Money, eh? While it can buy an abundance of international players for a football club, it sure as hell can’t guarantee you attractive football and astute tactics, as fans of both Liverpool and Man.City have discovered to their cost over recent weeks. While I was obviously pleased to collect the gift provided by last week’s advice to back under three goals in the terribly tedious “match of the day” at Eastlands on Sunday, I am at a loss to explain why neither Rafa Benitez nor Roberto Mancini seems keen for their respective sides to display the sort of attacking flair for which they are renowned, or to take any risks at all in their pursuit of the fourth Champions League spot. Since winning his opening four matches in charge, Mancini seems to have discouraged his team’s exciting forward play in favour of defensive solidity, with no subsequent improvement in results, while Benitez has presided over a spell during which his side have been involved in 0-0 or 1-0 scorelines five times in their last six matches, and

Some unexpected results in the last round of Premier League fixtures have once again tightened up all of the major battlegrounds, and following a short break for the FA Cup fifth round, we have many more intriguing League fixtures to look forward to this coming weekend. Just six points separate the three title contenders, the battle for the fourth Champions League place sees four closely matched teams swapping places with every passing round of fixtures, and, at the time of writing prior to the midweek matches at Stoke and Wigan, there are no more than four points between thirteenth placed Sunderland and Bolton in nineteenth position. As if there wasn’t a fine enough balance in each of these tussles, we also have to take into account the possible deletion of Portsmouth’s results from the records if they fail to survive the season, which would obviously be of most benefit to Wolves, Wigan, Burnley and Liverpool, each of whom have suffered the ignominy of defeat to the League’s bottom side.

Here we go again. The reason my heart sank when I heard details of the latest revelations concerning John Terry’s extra-curricular activities was nothing to do with the nature of his misdemeanours, but the thought of once more having to endure months of hypocritical hand-wringing amongst our supposed moral guardians in the tabloid press, and also the re-appearance of Max “holier than thou” Clifford on our TV screens. Without wishing to trivialise Terry’s despicable behaviour, it is hardly a surprise when you witness the pathetic example set for him by the tawdry pair who gave him his start in life and dragged him up, but all of this endless talk we have to endure about his position as England captain merely serves to give the tabloids more fuel, and misses the obvious point about potential replacements. Let’s look at a possible list and think about what unites all of them: Cole, Rooney, Lampard, Gerrard, Beckham. The connection is a string of headline-grabbing behaviour including affairs, bar-room brawls, sex