Mary Hannigan's Planet Football

Brendan T, Planet Football's bestest friend, was generous enough to share with us this tale, as told by Niall Quinn at a recent fundraising dinner in Dublin for the Retired International Players' Fund.

Quinn brews up shaggy dog tale

The setting was the Irish dressing-room in Rome in the immediate aftermath of the 1-0 defeat to hosts Italy in the quarter-final of the 1990 World Cup. The post-match scene, as described by Quinn, was one of emotional devastation.

Convinced they might have nicked a game that would have put them just 90 minutes away from the World Cup final, the players sat slumped, completely deflated, some with their heads in their hands, others hooded in towels, the tomb-like silence broken only by the sound of the odd boot thudding against a wall, as it was wearily shaken off.

Suddenly, the door to the dressing-room burst open and a man in an elegant suit entered in good cheer and loud voice. Arms aloft he launched into a stirring speech about the warrior sons of Erin, the brave performance of the team, the honour they had brought to their country, and more in that vein. Charles J Haughey, in full oratorical flight.

After he'd gone on like this for a couple of minutes, Quinn was nudged in the ribs by Tony Cascarino, who loudly inquired: "Ooo the fack is 'e, then?"

Quinn growled back, "For God's sake Cas, that's the Taoiseach."

Whereupon Andy Townsend turned to Cascarino and asked: "Ooo is it, Cas?"

"I dunno," Cascarino replied, "but Quinny says he owns a tea shop." Boom boom.

A ding-dong, merrily on high

We've seen some extraordinary things perched atop Christmas trees in our time but this "angel" (above), we reckon, beats all. (To save the owner from ridicule, embarrassment, invective, mockery, scorn and derision he/she shall remain nameless).

A little ditty about Goat manure

We were sad to read that Shaun Goater has been told by Steve Coppell that he is free to leave Reading, on loan if he can't get himself a permanent deal. "The Goat is testing the waters in terms of getting out and we had one enquiry this week that came to nothing," said Coppell, kind of suggesting that the enquiries haven't been flooding in for the veteran striker.

The news will be greeted with dismay at Manchester City where Goater was something of a cult hero.

Mind you, he'll hardly put the song they used to sing about him on his CV: "Shaun Goater scored a hat-trick, Shaun Goater scored a hat-trick, You must be shit, You must be shit."

Quotes of the week

"When have we ever been interested in Jeff Winter? He was hopeless at refereeing and absolutely despised by most of the professional players because of his attitude and thinking that he was bigger than any player."

- Birmingham manager Steve Bruce after the retired referee, in his newspaper column, had criticised Robbie Savage for his behaviour during the derby against Aston Villa.

"Who is interested in what he writes? What was he? A bog-standard referee who loved himself. He drives me nuts. An absolute prat. And you can print that as well."

- Bruce, concluding his appraisal of Winter.

"He has got about as much personality as a bag of chips."

- Bruce, just adding one last comment about Winter.

"I just think it is someone making a few quid. Who the hell is interested in Jeff Winter? He was disliked immensely for the way he was as a referee, the way he conducted himself, the way he portrayed himself."

- Steve? Enough. Let it go.

Gascoigne leads a merry dance

We felt badly let down - nay, gutted - last week when we read in the Newcastle Evening Chronicle that Paul Gascoigne's claim that he had been "crushed by the weight of pal Jimmy Five Bellies as the pair attempted to re-enact the famous Torvill and Dean lift" was untrue.

Gascoigne had blamed Five Bellies for him having to withdraw, with a back injury, from a Christmas ice-skating version of the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing. "I've been training with Jimmy," he had said. "In trying to lift him, a terrible accident occurred and I fell, crushed on the ice. Unlike Jane Torvill, he's 16 stone."

The Chronicle, though asked: "But did anyone else think this story just didn't 'rink' true? A quick call to the BBC soon cleared matters up. 'Five Bellies had nothing to do with it,' said a spokesman. 'Paul said it as a joke and everyone's taken it seriously. He was training really hard, old injuries started to niggle him and a doctor advised him not to carry on'."

A tall tale, then? Well, eh, how does the Newcastle Evening Chronicle explain this authentic photo?

More quotes of the week

"Just talking about Harry Redknapp brings me out in a sweat. I have never been sick like this before in my life. I've never had such stomach pains - I can hardly move."

- No, Harry Redknapp hasn't made Portsmouth owner Milan Mandaric love-sick, just under the weather since he took over at Southampton.

"I'm loving working with Mick. I find Mick very South Yorkshire, very honest indeed. He's very . . . I wouldn't say black and white, I would say red and white. There doesn't seem to be a bit of pink in the middle. If it's Friday today, it's Friday. He's slow to get his round in, but I'm really enjoying working with him."

- Sunderland chairman Bob Murray on black and white and red and pink relationship with manager Mick McCarthy.

"Pressure is to be nine points behind . . . when you need to get results and also wait for the teams ahead of you to lose. I prefer my position."

- Jose Mourinho's rather delicious reply to Gary Neville's suggestion that Chelsea would crack under the pressure.

"I have no intention of selling Shaun Wright-Phillips. If someone comes in and starts being silly then we will discuss it."

- Manchester City chairman John Wardle puts SWP up for sale.

Not such a cunning roos

"Dear Football Family member," read the statement on the Australian Soccer Association website last Thursday, "on 1 January 2005 (we) will be changing our name to 'Football Federation Australia' . . . While we are not pretending that all Australians will take to calling the Game 'Football' immediately, we feel it is important to make this symbolic change, and to bring the 'World Game' in Australia into line with rest of the Football World." Grand, except: does this signal the death of the "Socceroos"? "Footballroos" just doesn't have the same ring about it.