A weej of woes, on the whole, for Brian (allegedly) Kerr's Foreign Green Army. It's only January but already we've awarded our I'm Trying Hard to Be Kind Here/Understatement of 2003 award to Peter Schmeichel who admitted, on the BBC yesterday, that "Gary Breen didn't play his best game today".
Away from home
Granted, Breenie, as he's known in the trade, was surrounded by West Ham team-mates who posed as much danger to their own goalkeeper as Ruud van Nistelrooy, but, sadly, the centre half appeared to play a pivotal role in most of the six goals conceded by his team in the FA Cup tie at Old Trafford.
Manager Glenn Roeder finally put him out of his misery when he substituted him mid-way through the second half.
Ian Harte had a marginally happier weekend, even if he was an unused sub against Gillingham in the FA Cup - that, though, was an improvement on recent weeks when Terry Venables hadn't even named him in his first 16. "It cannot go on like this," Hartie told the Sun last week, "I know I'm a good player, I'm just not getting the chance to prove it at the moment." Brian Kerr? The decision is, allegedly, yours.
More woe? Damien Duff limped out of Blackburn's League Cup semi-final with yet another hamstring injury. Club physio Dave Fevre is now examining his bed and car to see if they are the source of his interminable injury problems.
Speaking of which - Keith O'Neill started his first game for Coventry in a year on Tuesday, captaining their reserves against Watford . . . and had to leave the pitch after 33 minutes when he "tweaked! his left hamstring.
Logo has to go go
Birmingham under-nine team Sedgley Scorpions are in a spot of bother with their local football association who have deemed the logo on their shirt badges to be "unsuitable, violent and offensive". A complaint was made to the association by the father of a member of an opposing team, leaving the Scorpions now facing a bill of £2,500 to replace their shirts, pennants and club souvenirs. "This is political correctness gone mad," complained club chairman Gary Davis, before revealing that "the printer thought the words were a bit of Latin". The logo? "Stuffem, tankem, 'ammerem".
Quotes of the week
"He has broken his left leg, which is a real kick in the teeth for him."
- Luke Harvey, as sublimely heard by Private Eye on Radio 5 Live.
"The most important part in playing football is using your brain and in this part it is apparent that Chinese players need to improve and this aspect will need a long time,"
- Paul Gascoigne, after his failed attempt at winning a contract with a Chinese club (em, see below)
"We could smell him drunk in the morning."
- A Chinese player with Liaoning Bodao, on his experience of training with Paul Gascoigne (em, see above).
"It was only a matter of time before they got fit and after that it's like riding a bike, or making love to a beautiful woman - you never forget."
- Graeme Souness on Andy Cole and Dwight Yorke learning how to score again (Football 365).
"I'd have to win nine out of eight games to get the manager of the month award."
- Sheffield United manager Neil Warnock, feeling aggrieved.
"He's not English, is he? So you expect one or two things like that."
- Neil Warnock, again, accusing Stephane Henchoz of spitting and not being English.
Teaser torture ends
No kidding, we received 11 "you are our final hope" emails last week from tortured souls asking us if we knew "which player has played in each of these derby games - Real Madrid v Atletico Madrid, Liverpool v Everton, Arsenal v Chelsea, Borussia Dortmund v Borussia Moenchengladbach and AC Milan v Inter Milan".
The teaser, we were told, had been doing the rounds on the Internet all week and no one could come up with the answer - including us.
Generally we offer Andrei Kanchelskis as the solution to these derby puzzles, largely because he's moved more often than your average bowels, but he didn't fit the bill this time.
The answer? Well, the Guardian, bless them, finally cracked it: "no such player exists". Why? "Because it's a trick question devised by some sadistic fiend who clearly gets his rocks off watching the demented minds of football trivia buffs slowly unravel". So, those of you who wasted seven days of your life trying to come up with the answer can feel suitably tulip-ish. Including? Ourselves.
No warm welcome
Another reason to hate Manchester United, Part 476: a carpet and a radiator have been installed in one of the dug-outs at Old Trafford, to keep the occupants snug and cosy.
Which dug-out? Need you ask? Of course, of course: the home dug-out. The away one? Would still freeze the nostrils off a brass monkey, by all accounts.
Darth Vader on board
Dave Prowse, the man who played Darth Vader in Star Wars (and if you knew that already you are truly sad) and who starred in a British Green Cross Code TV campaign, has been made an honorary director of Exeter City by co-chairman, fork-bender Uri Geller, joining Michael Jackson and freaky magic-man David Blaine on the honorary board. "He's a positive power," explained Geller, "and there's a psychological value - you can imagine when the players of an opposition team go out knowing that Darth Vader is watching them." Maybe that's why the Might Macclesfield only drew 1-1 with Exeter on Saturday?
Whatever happened to ... Diego Maradona?
(Or: 'How The Mighty Have Fallen')
A tragic end to a magnificent sporting life: Maradona confessed last week that ... sweet Jesus ... he's taken up golf. "I admit I don't feel the same emotions on the golf course as I did kicking the ball around," he said, trying to minimise the damage to his sporting reputation, "but I play absolutely every day, training like an animal. Sometimes when I am sleeping I wake up because I am dreaming that I made a wrong move and I stand up and repeat it in my room." Worse: Cuban high-jumping legend Javier Sotomayor has been known to join him in a round. And there were you thinking cocaine-use was the worst of Diego's afflictions.
More quotes of the week
"Gerard Houllier runs a very tightly knit ship."
- Sky Sports' Rob Hawthorne.
"Arsenal are streets ahead of everyone in this league and Manchester United are up there with them, obviously."
- Newcastle's Craig Bellamy, as heard by Dangerhere.com
"If you can get through the first round you have a good chance of getting into the next one."
- Norwich boss Nigel Worthington, on BBC Radio Norfolk.
Anne Robinson: "Which hot drink is an anagram of the word 'eat'? Contestant: "Hot chocolate?"
(Football link? None. But this Private Eye gem was, frankly, too good to exclude).
Give 'em some celery stick
Ugly scenes at the Scottish second division game between Berwick Rangers and Stranraer last week when two Berwick supporters hurled missiles at their visitors, in the form of . . . celery sticks. Northumbria police are still looking for the pair with the intention of charging them with embarrassing the good name of football hooliganism. "I drove 200 miles to watch the game, only for some fat, bearded git to bombard me with celery," complained Stranraer's fan.
Couldn't afford the sack
Huddersfield Town chairman David Taylor? Diamond. "I met with the manager (Mick Wadsworth) on Tuesday night specifically to sack him," reported Football 365. "We had a lengthy meeting to discuss compensation. The amount agreed, it transpired, could not be funded by the board. So basically we could not afford to sack him. I have now given the manager my full support." Love it.
