Practice makes perfect — but a few bob helps too

LET’s think back a moment, before we look forward. You’ve just had your dinner. A warm mug of milky tea is perched on the arm of the sofa as you sit back in short trousers on another yawning summer evening.

Old friends fill the TV screen for the eighth night on the trot: O’Herlihy, Dunphy, Giles — and like a wedding invitation; plus one. We’ve just watched 90 minutes of intriguing, incident-filled World Cup football between a muscular west African side and a technically-gifted outfit from a small central European mountain top.

Giles it has to be said, is not in the habit of Googling the names of centre-halves who ply their trade in the Russian second tier. Dunphy — though he likes the bit of La Liga of a Sunday evening — is not interested in dissecting the action between two dozen strangers for too long.