Squirrel hit: Knill toppled

ALL IN THE GAME:A soccer miscellany

Scunthorpe manager Alan Knill’s unfortunate brush with a squirrel when he went for a cycle.

“I saw it run into the road but couldn’t do anything about it and it just hit my wheel and stuck in it and hit my brakes. For a minute, I thought I might have been in trouble because I landed on my head. Then, all of a sudden, I thought: ‘I’m not, I’m alive!’”

At least Knill identified what creature he hit. A few years back Chris Coleman, now manager of Wales then captain of Fulham, broke his leg in a car accident. “He swerved to avoid what he thinks was a deer, it all happened so fast,” said a “friend” at the time. “He also said the animal could have been something smaller, like a rabbit.” Should have gone to Specsavers?

Spurred on: Fighting fires

Two of the London firefighters called to Arsenal's stadium to put out a blaze in the kitchens.

Kentish Town fire station watch manager Surjit Singh: "Even though a couple of them are Spurs fans, they all worked really hard to bring the fire under control. From a fire brigade perspective it was a job well done."

Always good to know firefighters will extinguish infernos despite being of a different footballing persuasion to the home-owner.

Signature line: Upward trend

So, what's making Cristiano Ronaldo unhappy at Real Madrid this weather? It's still a bit of a mystery, but Spanish paper Marca employed a handwriting expert to analyse his signature to see if he could find any clues.

"The first thing is that the signature is tilted upwards. This indicates high ambitions and desire to excel," Alberto Asiain revealed. "The word 'Ronaldo' dominates and appears complete, with a simple C referring to Cristiano. Capitalisation reveals egocentric traits." Ah, mystery solved.

Power point: Villas-Boas aims to 'solidificate' Burnley

After a brief fling with Chelsea, André Villas-Boas is now at the helm of Spurs, but it might have been different if he had sent a simpler CV to Burnley when he applied for the managerial job there two years ago.

"He sent a very detailed application," former Burnley chief executive Paul Fletcher said last week. "His CV and power-point presentation was amazing. Even by today's standards there was some complicated stuff. Tommy Docherty used to say he never said anything to his players his milkman wouldn't understand. I don't think any milkman would fathom the meaning of a lot of Andre's presentation. Would Burnley players have understood what he wanted if he told them to 'solidificate'?"

Double take : Fulham have Dem

Seeing double: Fulham fans mourning the departure of the rather excellent Mousa Dembele to Spurs might have wondered if home-sickness had brought him back to Craven Cottage last week. The scorer of a hat-trick for Fulham's youth team against Crystal Palace? Mousa Dembele. Yep, they have another one at the club, a French youth international. Happily, it means there's no need to burn the shirts.

Frankly speaking: Milan's El Shaarawy reveals secrets

Goal.com described an interview given by AC Milan's Stephan El Shaarawy to French magazine Max as "frank", and they weren't wrong. He touched on a number of subjects, for example….

Playing with Zlatan Ibrahimovic: "To tell you the truth, it was never easy . . . what you needed to do was just pass him the ball, or else he'd scream at you."

His relationship with Gennaro Gattuso: "He hated my eyebrows. The first time he saw that I trimmed them, he became furious and told me that all I needed to think about getting better at football."

Playing in the San Siro: "That place is insane. It's like a buffalo breathing down your neck for 90 minutes." . . . but it was, perhaps, when he talked about the perks of being a top flight footballer in Italy that the 19-year-old was at his frankest: "The moment I got to Serie A, my sex life multiplied by 10. I use Facebook to pick up all my women. You find so much stuff on the internet."

He's living it up, that fella.