Planet Euro 2004

He may be stealing the headlines from Thierry Henry at Euro 2004 but Wayne Rooney still lags behind the Frenchman in some people's affections. Rooney, yesterday's Observer told us, was runner-up to Henry in the Gay Football Supporters Network's "sexiest player" poll, ahead of Freddie Ljungberg and our own Shay Given.

Shay hey, hey!

Whether Given will boast about this accomplishment to Roy Keane at the next Irish get-together we're not sure - Keane, regrettably, joined Birmingham's Robbie Savage at the top of the Gay Football Supporters Network's "biggest turn-off" list.

Latvians big on Ben

Albanians, we learnt a while ago, have a soft spot for Norman Wisdom; Latvians, it seems, are partial to another English comedian of bygone days. The Telegraph reported that Latvian coach Aleksandrs Starkovs had a press conference interrupted last week when the mobile phone of a member of his staff began to ring. The ring-tone? The theme music from The Benny Hill Show. Surreal.

Euro talk

"The dwarfs from the Baltic left us suffering and despairing. After this debacle we're on the ropes. We're not out yet but someone should reserve tickets for the flight home."

- Bild am Sonntag writer Walter Straten after Germany's draw with Latvia.

"We're far from being knocked out yet. The church service isn't over as long as the organ is still playing."

- German football association president Gerhard Mayer-Vorfelder, offering us a variation on the 'fat lady' theme.

"I didn't spit, I only said 'putain'".

- Alexander Frei, insisting he only called Steven Gerrard a prostitute. That's alright then.

"Sick, broken and miserable."

- Ruud van Nistelrooy, taking Saturday's 3-2 defeat to the Czech Republic well.

"A 2-2 draw would be strange, unseemly and unspeakable."

- Italy's Alessandro Del Piero ahead of the meeting of Denmark and Sweden . . . 2-2 and Italy will be out.

Go ugly, go Portugal

Ahead of last night's meeting with Spain Portuguese coach Luiz Felipe Scolari produced a rather quirky analogy to describe his feelings for his players after spending his first lengthy spell with them.

"I'd only ever had two or three days with the players before," he said, "so these 20 days are the first time I have had the chance to spend a long time with the team. It is like going out with a girlfriend for five or six years, getting married and splitting up one week later. You sleep together, wake up and then you see what she looks like first thing in the morning - really quite ugly."

We have no bananas

Peculiar items that feature on the Euro 2004 organisers' list of things that cannot be taken into the grounds: bananas and sun protection cream. Both, apparently, can be used as offensive weapons.

More Euro talk

"You can say what you want about me as a player but when you offend me a person, well

. . . I am more of a man than all of you put together. You can say I am not in shape and that I don't score goals anymore. Like I say, I don't care anymore because I live for myself not for you."

- Christian Vieri, before walking out of a press conference. All's well in the Italian camp then?

"I would want to play in this game even without a leg."

- Croatian captain Boris Zivkovic, keen-ish on playing against England.

"We will give him a plane ticket out of Portugal through room service at his hotel. All he needs is his passport, he doesn't have to come back to the Netherlands."

- Dutch supporter Johan de Laat, as quoted by Reuters, offering Dick Advocaat an easy passage out of Euro 2004.

"David Moyes and I agreed Wayne (Rooney) has to be a £50 million player now . . . but he's not for sale."

- So why is Everton chairman Bill Kenwright putting a price tag on him?

"Raul Bravo? More like Juliet Bravo."

- Mark Lawrenson, a touch unimpressed by the Spanish defender.

"Forgive me, I am not talking to the Spanish media. You are Spanish and we are Portuguese. We have a game to play. My comments might be twisted or turned around. This is a war and in war you have to kill and not die."

- Portugal coach Luiz Felipe Scolari.

Ivan-a go home

Can Croatia beat England today? Nope, according to Ivan Klasnic . . . of Croatia. Klasnic, you should know, has yet to appear for Croatia and is none too happy about it.

"I don't know what's up," he said, "the coach is not speaking to me and now we have midfielders coming on as strikers - I might as well drive home."

And England? "I'm not banking on anything anymore, except that I will be going on holiday on Tuesday. We won't beat England."

Despite his own personal disappointment, it's nice to see Klasnic getting behind the boys.