It's a Queiroz situation for Sky Sports News presenter

Mary Hannigan TV ViewIn fairness to the Sky Sports News presenter, he demonstrated admirable professionalism by being in his seat, rather than rolling around on the studio floor, when we returned to him after listening to Carlos Queiroz on Friday.

"I am sure at the end of the season we will be able to say this has been a great season for us," we, and the presenter, had heard the Manchester United assistant manager say, just before he predicted that Ivor Callely would be Taoiseach by Christmas.

Carlos, then, wasn't unduly concerned about events in Portugal on Wednesday night and remained upbeat. He certainly wouldn't have shared the views of the RTÉ panel.

"Are you surprised that United lost their shape?" Bill O'Herlihy had asked Johnny Giles.

"They didn't lose their shape, Bill, they never had one," he replied. As for Ronaldo? "He was all over the place, bar the right place," he said.

Gilesie and Eamon Dunphy agreed that Alex Ferguson's reign should come to an end, although they differed on how attractive the vacancy might be for potential successors.

"It's a dog of a job," said Dunphy, implying that you'd want to be barking mad to take it.

"Well, I'd rather take over them than Hartlepool," said Gilesie. Hmm, that's a toughie.

But Richard Keyes, on Sky Sports yesterday, was adopting the Carlos line: there's hope yet. "United have got two games this week that could get them to within seven points of Chelsea; the champions play Arsenal next weekend, and if they lost that and United kept on winning, the gap would be four points and then it would be game on," he said, without taking a breath or cracking a smile. By full-time at Old Trafford he'd inserted his mathematical equation in the shredder.

Some would argue that Audley Harrison is now the Manchester United of the boxing world: yesterday's man. Frankly, anyone who steps in to a ring, even the referee and especially the "card girls", seems brave to us, but Audley, having promised to "incorporate all my talents and my full arsenal" against Danny Williams produced - how shall we put it? - a rather timid display on Saturday night.

"No excuses, but I hurt my left hand in the third round," he said after.

"At 34 he's running out of time," said Barry McGuigan at ringside. "He's got to show us he has intestinal fortitude."

Not guts, intestinal fortitude. How spectacular is that?

Bernard Dunne showed a bit of intestinal fortitude himself over on RTÉ2 when he beat Marian Leondraliu in Leipzig, which was still clearing up after the World Cup draw.

We're taking nothing away from Bernard, but Jimmy Magee seemed to suggest Marian had some weight issues.

"Fascinating man is Marian," he said. "He can eat up and slim down like a demented weightwatcher - a year ago he fought light-welter, six months ago he made feather, that's a 14lb fluctuation."

Hey, which one of us hasn't been there?

Another man to have suffered from weight problems in his time is Paul Gascoigne, but they're the least of his troubles these days.

"I'm sacked, but I'm turning up . . . I'm sacked from, well, I'm not sacked. End of day, I run the club, I run the club. I don't own it but I still do," he told our old friends at Sky Sports News after he was, well, sacked by Kettering. Was it necessary for Sky Sports News to air this interview?

Anyway, Gascoigne's former England boss Bobby Robson turned up on UTV's Kelly on Saturday night and attempted to be sympathetic.

"Daft as a brush, he was - he never could understand why his sister had two brothers and he only had one," he said. Thanks for that Bobby.

The highlight of the week, though, had to be that World Cup draw - or, more specifically, John Motson's commentary. He tried to explain how it worked, and seemed to have a grip on it all. But.

"Now then, who are England going to play? England's first opponents coming out now. IT'S THE IVORY COOOOAST!!!!!

"Eh. Um. But are they going into group B or not? Because this is where the Africans might have to be moved. Let's just see. No, they're going in to group C. I did warn you that this won't be entirely logical because of the Africans having to be shifted around. So. Let's just see."

That's one thing you can say about Motty: he has intestinal fortitude.