1998–99 in English football gets the manager's job on a permanent basis. 28 October 1998 – Chelsea player-manager Gianluca Vialli scores a hat-trick in the 4–1 League Cup third round win over Aston Villa. Making his debut as a late substitute is 17-year-old defender John Terry. On the same day, striker Brian Laudrup's departure from Chelsea is announced after just four months at the club. 31 October 1998 – Ron Reeves, a 55-year-old steward, is killed outside Highfield Road stadium after being crushed by the Arsenal team coach just before a game with Coventry City. The month ends with Aston Villa still top, a
Aston Villa F.C. to choose Frank Pike's scarf from an array in the BBC wardrobe; he chose a claret and blue one—Aston Villa's colours. The character Nessa in the BBC sitcom "Gavin & Stacey" was revealed as an Aston Villa fan in an episode screened in December 2009. In the 1952 film The Card, the main character Denry Machin becomes a town councillor and purchases the rights to locally born Aston Villa player 'Callear', the "greatest centre-forward in England", for the failing local football club. Villa have also featured on several occasions in prose. Stanley Woolley, a character in Derek Robinson's Booker shortlisted