I just read this quote:

"I can't stand the rubbish that gets talked about by everyone, players, fans, the media, club officials. Why should I waste my time listening to people who are clearly less intelligent than me?"

Personally I disapprove. He might be the best man for the job but even if he did win the World Cup with England, it would be like sharing it with Italy.

Furthermore, there are at least 10 English people who could do as good a job; including Sam Allardyce, Harry Rednap, Steve Coppell and my aunt Mabel, but not including Steve McClaren.

Under an Italian coach it will be all diving, feigning injury, arguing with the ref and girly hairstyles..... Ahem.... no change there then.

One of these days I might go through the archives and find the best of the quotes from Roy Keane's 1.5 seasons as Sunderland manager. For now though I'll just share with you a quote from what he said to the BBC interviewer after yesterday's defeat at Chelsea:

Interviwer: "You took off Kenwynne Jones, was that just because he was tired?"

Keane: "No not at all; we expect all our players to put in a full shift. We don't expect them to come off tired, we expect them to come off shattered"

Wouldn't you just love to have him managing your team?

I enjoyed watching two rugby games today: How weird is that?

If anything, the France - NZ game was even better than the England-Aus one

I just enjoyed watching a game of rugby and I just enjoyed watching England win. Both of which are not things that I enjoy too often. The game was great but not as good as seeing the Australian players cry at the end.

The girls

Two football stories in The Sun this morning....

1.

Niall Quinn:

"Roy (Keane) is an exceptional talent and somebody who is not here purely to win a match every weekend - but to build this club into an amazing force again"

2.

Glenn Roeder has vowed to restore Newcastle to the top end of the Premiership next season.

Which one is more believable?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/fa_cup/6551233.stm

I blame Sky

One fan, who had told me earlier that he loved Quinn so much he would give him a kidney, suddenly changed his mind. "The bloke's a legend," he declared, "he can have both of my kidneys."

http://www.sunderlandtoday.co.uk/ViewArticle.aspx?ArticleID=2218018&SectionID=1107

You may or may not have noticed but Sunderland haven't lost a league game this year. If you're from gypsy stock (like I suspect I might be) you probably think that me merely mentioning that fact will put the mockers on it. But that doesn't worry me.

We may or may not get an automatic promotion place this season, we may or may not go up via the playoffs. But I can say with absolute confidence that if we don't go up this season, we will piss it next.

The reason for my confidence can be expressed in four words: Naill Quinn and Roy Keane.

Sunderland fans have known Niall was a top man for some time now (we always loved him more than Kevin Philips) but I'll be honest, I had contempt for Keane until recently. I now think that his time as a star man for Man Utd, when he won League titles, FA Cups and the Champions(!) League, was simply training for his main purpose in life - to make Sunderland great.

We've had our false dawns at Sunderland in recent years but this one is different. This time it is right. This time we have a chairman and a manager who are talented and focussed. I am supremely full of faith. By 2008/9 we will be established as one of the very topclubs in Britain.

I can feel it in my water.

http://www.ftmforum.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=8117

I'm ashamed to say that I happen to know that Steve McClaren is a regular reader of my blog and this is a personal message to him. So my apologies to all of you who are not the current England footbal team manager.

Steve mate, your country needs you to resign. Be a hero.