The two defining events of this week have of course been the departure of Geri Halliwell from the Spice Girls and the omission of Paul Gascoigne from England's World Cup squad.
Some of the crueller commentators have not been slow to link the two stories about the five underclad millionairesses and the overweight multimillionaire Gascoigne. There have been too many rather obvious jokes about Gazza's chances of becoming the new Ginger Spice.
We have also been reminded of the following:
There are crueller activities than politics.
No individual is bigger than a team.
It is the end of an era.
There is no room in today's game for the maverick.
The cult of the "principal dancer" is on the way out.
A new breed of athletes has come to the fore.
Yes, and even more predictable comments were made about the Gascoigne affair. But there seemed to be a measure of originality in British soccer manager Glenn Hoddle's remark: "There is an art to coming off the bench."
For a brief glorious moment, it seemed Hoddle had finally shaken off his image as the dour, down-to-earth, born-again Christian that he is, given only to making cautious, sensible appraisals of team members, selection and World Cup chances. There is an art to coming off the bench.
Of course the comment was not up there with Eric Cantona's Zen-like pronouncements on sardines, seagulls and fishing trawlers, but it had potential, depth, obscurity, and the word "art". The maverick player had given way to the maverick manager, and one thought instantly of new insights into the philosophy of bench-sitting, of existential dug-out exit procedures, of what is signified by the different gaps between waiting players on a bench, their mixed feelings about other players' fitness levels, and their combined horror and elation when a team-mate goes down, necessitating a replacement from the waiting substitutes.
There is an art to coming off the bench.
Then Hoddle ruined it: "You can't take 20 minutes to get into a game."
That is all he meant. You can't come off the bench and on to the playing pitch unfit and unready. You can't come off like Gascoigne.
Dullness reigns.
Right. The eminent writer/ therapist Oliver James, who every week puts "Britain on the Couch" in his column of that title in the London Independent, wrote recently of the major national blight of wannabeeism. This afflicts more and more averagely talented or hardworking people, making them believe they can achieve goals that are beyond them. They "wannabe" famous in one way or another, imagining that fame/ money equates with happiness, a notion that survives despite everyday proof of its inaccuracy.
James sensibly points out that "most of us do not have the combination of exceptional talent, capacity for hard work and emotional maladjustment necessary for outstanding achievement". You may wannabe, but you cannabe.
The fates of Ginger Spice and Paul Gascoigne may result in a healthy rise of donwannabees. But that is unlikely. The wannabees will see only that their heroes made a mark, made money and achieved fame. They will not see that there was a genuine talent there too, however used, abused or dissipated.
Gazza has been called a clown but there seem to be few clown wannabees. And it seems odd that while Britain has recently established its first circus school in London, the Circus Space in Shoreditch, there is no clown training offered. It's all serious aerial work, acrobatics, juggling and unicycling. This is rather sad, since for many children going to circuses, the clowns used to be the biggest attraction.
The depressing truth is that circus has apparently seen a need to grow up too, and it seems that the following familiar statements apply:
There are crueller activities than clowning.
No individual is bigger than a team.
It is the end of an era.
There is no room in today's circus for the maverick.
The cult of the "principal dancer" is on the way out.
A new breed of athletes has come to the fore.