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The Express & Star is an evening newspaper based in Wolverhampton, England, published Monday to Saturday in nine different editions covering the Black Country, Birmingham and the wider West Midlands area from Tamworth to Kidderminster. It as widely perceived^{[by whom?]} as being moderately right-wing.^{[citation needed]} The paper reports on sports in the region, along side the Birmingham based, Birmingham Mail.^{[citation needed]}

The newspaper had a daily circulation of 124,480 in the second half of 2009,^[2] making it the biggest selling regional daily paper in the UK.

The Express & Star is one of the few independent newspapers now operating in the UK having been under the continuous ownership of the Graham family almost since its inception. It is owned by the Midland News Association, which also owns the Shropshire Star newspaper.

Its associated website expressandstar.com was launched in 1997, initially as westmidlands.com. It changed its title to expressandstar.com in 2002.

The newspaper's editor is Adrian Faber.

The Chronicle series of free weekly newspapers is also produced from the newspaper's headquarters in Wolverhampton. The weekly Sporting Star, published on a Saturday, was discontinued in June 2009.

History[link]

The origins of the Express & Star lie in the Evening Star – a liberal newspaper founded in Wolverhampton in 1880 as a rival to the existing conservative Evening Express, itself founded in 1874. In 1882 the Star was bought by wealthy Scottish-American philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, encouraged by his friend and fellow Dunfermline-born liberal (and by then prominent Wolverhampton councillor) Thomas Graham.

The combination of Carnegie's finance and Graham's organisational ability saw the paper flourish and within two years the Star had taken over the Express under the editorship of another Dunfermline native, editor Andrew Meikle. The combined newspaper adopted its current name in 1889.

Carnegie severed his links with the paper and its parent company the Midland News Association in 1902, leaving Graham in full control until his death in 1909. The following decades saw a steady expansion under Graham's descendents, with the paper's influence spreading out from its native Wolverhampton to cover the entire Black Country. An office in Birmingham was opened and later closed, although a Birmingham edition is still produced from Wolverhampton.

Boris Johnson once did work experience on the paper while Jeremy Clarkson wrote a motoring column for the group's Chronicle series of free newspapers.

The paper currently has a large reputation for sports (in particular association football) journalism with daily articles from Timothy Abraham, and weekly articles by Matthew Turvey.

The 21st century saw a drop in circulation and advertising revenues, in common with most other newspapers, leading to the company shedding around 50 jobs through a voluntary redundancy scheme in April 2006, with further cuts announced in January 2007. Since October 2011 all editions of the paper have been printed at the company's plant in Ketley, Telford. Former printing plants in West Bromwich and Wolverhampton were closed in 2009 and 2011.

External links[link]

• Express & Star website

References[link]

This English newspaper-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. v t e

Bill Brooks may refer to:

• Bill Brooks (coach), football and basketball coach at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington
• Bill Brooks (American football) (born 1964), former wide receiver for the Indianapolis Colts, Buffalo Bills, and Washington Redskins

See also[link]

• William Brooks (disambiguation)

This disambiguation page lists articles about people with the same name. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

Stephen George "Steve" Bull, MBE, (born 28 March 1965 in Tipton, Staffordshire) is an English former footballer who is best remembered for his 13-year spell at Wolverhampton Wanderers. He played there from 1986 until his retirement from playing in 1999, and holds the club's goalscoring record with 306 goals, which included 18 hat-tricks for the club.

He was capped 13 times for the England team between 1989 and 1990, scoring four goals.

Playing career[link]

Early years[link]

Bull was born on Tipton's Moat Farm estate and started school in September 1969 at Wednesbury Oak Primary School and moved up to Willingsworth High School in September 1976, by which time he was excelling in school football teams. The junior teams he played for included Ocker Hill infants, Red Lion and Newey Goodman. He left school in 1981 to join non-league Tipton Town. During this time he also held down a succession of factory jobs in addition to playing local league games.

