Pick Of The Week

Monday

Monday

Sky Sports 1 (7.0) - Live Football: Southampton v Chelsea. Live from The Dell, Chelsea attempt to narrow the gap at the top of the Premiership and maintain their spooky title challenge. Even Ruud Gullit seems surprised by it all.

TnaG (9.0) - Ole Ole. Micheal O'Domhnaill presents highlights of the Spanish football year, including the top 40 goals.

Channel Four (11.55) - The American Football Big Match: Road to the Super Bowl. A review of the American football season so far and a preview of next month's Super Bowl.

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Tuesday

TnaG (9.0) - Sportiris Speisialta. Highlights of the sporting year from TnaG's sports' magazine programme.

TnaG (10.45) - Sunday after Sunday. Louis Marcus's centenary documentary on the role of the GAA in Irish life. New Year's Eve

UTV (2.0) - Hoosiers (Film, 1986). Gene Hackman plays a basketball coach in an Indiana high school, in the film known as Best Shot on this side of the Atlantic (because they reckoned we wouldn't know people from Indiana were nicknamed Hoosiers - and they were right).

SKY SPORTS 1 (7.0) - Football Special: Hoddle's England. A look at the fortunes of the England team under Glenn Hoddle.

Channel Four (12.15) - Under the Moon. A special New Year's Eve edition of the late night sports show live from Ibrox, home of Rangers.

New Year's Day

Sky Sports 1 (1.30) - Live Foot- ball: Hearts v Hibernian. The Edinburgh derby from Tynecastle.

Sky Sports 1 (4.30) - Boxing: Fights of 97. We're promised the best action from the past 12 months, `featuring all the hype and all the knockouts'. The programme is three hours' long, the `hype' should fill about two hours, 55 minutes of that.

Sky Sports 1 (7.30) - Soccer Extra: New Year Special. Three and half hours of the year's best goals, matches and `classic moments'.

TnaG (11.0) - World Cup Gold: Ire- land v England (1990 World Cup finals). TnaG continue to make good use of the sporting archives with this new series, which replaces All Ireland Gold on Tuesday and Thursday nights. Packie Bonner presents the best Irish matches from the past 16 years every Thursday, starting tonight - Tuesday's programmes will feature classic World Cup games not involving Ireland.

Friday

Sky Sports 1 (1.0) - Live Football: Celtic v Rangers (Scottish Premier Division, kick-off 2.0). Saturday: St Johnstone 1, Celtic 0 . . . anything but a victory over Rangers in the third Old Firm derby of the season and it will be a grim 1998 for the Bhoys.

RTE1 (9.30) - The Sporting Year. George Hamilton and Michael Lyster present a review of the sporting year.

Saturday

Network Two (2.45) - Saturday Sport Live: Live Football (FA Cup, Third Round). In the first edition of the programme that replaces Sports Stadium in Network Two's Saturday schedule, Bill O'Herlihy presents live coverage of a third round FA Cup match.

Sunday

Sky Sports 2 (11.0) - Live Foot- ball: Chelsea v Manchester United (FA Cup, Third Round, kick-off 12.0).

RTE1 (12.0) - Everest Climb for Hope. Documentary following a Canadian attempt on Everest to raise funds for research into a rare neurological disorder.

UTV (1.30) - Live Football: Everton v Newcastle United (FA Cup, Third Round, kick-off 2.0). ITV's live coverage of the FA Cup gets under way with Brian Moore at the microphone.

SKY SPORTS 2 (7.0) - Live Golf: World Championship Final. The four leading players from the four Tours - Colin Montgomerie, Ernie Els, Davis Love and Hajime Meshial - compete for the $1 million prize in Arizona.

Channel Four (7.30) - Live Football: Juventus v Inter Milan (Serie A). Second-placed Juventus take on league leaders Inter Milan in Turin.