Planet Football

A round-up of today's other stories in brief

Look what's cooking

Falling neatly into our 'you couldn't make it up' category is a tale from Exeter City where striker Craig Farrell got into a bit of bother at the club's training complex. As he was getting himself ready for that morning's training session he noted that his socks were a little damp. Did he stick them in a tumble dryer? Oh no. He put them in a microwave oven and promptly started a fire in the complex.

"He ended up training barefoot," said manager Alex Inglethorpe. "The thing I am most glad about is that he has managed to dispel the tag that footballers are a bit stupid."

Sinclair loves scoring

Manchester City's Trevor Sinclair (left), speaking before Saturday's derby against United, became the latest in a long line of footballers to declare that scoring goals was better than sex. Ronaldo made a similar statement after scoring twice in the 2002 World Cup final, quickly adding "it's not that sex isn't good, but the World Cup is only every four years, sex isn't".

All of which reminds us of Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink's take on the issue: "you can never say a goal is better than sex - all the guys that say that are not having proper sex".

Quotes of the week

"I couldn't be more chuffed if I were a badger at the start of the mating season."

- QPR manager Ian Holloway. A disturbing image.

"I'm sick of every Tom, Dick and Harry getting linked with my job. Well, ding, dang, doo. It's my job, I own it and it's up to anyone else to take it off me."

- Holloway again. Wonder if "ding, dang, doo" is what he says when he meets a good-looking badger?

"I'm just blown away, impressed and filled with wonder at what I have seen. Manchester United is a completely different world, they take care of the tiniest detail for you. To be honest, I'll be the king of all ****s if I can't be a success under such conditions."

- Patrice Evra. If he carries on playing like he did on his debut he'll be crowned any day soon.

"The gravy train hit the ****ing buffers but the passengers kept eating."

- Ken Bates explaining how Leeds ran out of money.

"I told them these kind of opportunities may never come back again, so they should get out there and do it for their wives, girlfriends - or both, for that matter."

- Wigan manager Paul Jewell on his players and their infidelities.

"I don't want to waste my time any more in the Turkish Championship."

- Nicolas Anelka, nicely settled at Fenerbahce.

"Portugal is a backward country. I think Lisbon is about 20 years behind Moscow. It's a big village. There's no place for children to play outside."

- Andrei Karyaka, nicely settled at Benfica.

Artist is over the moon

According to the Telegraph last week Susan Gunn, the wife of former Norwich goalkeeper Bryan, "is not your typical footballer's wife". She is, in fact, a highly regarded artist who has just won the Sovereign European Art Prize for a painting titled Specto Spectus I & II. The work, apparently, "speaks of an overt male world of leather-bound clubs, but also a subversive powerful female reality that links it to blood and veins which appear to work below the surface".

Right. It sounds to us, though, that Susan is quite heavily influenced by the football world. Her response to winning the prize? "I'm over the moon."

Song of the week

"Oh here we are and here we are and here we go, Youssef is better than Ronaldinho, here we goooooOOO, Moroccan all over the world."

- Norwich City's tribute to their Moroccan midfielder Youssef Safri - to the tune of, naturally enough, Rocking all over the World.

More quotes of the week

"Here's £200 million, now go run Chelsea? Your grandmother could do it."

- Ken Bates on his respect for Jose Mourinho's achievements.

"He stands around with his finger up his a**e. Beckham runs the team."

- Ken Bates again, this time on Sven-Goran Eriksson's unique managerial style.

"What is the sense in investing money in the game when your players are mutilated?"

- Hearts owner Vladimir Romanov, still unhappy about Celtic roughing up his lads a fortnight ago.

"They threatened to go to Fifa if we played them. We asked Fifa and they said that if we played them, we risked losing the game . . . we pay the players to play for them and they can ban the players we pay from playing for us, at a period where they're not playing at all."

- We think Arsene Wenger was talking about the African Nations Cup but we lost consciousness halfway through the sentence.

"We were good going forward but in defence we were like my art at school - we are going backward and not very good."

- Gordon Strachan produces an analogy as dodgy as his back four.

"My relationship with Lehmann is the same as ever - we don't really have one."

- Arsenal's second-choice goalkeeper Manuel Almunia on his best buddy Jens Lehmann, Arsenal's first choice goalkeeper.

"I don't think it's because of my eyes, my beautiful eyes."

- Arsene Wenger rules out one possible reason for Thierry Henry pledging his future to the club.

Don't mention the war

Like its English counterpart the Dutch Football Association is hoping that its supporters will avoid offending their hosts at this summer's World Cup in Germany, being particularly eager that they desist from referring to "the war". They are, then, less than impressed with Dutch company Free Time Products who are selling orange plastic Nazi-like helmets to Dutch fans heading for Germany.

"There are so many ways you can make a joke, but this is too obvious to be funny, it shows no creativity at all," said the Dutch FA's Frank Huizinga. How many have they sold so far? 20,000. Which, when you think about it, amounts to an invasion.

Unlucky for some

Page seven of Fulham's programme for their FA Cup game against Leyton Orient: "Page will be supplied separately by 11.30 am on Thursday. Please do not print this page."

Ooops. There but for the grace of God go we. (Note to sub-editor: did you get home in one piece last night?).