Czech Republic captain Tomas Ujfalusi has quit international football, blaming the country’s federation and the media for his decision.

IRELAND has been portrayed as a furry brown set of bagpipes, Bulgaria as a Turkish squat toilet, Belgium as a box of chocolates and Luxembourg as a gold bar.

THE “unacceptable behaviour” of Czech President Vaclav Klaus here this week brings to mind an incident many years ago when two Czech diplomats were expelled from Sweden also for unacceptable behaviour, giving rise to the memorable headline, ‘Swedes bounce bad Czechs’.

Czech Republic 1 Portugal 3

STEVE STAUNTON’S dream of leading the Republic of Ireland to next summer’s Euro 2008 finals are effectively over after Marek Jankulovski’s first-half winner gave the Czech Republic an almost unassailable Group D advantage.