RTÉ's canteen may not be a place for the faint-hearted

TV View: "We almost garnished a point," said a despondent Fulham manager Lawrie Sanchez on RTÉ's The Premiershipafter Liverpool sprinkled parsley all over the tail end of a rather positive week by denying Fulham a draw with two late goals on Saturday.

And that was kind of the tone of much of our telly viewing all week: ifs, buts and maybes, garnished with despair.

Take Tom McGurk on Saturday night. All we can say is "let it go Tom, the World Cup is history, there's no point dwelling on it, it's over, we can change nothing now, look to the future, and if you can at all manage it: be optimistic". As Phil Coulter put it, what's done is done and what's won is won, and what's lost is lost and gone forever. (And, God willing, Phil's Ireland's Callwill be lost and gone forever soon, but we digress).

Mind you, it's hard for Tom to look to the future with any sense of optimism or cheer when he has George Hook sticking a pin in his balloon of hope as soon as he inflates it.

The Heineken European Cup? "Despite the euphoria of your panel none of these (Irish) teams is going to get out of their pools." Next weekend? "Two losses." The Six Nations? "I'm prepared to say now that we're not going to win the Championship, for cryyyyyyyying out loud!" "Ah Jesus," said Tom's face, while Brent "Popie" Pope just shook his head and chortled at George's misery. But when Conor O'Shea sort of almost very nearly half agreed with George, that Munster, Leinster and Ulster would not emerge from their pools, Tom had the look of a man who just wanted to open a bottle of brandy, before settling back to listen to his Leonard Cohen collection.

"If we don't have a good Heineken we're in trouble," he said, perhaps anticipating a dodgy tummy, but, again, George insisted there was no hope. "I mean, look at Ulster, very, very average players - it's not a question of them getting out of the pool, it's a question of them trying to stay off the bottom."

Munster? Nope. No chance. Although he was hopeful Ronan O'Gara would have a better campaign than he had at the World Cup, but that was largely because he reckoned "O'Gara played like a drain in France".

Leinster? Nope. A snowball would have a better chance in hell.

"Rationality is the watch word of the programme," Hook concluded, explaining to Tom he wasn't there to cheer him up, simply to call it as he saw it.

If Tom headed off for the RTÉ canteen in search of a bottle of brandy he might well have bumped in to Bill O'Herlihy, sitting in a darkened corner, still recovering from the Champions League muck he'd endured midweek.

"That was some crap game, wasn't it," he said when Darragh Moloney handed back to him after Manchester United's 4-0 win over Dynamo Kiev.

"BILL!! WOW!!," gasped Eamon Dunphy, while incredulity had Johnny Giles almost shifting in his seat.

It was, indeed, a shocking moment, like the day your Granny declared: "I wouldn't say no to a bit of bumpin' 'n' grindin'." Granted, at half-time Bill had hinted at his disgruntlement.

Bill: "It's been reeeeeeeally boring." Dunphy: "We don't want people to switch off, Bill. It's going to be a really interesting second half." Bill: "What channel do you think you're working for?" Dunphy: "Sky . . . (but . . . if the dog is complaining now's the time to take him for a walk)."

Fido and his owner were blessed if they went for a wander. Like Liverpool's attack against Besiktas the night before, they missed nothing.

"I think this is going to be a difficult match for Liverpool," Dunphy had said before Rafa's boys scraped home with an 8-0 win. "I think lads, with respect, you've got egg on your faces," Bill said to his panel at full-time. "Ah rubbish Bill, that's not fair," said Giles, before Dunphy stepped in and graciously accepted Giles should be exempt from having his face poached, scrambled and fried, he was the one who didn't anticipate a Turkish surrender of that magnitude.

But, despite Aiden McGeady's match-winning goal and performance for Celtic against Benfica the panel wasn't backing down. "Gordon Strachan was quoted as saying there is a subtle change in McGeady's game and he is now the creative force in the team," said Bill before the game.

Dunphy: "If he's the main creative force in the Celtic team, they're in trouble."

Giles: "McGeady needs a drastic change, not a subtle change." Bill: "What kind of change?" Dunphy: "A brain transplant, maybe?"