Messi Breaks Birmingham's Heart in Stoppage Time

For about thirty-five minutes last night, it looked like it might actually be happening. Anthony Gordon poked England ahead ten minutes into the second half at Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta, and across Digbeth, Moseley and the Jewellery Quarter, three packed fan zones erupted as one.

Then the small matter of Lionel Messi got in the way. With five minutes left, he threaded a pass through for Enzo Fernandez to level it at 1-1, and the noise in Birmingham dipped from roar to nervous murmur. Extra time beckoned, nerves were shredded — and then, deep into stoppage time, Messi did it again, this time crossing for substitute Lautaro Martinez to head home the winner. Full time: Argentina 2, England 1. Game over, in the cruellest possible way.

It's easy to forget, watching grown adults sob into pints of lager, that this was still a genuinely brilliant run. England had fought their way through to a World Cup semi-final, further than plenty of us allowed ourselves to hope for back in June, and did it playing some proper football along the way.

Birmingham had thrown itself into this tournament in a way that felt properly new. Luna Springs in Digbeth, The Village in Moseley and Saint Pauls Market in the Jewellery Quarter had all been rammed for the earlier rounds, turning a TV screen into a genuine city-wide occasion. Last night was no different, right up until the 92nd minute made it a much quieter walk home.

Argentina now go on to face Spain in Sunday's final at the new stadium in East Rutherford, New Jersey — a repeat, in spirit if not scoreline, of the sort of theatre this Argentina side has been serving up all tournament, largely because one man refuses to let them lose.

Spare a thought, too, for anyone who put money on England to go all the way. And spare a thought for the merchandise stalls: as you'll read below, Birmingham's Trading Standards team spent this same week confiscating fake England shirts by the crate-load. Somewhat academic now, but still the right call.

It hurts today. It'll hurt less by the weekend. Thanks for the run, England — see you at the next one.

If you've bought a suspiciously cheap England shirt down a Birmingham side street recently, there's a decent chance its cousins just got seized. Birmingham City Council's Trading Standards team, working with West Midlands Police, Immigration Enforcement and brand investigators from the Anti-Counterfeiting Group, carried out two raids on wholesalers in Hockley this week and came away with more than £650,000 worth of fake and unsafe goods.

The first raid turned up counterfeit World Cup kits worth upwards of £150,000 — shirts branded as England, Spain, France, Portugal and Argentina, all fake, all presumably destined for sale just as the tournament reaches its final week. Somewhat awkward timing, given what happened on the pitch last night.

The second operation, at a separate premises, was even bigger: thousands of counterfeit and unsafe mobile phone accessories, including imitation Apple products and fake Sony PlayStation controllers, with an estimated value north of £200,000.

What makes it worse is that this wasn't a first offence. One of the wholesalers involved had already been visited and formally warned earlier in the month, only for officers to find it still merrily supplying illegal goods on their return — this time including counterfeit toys carrying Disney, Marvel and K-pop branding.

Counterfeit goods aren't just a case of a slightly wonky logo. Fake phone chargers and accessories in particular carry real fire and electrical safety risks, and knock-off toys don't go through the same safety testing as the real thing — genuine concerns behind what might otherwise sound like a fairly dry enforcement story.

It's also a reminder of how much of this trade hides in plain sight around the Jewellery Quarter and Hockley's wholesale units, tucked between the legitimate jewellers and workshops the area is famous for.

No arrests were confirmed alongside the seizures, but Trading Standards say enquiries are continuing. If a bargain World Cup shirt looks too good to be true this week, it probably is.

Dudley Council has been released from special government scrutiny, after ministers confirmed the Best Value Notice issued to the authority last July has now been lifted.

The notice followed a stark warning from an external auditor back in January 2024, who called for urgent action to shore up the council's budget position and its use of reserves — the kind of language that, elsewhere in the West Midlands, has preceded genuine financial crisis. Birmingham's own well-documented troubles from 2023 loom large in the background of any story like this.

Rather than going the same way, Dudley appears to have clawed its way back onto solid ground. In a letter to the council, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government described the authority's progress over the past year as "significant, sustained and credible," and said ministers were now reassured about the council's capacity to meet its Best Value Duty — the legal requirement for councils to deliver services efficiently and economically.

It's not entirely mission accomplished, though. The same letter encourages Dudley to keep up the momentum, and to keep strengthening both its financial resilience and its wider organisational culture — civil-service speak for "well done, now don't get complacent."

Best Value Notices exist as an early-warning system, sitting a rung or two below the kind of full government intervention Birmingham experienced after its 2023 effective bankruptcy. Being freed from one is a genuinely meaningful marker that a council has pulled itself out of the danger zone, rather than just papering over the cracks for another year.

For residents, the practical upshot is less about the paperwork and more about what it signals: the risk of the sort of drastic cuts, asset sales or service reductions that have hit some neighbouring authorities looks, for now, to have eased.

A quietly good news day for Dudley, in other words — the kind of story that rarely gets a fanfare, but matters rather a lot if you happen to live there.

The Friar Park Millennium Centre, the community hub at the heart of one of Wednesbury's best-known neighbourhoods, has officially reopened after a year-long refurbishment and extension funded through the government's Levelling Up Partnership Programme.

The rebuilt centre now has noticeably more to offer than before: a community café, a dedicated youth space, and — for the first time — a permanent library. The idea is a single flexible building that can host everything from skills workshops and youth clubs to community events and simple social get-togethers, for every generation in the area.

It hasn't been an entirely smooth year to get here. Linda Matthews, chair of the Millennium Centre's board, thanked everyone who'd put up with the building disruption, singling out staff members Julie and Sam for keeping things running for the community throughout the works.

The project was delivered by Seddon Property Services working alongside Sandwell Council and the centre itself, and was marked with a ribbon-cutting attended by centre staff, members of the Wednesbury Levelling Up Partnership Board, local councillors, and young people who use the building regularly.

Kallianne Titley, who chairs that Partnership Board, said the investment had already made a visible difference locally — whether that's young people turning up for activities, residents picking up new skills, or community groups finally having a decent space to meet in.

There's more to come, too. Sandwell Council leader Councillor Nock confirmed Friar Park has also been chosen for the government's new Pride in Place Programme, worth £20 million over the next decade — with residents now being asked to help shape what that next phase of investment actually looks like.

If you're local, the centre is already taking bookings and enquiries for activities — a rare bit of building work that ends with more for the community, not less.

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✅ YESTERDAY'S ANSWER

Yesterday we asked: Tonight England face Argentina in the World Cup semi-final — which US city are they playing in?

The answer: A) Atlanta.

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