When Shorts Were Short concerns itself solely with what was actually a very narrow window in football history when teams wore, well, short shorts. The podcast takes 1954 as its starting point, when Umbro made their first England kit with shorter shorts, to 1992, when short shorts were all but finished as Umbro's baggy shorts for Tottenham's new kit, ahead of the '91 FA Cup Final, quickly caught on.

If the shorts weren't short, we don't talk about it.

If you were to name the great managers of British football during the 1954-92 era covered by this podcast, most of us would probably namecheck the likes of Busby, Shankly, Stein, Clough. Bob Paisley, six league titles in just 9 years, 20 trophies overall during his managerial reign, would be my own choice. Bill Nicholson might be in there. If he isn’t, he should be. But one name that should be around the top of that list is sometimes missing and that is Don Revie, a visionary as a player and as a manager. Much of what we see in modern football, as we’ll cover in this interview, the dossiers on the opposition, the mass market that is replica kits, Revie was behind that.

My guest this week is Labour and Co-op MP for Islwyn, Chris Evans, whose book Don Revie – The definitive Biography was described by the Time as '[an] engrossing account of one of football's most divisive yet brilliant characters... this book rehabilitates a much maligned manager who changed English football.'

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Don Revie - The Definitive Biography

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