The bodies of three of the four oil workers who died when a helicopter plunged into the North Sea have been brought back to the mainland.

AS the Premier League season heads towards an exciting climax – arguably the most gripping since Michael Thomas galloped through the heart of the Liverpool defence on May 26, 1989 – it’s worth remembering that, despite its cosmopolitan values, English football remains one of the tightest closed shops in the sporting world.

ARSENE WENGER will join one of football’s elite clubs today when he turns 60. It should be called the 60-is-the-new-40 club.

FORMER Arsenal chief executive David Dein, director Ken Friar, legendary Gunners striker Thierry Henry and Hull manager Phil Brown were among those to pay tribute to Arsene Wenger yesterday.

GONE are the easel and chart, the dusty schoolroom blackboard, the solitary television and the bungalow-sized video player with which General 'Stormin' Norman Schwarzkopf showed fuzzy images of smart-bomb raids during the 1991 Gulf War.