As speculation mounts that Giovanni Trapattoni is to be put out of the Republic of Ireland's misery, the key stakeholders are adopting familiar stances. The manager is said to be hoping to avoid the sack by barricading himself into his room and pretending he doesn't understand entreaties to come out, the head of the Football Association of Ireland, John Delaney, is believed to be playing hopscotch with revellers at a 24-hour service station and Irish supporters are furiously denouncing the people responsible for the inadequacies of their national team while getting ready to head off to England this weekend to watch their favourite clubs.
Meanwhile, the Irish papers and airwaves are awash with suggestions as to who should be appointed to replace Trapattoni and make the Irish team if not successful, than at least watchable. Martin O'Neill features prominently in all discussions, given that he is Irish and unemployed, therefore presumed to be in touch with the zeitgeist or something. David O'Leary's name has cropped up for similar reasons and the former Leeds United manager once said, when linked with the job many years ago, that he would not like to take it until he was reaching the end of his career, a point he appeared to arrive at several years ago. There have also been calls for Mick McCarthy to be invited back, since he did a pretty good job last time and won't have to cope with Roy Keane, or indeed any other world class players, this time. Brian McDermott is a man who can build an enterprising side from limited resources and for that reason would get the Mill's vote.
The most popular non-Irish candidate – and when we say 'candidate' we mean name that has been bandied about in chitchat without any inkling as to whether the person involved would consider being offered the job an honour or an ill-judged prank – is Sir Alex Ferguson. It has been suggested that the Scot may be getting bored in retirement and the opportunity to work with John O'Shea again could prove too hard to resist.
Perhaps the FAI will do Aston Villa a favour and offer the job to Shay Given? It's hardly beyond the realms of possibility given the previous appointment of Steve Staunton, although the goalkeeper's £3m annual salary would be even more objectionable to the FAI than it is to Randy Lerner, so Given's best chance of becoming relevant again is to be loaned out to a wealthy Championship club. Several are said to be interested.
Other goalkeepers on the move could include Iker Casillas, although not if Zinedine Zidane has anything to do with it: though Zizou has more experienced of coaxing players away from their current clubs he has this time been asked by Real Madrid to convince a player to stay. It is hoped that soft words and perhaps the promise of some free yoghurt could persuade the unhappy Casillas to ignore calls from Arsenal and Manchester City.
Petr Cech, meanwhile, could find it difficult to ignore an appeal from Barcelona, who are known to be keen on the keeper as they seek a replacement for Victor Valdes. If Cech express a desire to leave Chelsea, the club may just grant him his wish as they have a ready-made replacement in Thibault Courtois, who is currently out on loan.
The closure of the transfer window is not going to stop the famously extravagant Arsène Wenger from spending. The Arsenal manager has just noticed that his squad could do with another striker so he is set to beat West Ham United and Shakhtar Donetsk to the signature of Ciprian Marica, the Romanian who is a free agent after letting his contract run out at Schalke. "Marica is a really great striker," trumpeted Ioan Becali, who would surely say exactly the same thing if he were not the player's agent.
Finally, Roberto Carlos has been sharing his views on Samuel Eto'o and the pair's time together at Anzhi Makhachkala. "I've known Eto'o since I was 16 and always liked him," said the Brazilian. "He is a good person but he always thinks about himself and not the group When a player, instead of playing, wants to get involved in recruitment and with players who are his friends, it's a little distracting and strange. He did everything at Anzhi except play football." There'll be none of that carry-on in the Chelsea dressing room. No siree Bob.
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