Football tennis hopefuls prove it never hurts to ask

JOHN GILES scrambled down his staircase in his Yorkshire home one morning to bafflingly find a pair of match caps had dropped in the letterbox from Dublin.

The Leeds legend — whose excellent autobiography is out at the moment, by the way — had played in midfield in a defeat to Trinidad and Tobago. The FAI issued two caps.

Representing your country is never cheap, but not since Dana was elected to Brussels will Europe have welcomed Irish representatives as unlikely as the crowd we’re sending out next week.