LENT IS OFTEN a time for short tempers, as the faithful have to go without certain soothing things they have grown accustomed to and may thus react accordingly — and it’s certainly been a week when one is tempted to don the comedy Scouser wig before yabbering “Calm down! Calm down!”

DID alright last night, did we? Writing this on a Monday, all I see is this when I look at Lille: a mundane opposition, well off the pace in a poor league, who have only won 10 games all season and who have only scored 30 goals, without key players lost to injury and suspension.

MY favourite hack amongst the Sunday newspaper pack at Old Trafford is a chap called Simon Mullock on the Sunday Mirror, who is rarely found wanting when it comes to Mancunian football knowledge and banter, being a born and bred Manc. (Incidentally, he is well-known to Mr Kelly of these pages, who apparently frequently lambasts Mullock online for allegedly being anti-scouse and a Red.

WITH the typical charmlessness we have come to expect from the Blue bums, Chelsea’s website on Saturday announced John Terry’s return thus: “not since Napoleon’s return in 1815 has a comeback been as eagerly awaited as this.”

WHAT a top week for our SpudFacedNipper! On Monday, a court case involving an aged occasional prostitute collapsed, sparing him from the ordeal of having to appear as a witness.

LAST week I spoke of our hopes that Rooney would live up to his big-game reputation and break his drought, and when the Spud-Faced Nipper duly vindicated our trust in him just after 5pm on Sunday, you could have forgiven us all for mentally cracking open the champers.

I CAN’T remember who exactly first came up with the name “Theatre Of Dreams” for Old Trafford but one has to assume it was some kind of silly tabloid hack or cretinous PR git.

PITY poor pundit Alan Green, who hasn’t exactly been on a purple patch when it comes to his analysis of all things United recently.

IT’S apt to drag out the old bus route — you wait for two years for a Chelsea blip and then three or four come along all at once. Where was Terry’s bad back when it was needed back in April, eh?

IF FOOTBALL seasons are marked as much by their glorious moments as by trophies won, then we should still be remembering last Saturday warmly come the summer.