It’s early 1971 and the footballing world is still coming to terms with the god like genius of current World Champions, Brazil.  As the curtain comes down on an illustrious career, Dima Istow, for World Soccer magazine, catches up with the legendary USSR goalkeeper Lev Yashin to talk football and the future.

Lothar Matthaus, 28, the midfield ace and captain of the West German national side looks back on a splendid year. In his first season with Italy's lnternazionale he won the league championship, and with the national team he is on course for the World Cup finals next year.

When, in the customary steaming heat of summer, the French began their championship in Lyon last July, Chris Waddle and Mick McCarthy, the new arrivals from Britain, found themselves in direct and contrasted opposition.

If one player symbolises the renaissance of lnternazionale then that young man is Nicola Berti. While the media glare focuses on Giovanni Trapottoni, free-scoring Aldo Serena and imported German stars Lothar Matthaus and Andy Brehme, 22-year-old Berti has captured the hearts of Inter's 'tifosi' with his driving midfield play and ability to score vital goals.  Not only has Berti played an instrumental part in Inter's first 'scudetto' since 1980, he has also laid claim to a permanent spot in an Italian team among the favourites for next year’s World Cup.

John Toshack, team boss of Real Madrid, is a fully paid-up member of the European managers' society.

The checking-in booths at Terminal 3 at Heathrow Airport seemed unusually crowded on that sunny morning when our intrepid party gathered to 'vene,  vide', and if possible, 'vici' in Rome.

The rise and rise of Mark Hughes is the comic strip story of the 1984-85 European soccer season.

England went some way to restoring the tarnished reputation of British football with their ultimately successful, if gruelling, tour of Mexico and North America. Starting the three-week tour within hours of the carnage of Brussels and against a backcloth of grief and emotion, the players revealed a profoundly genuine team spirit that was to support them right through the tour to its ritzy finish on Sunset Boulevard, Los Angeles.

Vincenzo Scifo is not, in many ways, so very different from thousands of other 18-year-olds growing up in Belgium. He is fascinated by the sight and sounds of a smart sports car and in his spare time he delights in a game of tennis.

Juan Alberto Schiaffino is now 51, and it's 34 years since he was given the opening to launch a career which brought him fame as the world's most expensive footballer. Today Schiaffino lives on the outskirts of Montevideo, his native city, in a spacious villa out towards the airport.  “I’m not rich," he'll tell you. "But I'm not poor either."

An unlikely band threaten to join England's European roadshow next season - Howard Wilkinson's Sheffield Wednesday.

“Droit au but" (straight for goal) is the motto of current French League and Cup winners Olympique de Marseille.  That phrase has particular relevance this season as club president; Bernard Tapie has invested heavily on new faces so that Champions’ Cup quarter­ finalists Marseille can achieve their goal of becoming the first French club to lift a European trophy. 

Athletic Bilbao struck a resounding blow last season for self-reliant clubs by reaching the UEFA Cup and Spanish Cup Finals with a team made up entirely of local-raised players.

The More gloomy the fans in Argentina became over the recent series of prestige friendlies, the more optimistic has become Mario Kempes over his chances of returning home next summer to lead the World Cup bid.