses in Lancashire, according to agents. Julian Troup, director of Christie and Co's Manchester office, said there was a marked
CAMPAIGNERS fighting for traditional boundaries to be reinstated between the Red and White Rose counties will be staking their claim to the former dividing line on Saturday. The Roses Alliance, made up of the Unite Craven and Friends of Real Lancashire
CAMPAIGNING MP Gordon Prentice is urging the Government to prevent plants genetically modified with antibiotic resistance being brought into Britain, for fear they might produce untreatable killer diseases. The Pendle Labour backbencher spoke out after
A LABOUR boss today called for an inquiry into proxy votes in the Daneshouse area of Burnley after it was revealed that up to a third of the local electorate will register their votes at next week's council elections - without turning up at polling booths
Blackburn Rovers Reserves 0 Stoke Reserves 0 A GOALLESS draw was probably the maximum that could have been expected from a Rovers Pontin's League squad which comprised 14 teenagers, 20-year-old Lee Fitzpatrick and keeper Tim Flowers. A few members of
STEVE Davis is looking forward to a double celebration to mark Second Division safety and his place in the division's all-star team. The Clarets defender made it a hat-trick of selections in the divisional team chosen by votes from the players themselves
REGARDING Peter White's 'Where Are They Now?' feature on ex-Rovers Mike Ferguson and his "greatest goal ever seen" (LET, April 20). I played in that game at Aston Villa and the goal sure was a brilliant piece of individualism. Andy McEvoy and I were making
I AM attempting to build up a complete collection of thimbles from all 18 major County Cricket clubs, which I intend to present to my cricket-mad mother on her 70th birthday. To this end, I have sent a letter to the headquarters of each club, and have
MATT Jansen has made a remarkable recovery from a cartilage operation, returning to training just 18 days after surgery. And, while Blackburn Rovers boss Brian Kidd stresses he will not take any unnecessary risks, it does raise the prospect of Jansen
I AM not always of the same opinion as Neil Bramwell, but I must back up his views of the Robbie Fowler fiasco (LET, April 8) with his stupid actions he did nothing to enhance the credibility of the game of soccer. Maybe he was taunted by the crowd -
A WORKER at Tarmac's Banksfield Quarry in Clitheroe was lucky to survive after being crushed by the mini digger he was operating. Blackburn magistrates heard that the accident would not have happened if the cab of the vehicle - a vital safety feature
REGARDING the article on Lancashire dialect (Letters, April 13), I was about six years old and peering through our cottage window. I saw two horse drawn carts - one leaving, the other returning to the Norden Fire Clay works, owned by my great grandfather
GREAT Harwood can haul themselves out of the UniBond First Division's bottom three for the first time since September with victory over Stocksbridge PS at The Showground tonight. The Reds are one point behind fourth bottom Congleton Town who they play
I AM utterly disgusted by the thieves who have stolen three cherry blossom trees from the grounds of Derian House children's hospice, in Chorley. These were trees planted by the parents of children who have died. Some friend and I recently completed a
LANCASHIRE skipper John Crawley today admitted that the Championship match against Leicestershire starting at Grace Road tomorrow is one his team cannot afford to lose. Leicester, the 1998 champions, launched their defence by beating Essex, which means
DARWEN Alexandra booked their place in this Sunday's Blue & White Rosebowl Cup Final and will play King's Inn at Mill Hill St Peter's ground. In their semi-final replay they beat Station who took the lead inside two minutes when the Alex keeper could
I WAS disgusted to read that the Government has awarded 66 of its special advisers a £1 million rise. It now costs nearly £4 million to employ these spin-doctors to promote Labour Party policies. That is nearly double what the last Tory Government spent
WITH just a few loose ends to tie up, this weather-ravaged season is now coming to an exciting conclusion. New Gardeners duly took the Third Division title with a narrow 3-2 win against Alexandra Hotel Res, Anchor Hotel having completed their league programme
KENYA could be in for a shock to the system when they step up their World Cup preparations at East Lancashire's Alexandra Meadows ground tomorrow. The Kenyans flew in to Manchester yesterday and will be faced with damp conditions when they take on a Lancashire
SINCE the end of the Second World War, millions of people have died in subsequent wars. Is it any wonder that the United Nations General Assembly has been described as a 'bunch of crooks?' Peter Billington (Letters, April 12) seems to think that it is
WE hear increasingly from the Government of the problems caused by 'social exclusion,' but seldom do we hear of any effective remedies. There are, particularly in the so-called working-class areas of the North, what used to be one the principal sources
LUCAS Aerospace are to make another 67 workers redundant at its Burnley factory - MP Peter Pike announced today. The latest jobs bodyblow leaves a major question mark over the future of Lucas Aerospace in Burnley, which once employed thousands, even though
A HOUSEHOLDER was woken at midnight by the sound of a burglar forcing open his front door, Burnley Crown Court heard. Ivan Parker noted a car registration number and rang the police, and officers later found his television and video recorder in the back
BURNLEY'S only department store - the town centre Co-op Living Store - has been taken over as part of a £150 million deal. The sell-off of non-food interests by Co-operative Retail Services to London-based group Miller Developments has thrown the future
STEVE Davis is looking forward to a double celebration to mark Second Division safety and his place in the division's all-star team. The Clarets defender made it a hat-trick of selections in the divisional team chosen by votes from the players themselves
ENGLISH graduate Mark Burrow has joined Blackburn based public relations firm PAPR. Mark, 22 of Kestrel Drive, Darwen, has already spent six months at the firm under the Graduates into Industry scheme run by ELTEC. Converted for the new archive on 14
TEENAGER Sajjad Mahmood was savagely beaten and dumped in a lodge after falling foul of a gang of drug dealers, a court heard. Three men denied murdering the 18-year-old from Accrington when they appeared at Preston Crown Court yesterday. Karl Barton,
A SPECIALIST rig used to test flying systems on the new Eurofighter Typhoon has won a top accolade. The Virtual Avionics Rig developed by British Aerospace at Warton has been chosen as one of the products of the Millennium by the Design Council. The rig
WE are reminding schools and young readers at home that our "In the News" poetry competition was launched last week, inviting budding poets between the ages of eight and 16 to send their thoughts and comments in verse by May 31. Prizes on offer include
TEACHERS with an eye to the future attended two NIE placement days to discover more about our newspaper's website and ways in which we can make internet links with schools as well as offering a website reviewing opportunity for pupils. Primary and secondary
THE boss of an East Lancashire building society today said he was "extremely disappointed" over the Bradford and Bingley vote to convert to a bank - but pledged the Marsden would remain owned by its members. And he said the society, which has 76,000 members
A COMPANY boss whose firms went bust owing more than £450,000 has been banned from being a director for four years. Raymond Dobson, formerly of Mellor Brow, Mellor and now living in New Delhi, India, was banned by a court over the collapse of Hoveshaw
