But not every team has received the recognition they deserve.
Stockport County FC – a club that sits seven miles south of Manchester and four tiers below the region’s two top teams – has been hit harder than most by the pandemic.
But they’ve still been doing their bit to help out their local community.
Right at the start of lockdown, The Hatters donated £75,000 at to the Stockport NHS Foundation Trust and have since pledged to donate £3 from every purchase of their new 2020/21 shirt to the trust as well.
When the situation is put into perspective, it becomes clear just how significant the contributions from Edgeley Park actually are.
There are plenty of out of contract players in the lower divisions who are at risk of unemployment.
Some football clubs may even go under entirely.
Things will only get worse if fans are not allowed into stadiums next season, with many teams relying on ticket sales to keep their clubs running.
That’s why a side in Stockport’s position, making donations in the current climate, is worthy of applause.
Of course, County know what it’s like to go through financial difficulties.
The club struggled throughout the 2000s, eventually being sold in 2005 to the Stockport County Supporter’s Trust for just £1.
The club were later placed into administration in 2009 as their situation failed to improve.
The financial troubles eventually spilled over onto the pitch, with the club sliding down the leagues until they dropped out of the football league entirely in 2011/12 for the first time in their history.
We are excited to kick-off the next chapter at Edgeley Park. Evolved Club badge, kit partnership and a famous Stopfordian celebrating the spirit of the Club. Enjoy the journey. pic.twitter.com/F2AacGkY0u
— Stockport County (@StockportCounty) June 1, 2020
Fans nowadays, however, about more positive about the future under new owner, Mark Stott.
David, who runs the supporters group @stockport_fans on Twitter, believes the club will be “fine” during this time and has faith in the new owner to do what’s best for the club:
“Mark Stott has the financial punch to keep this club afloat while being sensible,” David tells The Manc.
“He has laid out plans of what he wants to do and achieve already and has put together a team to keep it that way.
“We can survive.”
It’s perhaps no surprise supporters are happy, given that their owner is a longtime fan of the club and recognises the importance of Stockport County to the town.
Following the takeover back in January, Stott said that he wanted to deepen the club’s “longstanding ties with the local community”, calling Stockport a “unique community club”.
County clearly haven’t forget how the community supported them during their most “arduous” times, and they have been looking to lend a hand wherever possible during the pandemic.
In recent weeks, Stockport have also been putting the spotlight on their local sponsors.
On the club website, you’ll find a series which aims to “highlight the current operations and offerings of [their] club sponsors during these most difficult of times” in order to “return the favour” for all the support the businesses have given them over the years.
Despite the financial improvements over the past few months, fans are still weighing in to help the club in whatever way they can – backed by community group Help the Hatters.
David, a volunteer for Help the Hatters has said the group is all about “getting things done”.
While volunteers primarily provide practical support to help maintain the facilities at Edgeley Park, they’ve also created The Stockport County Museum at the ground – turning an unused space into something useful for the community.
The group has defied its size to make a definite difference over the past decade.
Just last month, they were awarded the Queen’s Award for Voluntary Service – which is the highest award a volunteer group can receive in the UK.
Wikipedia
Following their award, Chief Executive for the Hatters, Johnny Vaughan, said: “Ever since I came to County in January, I have been staggered by the amount of work this relatively small group of volunteers achieves on a weekly basis.
“This accolade is deserved recognition for everything they do and we are delighted that they are being honoured for their incredible efforts.”
Community is at the heart of Stockport County, but above all else, fans just want to get back to watch their team play.
As Russ Johnson, founder of the fans podcast ‘The Scarf Bergara Wore’, aptly summarised: “County fans are so because we go to the games, we walk the streets and we know our club inside out.
“It doesn’t bear thinking about that we cannot have our match days.”
Sport
Pep Guardiola hints at when Manchester City fans can expect to see their latest arrival
Danny Jones
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has given supporters a rough timeline as to when they can expect to see their new signing, or at least their latest arrival, make his first appearance.
The Blues wrapped up the January transfer window with four major signings: their new attacking number seven, Omar Marmoush (who has already bagged a hattrick on his home debut) promising defensive duo, Abdukodir Khusanov and Brazilian Vitor Reis, as well as their ‘mini-Rodri’, Nico Gonzalez.
However, the club has had another late arrival who was technically signed back at the start of last year but who has spent for the last 12 months or so loaned back to his previous parent club, River Plate in Argentina, waiting to make the move over to the Etihad Stadium – and now he’s here in Manchester.
Speaking on his touchdown in 0161, Pep said Claudio Echeverri won’t be thrown into first-team action straight away but did give a rough estimate as to when City fans could expect him to get involved. You can see him discussing the integration plan in his post-match press conference following the Spurs win.
