McQueen's pub rub takes the wheels off Sky's Vogts wagon

Mary Hannigan, TV View: If our friends from Mars had chosen yesterday to visit planet Earth and made Edinburgh's Easter Road their first port of call they might well have scratched their little green heads, got back in to their saucers and sped home, concluding that life on earth was far too confusing.

We'd have had sympathy for them. How, exactly, would you have explained the logic of the following to ET? Scotland, managed by German Berti McVogts, are playing Trinidad and Tobago, who met Iraq in Birmingham last Sunday, and they've just gone 3-0 up, after 23 minutes, so the Tartan Army is celebrating by singing the praises of a retired Argentinian footballer and the Hand of God goal he scored against England in Mexico 18 years ago . . .

"You put your left hand in, and you shake it all about, you do the hokey cokey and you score a goal, that's what it's all about, ooooh, Diego Maradona, he put the English OUT, OUT, OUT . . ."

"Right," the little green men would have said, "we'll be off."

They would, also, have been somewhat confused by Trinidad and Tobago's defending, principally because there wasn't any. Half-time. "It's 4-0 to Scotland," said Sky's Jim White. "No, really."

A disbelieving Jim and a gobsmacked Charlie Nicholas had, then, to dip into their book of "useful phrases to describe a positive Scotland footballing display" because since Berti took over they've been largely confined to "a catastrophic, calamitous, shambolic debacle of a shameful, disgraceful fiasco".

Before yesterday Berti's slogan was: "Not Much Done, Heaps More To Do."

So, Jim and Charlie were exhilarated, until Gordon McQueen poured a large bucket of water over their enthusiasm (and the crowd's: "It's just like watching Brazil," they sang). "That's a pub side we're playing," he sighed, "that's the Dog and Duck, they're absolutely woeful, dreadful," he said of Scotland's opponents. Crestfallen Jim and Charlie abandoned their plans to discuss the likelihood of Scotland winning the 2006 World Cup.

After the second half, which T & T won 1-0, McQueen conceded the visitors' performance had "picked up a little bit", perhaps more reminiscent of the Hound and Ferret, but James McFadden, in his post-match interview, practically suggesting he and his team-mates deserved an open-top bus-ride through the streets of Edinburgh. "There are lot of people who have slated us, including your man Charlie," he said, "but I don't think he can say very much today - hopefully that's rammed the criticism down a few people's throats."

Charlie was agitated, to the point where his lacquered hair almost moved, but Gordon sat stoically in his chair. He didn't say much, but he asked himself: would Dalglish, Law, Souness, Hansen, Baxter, Johnstone and Bremner have done a lap of honour after a 4-1 win over the Dog and Duck in an end-of-May friendly at Easter Road? The answer was: "I'll be off."

At least Ray Wilkins was more enthusiastically energised than Gordon yesterday, as he prepared for his co-commentating gig on Japan v Iceland in a City of Manchester stadium so empty Ray's every raring-to-go word echoed around the stands. "I am looking forward to this, very much so," he said, "tremendous."

"The game hasn't quite captured the imagination of the Manchester public," said Martin Tyler, counting the empty seats, noting that Manchester's Icelandic community had opted to stay at home. Indeed, when Heidar Helguson scored after five minutes the only sound you could hear was Ray saying "tremendous".

Ray, as you probably know, is the nicest man on earth. He is, after all, the chap who once said in commentary: "That was an inch-perfect pass, to no-one."

"Eidur Gudjohnsen hasn't quite got burning pace," said Tyler. "No," said Ray, "but he's got burning pace in his head, Martin, and sometimes it's more advantageous to have that than pace afoot."

See? A very nice man.

Ray would never have said: "Christian Klien looks like a 12-year-old who's hot-wired a car down the estate, he can't see out of it, he needs to sit a bit higher, you can see him peering over the top of it, he's a tiny lad," as ITV's Martin Brundle did yesterday of the Jaguar driver. Ray'd have said: "Christian isn't the biggest lad, but if he put a cushion on his seat so that he could see where he was going he'd be as electric as Michael Schumacher. Very much so. Tremendous. A lovely lad."

And he'd never question Darren Clarke's eating habits.

"Darren had mates over to his house last night for a barbecue," said Ken Brown during the Volvo PGA Championship. "What'd he have," asked Peter Alliss, "a whole bullock?"