He began his professional career, aged 19, after being recommended to West Bromwich Albion in 1984 by his Tipton Town manager Sid Day, who also worked as a scout for the Baggies. After initially having to train with the club's youth ranks, he was quickly offered a pro contract and moved into first team contention. He made his senior debut on 23 October 1985, replacing Garth Crooks in a 2–1 Full Members Cup win against Crystal Palace.^[1][2] He made his league debut as a substitute against QPR, away, on 12 April 1986 (lost 0-1), and his full debut at home to Sheffield Wednesday on 22 April (drew 1-1); they were his only league appearances that season and only appearances in top flight football.^[3] He played three Second Division games for Albion after they were relegated in 1986, scoring twice, and also scored one goal in two League Cup appearances for the club.^[4] In November 1986, he was sold to local rivals Wolverhampton Wanderers, along with Andy Thompson, for £65,000 where he remained until the end of his professional career in 1999.

Wolverhampton Wanderers[link]

In over 13 years at Wolves, Bull broke no less than four of the club's goalscoring records. He became their all-time leading goalscorer with 306 goals in competitive games (250 of them in the Football League, also a club record) and became their highest goalscorer in a single season when he scored 52 goals in competitive games during the 1987–88 season.

He also scored a club record of 18 hat-tricks - the first of them against Hartlepool United in a 4-1 Fourth Division home win on 9 May 1987,^[5] the last on 17 August 1996 in a 3-0 Division One away win over Grimsby Town.^[6]

His debut for Wolves, then languishing in the Fourth Division, was against Wrexham on 22 November 1986. He went on to make 464 league appearances for the club, 561 appearances in total.

He is regarded as such a legend at the club that one of the main stands at their home ground, Molineux, is named after him. This commemoration was made in June 2003, with the stand having previously being known as the John Ireland Stand.

His first season at the club, 1986-87, saw him score a total of 19 goals for Wolves - 15 of them in the Fourth Division, in which they finished fourth - although they lost out on promotion after being beaten by Aldershot in the playoffs.^[7]

Bull scored 52 goals in all competitions during the 1987-88 season as Wolves won the Fourth Division championship and became the first of only three teams (later matched by Burnley and Preston North End) to have been champions of all four divisions in the English league. 34 of his goals came in the league, including hat-tricks against Exeter City and Darlington. He also scored hat-tricks against Cheltenham Town and Brentford.^[8]

On 11 February 1989, after just over two years at the club, he surpassed the 100-goal margin for Wolves when scoring a hat-trick in a Third Division game against fellow promotion contenders Fulham at the Molineux, which Wolves won 5-2.^[9]

In 1988-89, he inspired Wolves to a second successive promotion, this time as Third Division champions, with 50 goals — marking a tally of 102 goals in two seasons. While still playing in the Third Division, he was selected for the England team and scored on his debut against Scotland at Hampden Park. 37 of his goals that season came in the league for Wolves. He achieved his first four-goal haul on 26 November 1988 in a 6-0 home win over Preston North End, scoring a hat-trick the following month in a 6-2 home victory over Mansfield Town. He managed a third league hat-trick that season in a 5–2 February home win over Fulham. He also scored freely in the cups, scoring four against Port Vale in the Sherpa Van Trophy and then against Bristol City in the same competition.^[10]

In 1989-90, he finally played Second Division football for Wolves, his first goal at this level coming on 26 August 1989 in a 1-1 home draw with Bradford City. On Boxing Day, he reached the 10-goal margin in the league, before impressively grabbing all four goals for Wolves in their 4-1 win at Newcastle United on New Year's Day 1990. On 20 March, in the Black Country derby at Molineux, as Wolves beat struggling Albion 2-1 to boost their promotion hopes, Bull scored his 20th league goal of the campaign. A hat-trick against Leicester City followed a month later, and he finished that campaign with 24 league goals and 26 in all competitions, although Wolves missed out on the playoffs and the chance of a third successive promotion.^[11]

He started the 1990-91 season in style with both goals at home to promotion favourites Oldham Athletic, who came away from the Molineux with a 3-2 victory. A hat-trick in a 4-0 home win over Bristol City saw him reach the 11-goal mark in the league by 6 October, and he reached the 20-goal margin (for the fourth reason running) on 26 February as they beat Port Vale 3-1 at home. A hat-trick at home to Oxford United in a thrilling 3-3 draw came the following month, and Bull finished the season with 25 goals in the league and 26 in all competitions.^[12]

