We were all set to do two This Is Your Life specials on Gareth Farrelly and Joe Murphy after events midway through their respective Premiership appearances on Saturday, but then Arsenal and Liverpool banjaxed our plans by leaving both men's teams pointless after gutsy enough displays.
Away from home
"I feel I have been cryogenically frozen for a year, but once I'm defrosted I'll be alright again," Farrelly said of his time at Everton, where he spent an unhealthy amount of time in the reserves. He defrosted nicely on his arrival at Bolton and, in his first game of the season on Saturday (after injury), did a "Ronaldinho" by beating David Seaman with a peculiar effort that, surely, wasn't intended. That made it 1-1, but Kanu ruined the story with an injury-time winner.
And what of Murphy? It was only last week West Brom finally agreed a fee (£320,000, rising to £600,000 after 45 first-team games) with Tranmere for the Irish under-21 goalkeeper, who they'd signed at the end of last season. Before Saturday he was West Brom's third-choice 'keeper, then he was promoted to the bench for the game at Anfield. First-choice Russell Hoult was sent off after 35 minutes, Murphy came on, and duly saved Michael Owen's penalty seconds after his arrival on the pitch. But then Milan Baros and John Arne Riise wrecked our script.
Elsewhere? Visit Millmoor these days and you might be serenaded with cries of "Lee for Ireland". Alan Lee, that is. The former Aston Villa trainee is having a happy time at Rotherham, scoring his seventh goal in 10 games on Saturday (only Forest's David Johnson has scored more) to give his team the points against Brighton and lift them to fourth in the first division. His chances of adding to his total where somewhat impaired by him limping off after 37 minutes.
Judge in the dock over remarks
Graham Richards, a circuit judge by profession, has been a freelance reporter on Derby County games for the last 15 years but, it seems, his career may, possibly, be over. Why? Well, the Telegraph reported last Monday that Richards was in a spot of bother for declaring, during his commentary on Derby's game at Leicester, that striker Brian Deane had "collapsed just like the World Trade Centre, only less spectacularly". With that the switchboard glowed, as did the cheeks of the powers-that-be at BBC Radio Derby. Richards awaits his fate.
Kev's artificial intelligence
Lasst week we shared with you Kevin Keegan's thoughts on the perfect striker - "If you created a template for the ideal striker to put into a computer, like they do with cars, and it then sends out the perfect aerodynamic hatchback, it would come out with Thierry Henry and Nicolas Anelka as the perfect strikers".
This week? Kev is warming, disturbingly, to his theme. "When cars are designed they feed the information into a computer and it throws out this aerodynamic design with the hatchback and all the trimmings. If you put the details for a centre half into a computer, especially a left-sided one, and you said he needs to be 6ft 3in, he needs to be quick, he needs to be strong, and he needs to be able to use the ball, then it would be: Sylvain Distin." (Next week: Kev discusses the perfect aerodynamically designing hatchback manager).
Quotes of the week
"Football's like a big market place, and people go to the market every day to buy their vegetables."
Bobby Robson, as quoted by Private Eye, explaining ... explaining ... em ...dunno.
"We are no longer the flitty-farty QPR - we are hard to break down."
Queens Park Rangers manager Ian Holloway. Flitty-farty? Right.
"I'm someone who witnessed one of the defining moments in Irish history. People talk about Irish patriot Robert Emmet's speech from the dock. They talk about the oratory of Brendan Behan, Eamon de Valera, Michael Collins. But Roy Keane's 10-minute oration can be mentioned in the same breath."
Niall Quinn, an extract from his autobiography.
"It's a bit of a clash like Manchester United against Wimbledon, the aristocrats against the dour, dogged."
Pat Spillane, previewing the Kerry v Armagh All-Ireland final. True, United have slid a bit, but steady Pat, calling them dour and dogged is a bit rough.
"I keep saying to him (defender Sylvain Distin): 'France must have some really good defenders for you to not be in their team'. But the older ones will get older and he will get better."
Kev Keegan. Are the younger ones not getting older too?
"We looked shaky in defence, we were not as bright in midfield and we could have done better up front." Gerard Houllier post-mortem on Liverpool's Champions League defeat by Valencia. Apart from that ...
"Being called an asshole has become normal." German goalkeeper Oliver Kahn on life since his dodgy World Cup final display.
"Liverpool will think: 'we could have won this 2-2'." Big Ron Atkinson on Tuesday. Big Ron on any day, really.
"What did the likes of Peter Osgood and Alan Hudson actually achieve for the club? Between them they won two cups ... it was nothing ... look at the Chelsea of today and you can see consistency."
Chelsea chairman Ken Bates, in need of a good set of spectacles.
"I'm sure I'll be a laughing stock in Birmingham for the next couple of weeks."
Aston Villa goalkeeper Peter Enckleman assuming his cock-up last Monday will be forgotten in a fortnight. God love ya Pete, in your dreams.
Shelling out big for a striker
We're old enough to remember Gillingham buying Tony Cascarino from Crockenhill for the price of a set of tracksuits (to this day, some Gillingham folk claim they were overcharged). Perhaps inspired by this transaction Norwegian third division side Flekkeroy have just bought striker Kenneth Kristensen from rivals Vindbjart for Kristensen's weight in fresh prawns. "Kenneth was in top form when he left us in the winter, but he has had a relaxed summer eating seafood on Flekkeroy - I think this will be a good deal for us," explained Vindbjart chairman Vidar Ulstein. Those of you are thinking if it was Richard Dunne Norway's annual quota for prawn fishing would be used up should be ashamed of yourselves.
Fergie changes a winning team
Exchange of the week: Alex Ferguson - "We've watched their videos. Israeli football has improved a lot and beating Lokomotiv Moscow, Parma and AC Milan last season was a big step up. We know we cannot underestimate them." Lilach Sonin (Israeli television football presenter) - "I think you are speaking about a different team now." Ferguson - "They've made changes?" Sonin - "No, you are talking about a different team, Hapoel Tel Aviv."
Keane takes on murder man
It's probably best, for peace sake, for us all to agree to differ on the subject of Roy Keane (even if the pro-Keane camp has, quite obviously, right on its side), but even the antis might have been taken aback by the headline in yesterday's News of the World: "Murder lawyer to fight Keane". According to the paper, Sturman, who "has extensive experience in murder, armed robbery and major drug cases", has been hired by the English Football Association to present their double disrepute case against Keane. In the past Sturman has represented Primrose Shipman, wife of Dr Harold Shipman who was jailed for life after murdering 215 patients, Robert Kleasen, "accused of murdering two Mormons in a case that inspired the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie and, scariest of all, Dennis Wise.