The mention was only brief but there’s still plenty of reason for Man City fans to be excited by the late January signing.
“Yeah, he [Claudio Echeverri] is going to start to train and mainly will be for the end of the season, maybe the [Club] World Cup and as soon as possible [that] he arrives he can adapt quick for the future.”
As mentioned, the 19-year-old Argentinian attacking midfielder from Resistencia officially put pen to paper with CFG back in January 2024 and was quickly dubbed ‘the next Messi’.
Now, although the football world is often quick to jump the gun with these things and he isn’t the first and certainly won’t be last to be slapped with this premature title, he’s done more to back up these claims since then than he has rubbish them.
Starring at the 2025 Under-20 South American Championships, netting six goals in nine games to finish the tournament as the second highest scorer thanks to notable braces against Brazil and Uruguay as the young Argentine’s finished as runners up.
He also notched 48 senior appearances for River Plate thus far, netting four goals and grabbing eight assists in that time, not to mention having already captained his national team at the 2023 Under 17s World Cup, where he scored another five.
Safe to say there’s plenty of talent to be tapped in this lad.
Once again, Echeverri won’t go straight into the senior set-up for a little while yet, barring a major injury crisis, but he’ll be a more than exciting addition to the City Football Academy and for future first-team lineups for years to come.
Who knows, maybe he’ll be included in an FA Cup matchday squad? Nevertheless, you can expect him to not just come of the bench but hopefully show what he can do at the Club World Cup this summer.
City‘s first fixture as reigning champions of the competition will be against Moroccan side Wydad AC on 18 June 2025.
You can watch Echeverri’s first full interview as a Man City player down below:
The new Man City signing is excited to be finally be part of the club 13 months on from agreeing his contract.
‘Nothing is eternal’: Is Pep Guardiola hinting at the end of Manchester City’s supremacy?
Danny Jones
Pep Guardiola looks to have suggested that more than a decade of Manchester City’s supremacy and Premier League dominance at the very least might be coming to an end.
Speaking in his post-match press interviews after City were knocked out of the Champions League by serial European Cup winners Real Madrid, Guardiola cut a somewhat more deflated figure than usual following the 3-1 defeat.
A Kylian Mbappe hattrick which was closed out within an hour of play was enough to stretch the aggregate score to 6-3 over the two legs and Madrid doubling their lead across the tie proved yet again why, not unlike City domestically over the last decade, they’re the kings of the continental competition.
In contrast, however, Pep seemed to accept the loss much more easily than perhaps we’ve seen in the past and rather than appearing familiarly frustrated or defiant in the press conference; instead, he seemed rather reflective, responding to one reporter: “Nothing is eternal”.
🗣️ "Nothing is eternal" – Pep Guardiola.
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Insisting that they have to decide whether a significant rebuild is needed to keep competing at the very top level consistently as they have done since the 54-year-old arrived back in 2016, he argued that it is only with that they’ll be able to determine what comes next.
As for the result itself, he made no bones about Carlo Ancelotti’s side having “deserved it”, stating simply that “the best team won” and that fans and players alike have to “accept the reality: they were better.”
Having been a familiar foe for Pep long before he arrived in Manchester, both at Barcelona and Bayern Munich – not to mention City having faced Los Blancos a dozen times before Tuesday night since 2012 – there have been less surprising outcomes for supporters to come to terms with.
“With time, the club and everyone is going to accept what it is but for now we have 30/40 games for the Premier League next season to try and be here [in the Champions League] and to improve. Nothing is eternal”, said the Catalan coaching genius.
On the other hand, he also went on to add that it was merely a reflection on the night itself and not what his team have achieved in recent years.
He went on to remark that “when we were playing outstanding it hurt more” to be knocked out of the UCL when he felt they deserved to stay in it, but still insisted: “We have been unbelievable and we have to try step by step to get better from today.” Tonight just wasn’t the night.
Who knows? Perhaps it was just some more melodrama from a manager with an undeniable flare for pageantry and playing into/in the face of narratives when he doesn’t come out on top – which hasn’t happened all that often until their dip in form this season.
Plus, there’s certainly still plenty for him and the fans to be positive about; not only has the arrival of their ‘Egyptian Prince’ and the media’s Mo Salah successor, Omar Marmoush, got plenty of people excited – especially after that first-half hattrick against Newcastle – but so too have the other January signings.
In fact, for all of his downplaying in this particular presser (which you can hear in full HERE), it felt like there were only upsides after their victory over Newcastle, even going so far as to dub new signing Nico Gonzalez a ‘mini-Rodri‘.
You can watch the highlights from the game down below:
Pep is right, nothing is eternal – but sometimes you just come up against talents like Mbappe and there’s very little anyone can do about it.
Kate Jackson -
14th July 2020 
