Planet Football

Today's other stories in brief

Music to Trundle's ears

Ireland's Eurovision Song Contest entry this year, as you know, is specifically about the Prague Spring of 1968, when tanks rolled into the city, but, more generally, it's about the enduring spirit of human nature in the face of adversity. Meanwhile, one of the entries in Britain's national song contest is all about, well, Lee Trundle of Swansea City. Remember? The fella who's been looking for an Irish call-up since time began.

Liz McClarnon, an Atomic Kitten in bygone days, has co-written the tune - '(Don't It Make You) Happy!' - and will sing it on March 17th in the national song contest. And Liz revealed last week that the song is all about her beloved Trundle, the Scouser with the Irish grandfather.

While the Irish entry makes reference to "archipelagic icicles", Liz's song goes more along traditional Eurovision lines - eg "oooh, oooh, yeah, yeah, yummy, yummy, honey bunny, yeah, yeah", that kind of thing. Divil a mention of the Prague Spring.

Trundle has been in and out of bother for most of his football career, indeed he was sent off again on Saturday, and we fear that if Liz wins the national contest he'll find himself at the centre of controversy yet again: '(Don't It Make You) Happy!' sounds spookily similar to 'Son Of A Preacher Man'. There may, we fear, be trouble ahead.

Quotes of the week

"Ryan Giggs is one of those special and rare players who could play football in a phone box and find the door no matter how many players were in there with him."

- Carlos Queiroz attributes Superman-like qualities to the Welsh wizard.

"If you are the son of the Queen, if you are not good enough, you do not play at Arsenal. Has Prince Charles played for Arsenal?"

- Arsene Wenger insists if he could find decent English players he'd sign them, but rules out a swoop for the Queen's eldest lad.

" That pitch was unplayable. It was a pudding out there and it looked just like what we had to eat last night - souffle. It's a bog - and it was moving. I wouldn't even put my horses on it."

- Cardiff manager Dave Jones not altogether impressed with Birmingham's St Andrews pitch.

" Sooner or later I will take some pictures naked, so all this gossip on me being fat will finally end."

- Ronaldo (the Brazilian one) finds a way of ending press speculation about his weight.

Question: "What will you be doing when you're 50?" Nuno Morais: "Maybe I will be dead."

- The Chelsea midfielder and all round cheerful chappy's response to a question in the club programme.

" It made me think of taking on somebody else's wife. When someone's been married a few times, do you want to take them on?"

-Swansea City chairman Huw Jenkins explaining why he won't appoint anyone as manager who's been through a messy divorce with a previous club. That's a very short short-list.

Grin and bear it

It was a frustrating auld night for Ronaldinho at Anfield last week, bad enough that Barcelona were knocked out of the Champions League, worse that he had to listen to this from the Kop for much of the evening: "Cilla wants her teeth back, Cilla wants her teeth back, La, la, la, La, la, la."

More quotes of the week

"It is great to play against a team whose manager already knows everything. Maybe it is his way of hiding any kind of anxiety he might have himself. The people who know everything and say they know everything are the ones who know the least amount."

- Barcelona's Frank Rijkaard on Liverpool's Rafa Benitez. He's sorry he opened his mouth now.

" They set themselves up very well at the back - and by playing ugly and dirty they beat us."

- Barcelona's Leo Messi, admirably magnanimous towards Liverpool after their Champions League triumph.

"Cristiano Ronaldo could, over the next years, be one of the candidates for the Fifa award for the best one in the world . . . but I would like to think that he doesn't fall into the trap of believing that he is already the best player in the world."

- Portugal coach Luiz Felipe Scolari, suspecting Ronaldo's boots won't fit him anymore.

" I feel like a steaming cow-pat. Or a car that's clocked up 400,000 miles in one journey."

- Plymouth manager Ian Holloway, a bit under the weather after being laid low by a virus.

"He was so rough he looked like Gollum. We thought the Lord of the Rings had become our new manager. But at least he lost a bit of weight he needed to lose - so every cloud has a silver lining."

- Plymouth's Kevin Gallen sees the upside of his manager feeling like a steaming cow-pat.

" If they don't like my words they don't like it. I will never change. Would you like to see me with a dictionary after the game and think 'oh no, that's a little bit strong, what's the synonym of that word because I could be punished by the FA?'

- Arsene Wenger, refusing to arm himself with the Oxford Concise in his battle with the FA.

Something for the garage

Remember last August Andy van der Meyde had a Ferrari, a black Mini Cooper convertible, Rolex watches and jewellery stolen from his home, but his only concern was that Mac, his seven-month-old dog, had also been nicked? Happily, after an emotional appeal from Andy, who joined Everton from Inter Milan in 2005, Mac was returned, the suspicion being that he had paid a meaty ransom. But in an interview last week Andy revealed just how big a part animals play in his life. Back in his Italian home - bizarrely his wife chose to return to their Lake Como villa, rather than stay in Liverpool - there reside seven horses, nine dogs, three cats, two ferrets, two turtles, a talking parrot, two rabbits, three goats, two deer, two zebras, three geese and a partridge in a pear tree.

Any more? "When I went back to Italy before Christmas. I arrived late at night and opened the garage door - I nearly died on the spot. In the dark was this massive camel staring at me from about half a yard away." We've all been there Andy, we've all been there.