Late in the 1991-92 season, he scored his 195th competitive goal for Wolves after just over five years at the club, breaking the club's decade-old goalscoring record set by John Richards. Early in the following season he scored his 200th goal for the club.^[13]

Bull remained a prolific goalscorer in the second tier of the English league, and stayed loyal to his Midlands roots despite interest from the likes of Coventry City and Newcastle United. In fact, when former England manager Graham Taylor was manager at Molineux in 1995, he had agreed with then Coventry City boss, Ron Atkinson the sale of Bull to the Highfield Road club. The outcry from the gold and black sector of the Black Country was prolific, the local Express and Star newspaper even launching a campaign to keep Bull at Wolves. Whether it was a prick of guilt, or a tug at the old heart-strings, no-one will ever know, but Bull backed out of the deal and his transfer to Coventry never happened.

More than three years earlier, during the 1991-92 season, it had been reported that Bull was a transfer target for Leeds United,^[14] the team who won the top division title that season.^[15]

Bull played only one game in the English top flight — coming on as a substitute, replacing Andy Thompson, for West Bromwich Albion in 1986 — the rest of his career was spent in the lower divisions. He came close to achieving his ambition of reaching the Premier League in 1995 and 1997, but Wolves lost in the play-offs both times.

During his final two seasons at Molineux, his chances of first-team football were reduced by a series of knee injuries. He reached the 300-goal milestone^[16] on 18 February 1998, scoring in a 2-0 home win over Bradford City in the league.^[17]

Bull's final goal for the club came against Bury on 26 September 1998^[18] and his final competitive appearance for the club came on the last day of the 1998-99 season against Bradford City.^[19]By January 1999, however, reports were circulating that Bull would soon be retiring as a player due to an ongoing knee problem.^[20]

On 13 July 1999, at the age of 34, Bull finally admitted defeat in his battle to fully regain fitness and announced his retirement after 13 years with Wolves.^[21]

However, he soon returned to playing as player-coach of Hereford United for a season in the Conference, working with Graham Turner, the manager who had signed him for Wolves.

Known by his fans as 'Bully' for his club loyalty, rapport with supporters and passion for the game and also known as the "Tipton Skin" for his trademark closely cropped haircut, he received an MBE for services to Association Football in December 1999, shortly after retiring as a first class player.

In May 2003, Bull appeared in a testimonial game for West Bromwich Albion's Bob Taylor at The Hawthorns. He amused many of the Albion fans in attendance by dramatically falling to the ground when the chant went up, "Stand up if you hate the Wolves".

On 29 July 2006, Bull made one final appearance for Wolves in his 20th anniversary testimonial game against Aston Villa at Molineux, playing the first seven minutes of the match.

International career[link]

Bull was capped 13 times by England, and scored 4 goals, all coming in the build up to Italia 90. He scored his first goal on his debut after replacing an injured John Fashanu against Scotland on 27 May 1989. Two more goals came in a friendly against Czechoslovakia in 1989–90, one of which was voted number 37 of England's 50 Greatest Goals. His final England goal came against Tunisia, which earned him a place in Bobby Robson's World Cup squad.

Despite starting his international career well, he did not score another goal for England after this. He played four times during Italia 90 - three times as a substitute against Republic of Ireland, Holland and Belgium and once as a starter against Egypt. His final match for England was on 17 October 1990 against Poland, but he was not picked again by his future Wolves manager, Graham Taylor.

Bull was still technically a Third Division player when he won his first two caps, at the end of the 1988-89 season, as Wolves had not yet played in Division Two after their promotion that season. He remains the last player to be capped by England from outside the top two tiers, and one of only five post-war players so honoured.^[22]

In total he scored nine goals in 23 appearances for his country at full, U-21 and "B" team levels.

Management career[link]

On February 21, 2008, Bull entered management with Conference National side Stafford Rangers. He had previously worked as a coach at this level with Hereford United in the 2000–01 season and had completed his UEFA Pro B coaching licence in the years in between. The team were mired in the relegation zone at the time of his appointment and he was unable to prevent relegation.

