Have you ever lain awake at night wondering what television football pundits do to occupy their time during the off-season? No, me neither, but some of them sure pick peculiar summer nixers to pay the rent.
Take Sky Sports' Andy Gray, for example. On Thursday he was spotted guesting on BBC1's Through the Keyhole, the programme where you have to guess which world famous celebrity owns the particular home they're snooping on (and always leaves you wondering (a) why do all rich people have such bad taste? and (b) do they decorate their homes like that for a bet?).
Andy took on the challenge with typical gusto and enthusiasm but Thursday's house was tricky because every room had a different "personality" (rooms have personalities on Through the Keyhole), so the bathroom could well have belonged to Barbara Cartland and the livingroom to Bernard Manning.
Andy was stumped, but he guessed the owner might have been a comedian "because he has a Sheffield United sticker on his wall". As it turned out there were two owners, a celebrity couple, which probably should have made their identity easier to guess. "You're going to kick yourselves when I tell you," teased presenter David Frost, after Andy had chucked in the towel. "It's . . . Bobby Knutt and Donna Hartley!"
"Ooooh, you are joking, I don't believe it," exclaimed Andy, while desperately trying to figure out just who Bobby Knutt and Donna Hartley actually were.
"I knew they wouldn't guess us because nobody else has ever heard of us either," conceded Bobby, with good grace, after he and Donna (a top British runner in her time) emerged through the keyhole to polite applause from Andy who was busy whispering "is this a wind-up?" to his fellow panellists. As UEFA president Lennart Johansson put it, during Eurosport's build-up to Monday's Under-18 European Championship game between Ireland and Spain, "it's a little bit too late to learn an old dog to sit".
He was actually talking about the importance of top coaches working with young players, rather than old ones, but he could have been referring to the ability of football pundits to transform themselves in to game show panellists without looking like a smile on Nicolas Anelka's face: uncomfortably out of place.
Andy's had enough of admiring the likes of Bobby Knutt's dado rails and built-in wardrobes and just wants the football season to start as soon as possible, so he can get back to doing what he's good at doing. DJ Bruno Brookes is another old dog who's struggling to sit comfortably with his alternative career.
"I know you're not one to blow your own trumpet but you won the Tight Lines Sea Angler of the Year category - I'm sure that's really changed your life," he said, excitedly, to Emma Davis, a guest on Friday's edition of the fish programme he presents.
"Oh yeah, I can't go anywhere without being noticed now," Emma giggled hysterically, throwing her eyes heavenwards. "Well, it's better than being the Carnival Queen, isn't it?," Bruno snapped. Emma looked doubtful. Keith Arthur, the resident expert on Tight Lines, sensed Bruno's pain and quickly suggested they take a few calls from viewers. "Good idea," said Bruno, who would have fed Emma to Moby Dick at that moment, if he'd had the chance.
Alan from Nottingham was having trouble catching chub. Don't we all! Keith's your only man at a time like that. "You can catch chub with anything, Alan," he said. "If there's a fish that's got more catholic tastes I've yet to meet it - they'll take everything from cigarette ends to . . . well, I don't know. If they're peckish they'll eat it."
(The moral of the story being: if you're dining at a fish restaurant in the near future avoid badly filleted chub because you'll end up with a mouthful of fag butts).
Alan said "thank you very much" and went off to buy a packet of Woodbine for bait, while Emma could still be heard chuckling at the idea of her Tight Lines award changing her life. Eurosport's David Duffield knows all about stroppy guests. When Stephen Roche turned up late for work (i.e. as a co-commentator on the Tour de France) on Thursday he wasn't a happy chappie. Someone had poured diesel in to his petrol tank and, according to David, his engine's last words were "chug chug blurrgh". "It'll cost him £2,000 to fix," revealed David. "Merde," Stephen very probably muttered offair.
Not that it was a gaffe-free week for David either (eg: "I get 50 faxes a day and if I take one minute to reply to each that's an hour on air") but he did at least put up several spirited defences of the Tour's code of ethics and complained about all the "dirt bandied about by the less . . . how do I put it . . . perfect journalists".
Some of these journalists, apparently, had hinted that the sight of riders climbing L'Alpe d'Huez with a smile on their faces suggested their blood samples might not be as pure as they should be. Surely they're not suggesting . . . ? Anyway, the Tour de France is the highlight of Eurosport's year so we can hardly expect their commentators to stop trying to cod us viewers in to thinking that all is well (and drug-free) in the world of cycling.
The Tour ended yesterday and so did Clare's All-Ireland hopes. Well, that's what it seemed like in the 50th minute when they were 2-13 to 0-10 down to Galway. I'd a lovely obituary written too, but I should have known better. "At half-time we were said we were facing the end of the road," said Ger Loughnane, at full-time, after the quarter-final had ended in a draw. That crowd will never see the end of the road, because they keep taking the wrong turn. And come September, when Ger appears on Through the Keyhole, bet you anything Liam McCarthy will be sitting as comfortably as a young pup on the mantelpiece in his living-room. And panellists Cork, Offaly, Galway and Kilkenny won't need David Frost's help to guess whose house it is.
