IS there such a thing as Second Season Syndrome, of some sort? Y’know, akin to the Second Album Syndrome, so beloved of pop geeks?

He was still a coach, still getting into a player’s head, determining who needed cajoling, who would be incentivised by reward, all to elicit a better account of themselves, writes Michael Clifford

Seemingly, the Trumpian dynamic has its limits.

Here we are, back again to those regular bedfellows, the bantz and the ‘controvassy’.

In my previous column a fortnight ago, on the cusp of transfer deadline day, I held up a stressed Irish Examiner sports editor with a last-minute Sunday evening insertion. “I’ve heard on the grapevine that United might be in Monaco, chasing some French player: Throw in this extra line about it, just in case, would you?”

With Lee Dixon left to carry the fight for ITV — and even he wouldn’t command much of a purse — it’s already turned into a straight battle off the field between RTÉ and BBC.

Before kick-off on Saturday, a colleague dryly remarked: “So, we’re a wobbling mid-table side, up against a tight, in-form, Champions League-able team, who have a settled-in manager, with players that he actually wants at the club, in a system they are comfortable with ... I’ll be happy with a point gained.”

Celebrity Big Brother' star Ron Atkinson has come under fire for making a racist joke.

The two finest football pundits to work during what we must call the Premier League era were in notable action this week; albeit not on Premier League duty.

Arsene Wenger’s tormenters are circling for the kill now. There is a Shakespearean vibe around North London. A great man is on the verge of being driven demented by betrayal and changed circumstances.

Such are the peculiarities of footballing hysteria that a series of subtle, successfully-executed dives will bring about nothing like the binge of handwringing a bunch of botched, largely fruitless ones will.

Once more, Ron Atkinson must ruefully ponder his terminal exile from football since the day racist nonsense tumbled out of his mouth in the privacy of a largely deserted gantry position in Monaco.

It was Roberto Mancini who called it a “crazy season”, so crazy that, after all the madness which had preceded the dawning of the final day in the Premier League last time around, Alex Ferguson was left with not unreasonable grounds for hoping the noisy neighbours would do “something stupid”, maybe even a “Devon Loch”, at the death.

NO wonder the spirit of volunteerism is dead.

“THERE was a word beginning with ‘N’ that some football fans used to shout at people like me. They don’t do it any more.”

A FEW of us spent a most enjoyable and rewarding hour in the company of three Irish football heroes of yesteryear on Monday morning as Tony Cascarino, Frank Stapleton and Paul McGrath mixed some astute analysis of the Premier League and Trapattoni’s Ireland with a few entertaining detours down memory lane.

IRELAND’S World Cup 2014 destiny will be partly in the hands of Ronaldo this evening.

LET us look forward, not back, dear reader. And that’s not just to avoid discussing Goodison. (Which is easily summed up: an ongoing makeshift defence; a Rooney off-day; the post-Milan hangover. Move on.)

HELLO? Hello. I said hello! I’m over here! Well, yes, even a top columnist like myself has to shout when Yer Man suddenly moves in next door.

IT’S THE END of the world as we know it.

IT’S car crash telly of the most lurid kind but a glimpse of ‘Big Ron Manager’ on Sky has left me gasping for more.

AS THE knock-out stage of World Cup 2006 fast approaches, some of the game’s heavyweights are already on the ropes, hoping the bell will give them a reprieve.

A SIZZLER of a Sunday in Munich, although that had more to do with the scorching weather than the fairly modest amount of heat generated by the boys from Brazil.

ON the train down to Mannheim, the morning after watching Brazil do just enough to edge out Croatia in the Olympiastadion in Berlin, we fell in with a friendly group of Croatian Football Association staff in the restaurant car.

THEY made us wait.

SO young Theo Walcott is off to Germany this summer, and not on a school exchange programme either.

HAVING already made an offensive remark about black people, Ron Atkinson has now insulted the Chinese.

John Barnes has handed Ron Atkinson a chance to resurrect his TV career eight months after he was forced to resign for an on-air racist remark.

Former football pundit Ron Atkinson is to make a documentary about racism.

Football pundit Ron Atkinson was “devastated” today after resigning from ITV Sport for making a racist comment about a black Chelsea player.

FOOTBALL pundit Ron Atkinson has resigned from ITV Sport after making racist comments off-air following Tuesday night's Champions League game between Chelsea and Monaco, a spokesman for the channel said last night.

The magic of the FA Cup weekend will have a very strong Irish flavour, especially among the lower ranked teams writes Mark Gallagher