However, he parted company with the club on 12 December 2008.^[23]

Personal life[link]

He is the cousin of West Bromwich born former footballer Gary Bull, who played for clubs including Barnet, Nottingham Forest and Birmingham City.^[24]. Bull is one of a number of sporting and showbiz stars competing in the 2012 Silverstone Classic Celebrity Challenge race.

Honours[link]

• 1988 Fourth Division Championship
• 1988 Football League Trophy
• 1989 Third Division Championship

Career statistics[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official Site bullybully.net
• Profile at the Official Wolves site
• Steve Bull career stats at Soccerbase

v t e England squad – 1990 FIFA World Cup Fourth Place 1 Shilton 2 Stevens 3 Pearce 4 Webb 5 Walker 6 Butcher 7 Bryan Robson (c) 8 Waddle 9 Beardsley 10 Lineker 11 Barnes 12 Parker 13 Woods 14 Wright 15 Dorigo 16 McMahon 17 Platt 18 Hodge 19 Gascoigne 20 Steven 21 Bull 22 Beasant Coach: Bobby Robson

Glynis Barber (born 25 October 1955) is a South African actress of Afrikaner descent, born and brought up in South Africa. She was born Glynis van der Riet.^[1] When she was five years old, her parents divorced, and she and her mother moved to Johannesburg. She is best known for her portrayal as Sgt. Harriet Makepeace in the British police drama Dempsey & Makepeace.

Acting career[link]

Television[link]

She studied at the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts. Acting since 1978, her popular breakthrough came in 1981 with her role as Soolin in the BBC science fiction television series Blake's 7.

In 1982 she took the title role in the television series Jane playing a World War II heroine. This series was filmed against a blue screen allowing for the addition of a cartoon background, an experimental technique in its day. However, Barber is best known for her mid-1980s role of Sgt. Harriet Makepeace in the British police drama Dempsey & Makepeace, where she met her future husband, Michael Brandon.

Since 1987, Barber has appeared frequently in plays, films and television series. She also starred in the LWT drama series Night and Day as Fiona Brake. In 2006 she joined the cast of ITV soap, Emmerdale, playing the character of DCI Grace Barraclough, investigating the death of Tom King on Christmas Day. She exited the soap in September 2007, when her character was killed.

In 2009, she appeared as hospital administrator Jean McAteer in The Royal, another ITV drama series set in Yorkshire ^[1] On 23 October 2009 it was announced she would play Glenda Mitchell the mother of Ronnie Mitchell, Roxy Mitchell and Danny Mitchell in EastEnders after Jill Gascoine withdrew from the role during her first day on set.^[2] On 27 February 2011 it was announced that Barber was to leave EastEnders in March 2011.

Theatre[link]

Her stage work has included Macbeth, Killing Time with Dennis Waterman, High Flyers with Hugh Grant and Make Me A Match and The Graduate. In 2011 Barber starred alongside Christopher Timothy and Denis Lil in Alan Ackbourne's Seasons Greetings playing Belinda.

Film[link]

She appeared as Lady Caroline in Michael Winner's 1983 remake of The Wicked Lady, which starred Faye Dunaway. She later appeared alongside Vanessa Redgrave in the 1997 film, Déjà Vu.

She appeared as Anthea Davis in On the Nose in 2001 along with Dan Aykroyd and Robbie Coltrane.

Personal life[link]

Barber married actor Paul Antony Barber, whom she met at drama school, in 1976. They were divorced in 1979.^[3]

Barber married her Dempsey & Makepeace co-star Michael Brandon on 18 November 1989; they have a son, Alexander Max Brandon (born November 1992).

Selected filmography[link]

• Tangiers (1982)

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official Website
• Glynis Barber at the Internet Movie Database
• Filmography at TV.com
• Ellis, James (3 September 2003). "Glynis Barber". Metro (UK). http://www.metro.co.uk/fame/interviews/article.html?in_article_id=1070&in_page_id=11. Retrieved 10 February 2009.