Northern Ireland Nil Italy Three.

Monday morning found me in the coal bunker, curled up in the foetal position, whimpering like a baby with my thumb in my mouth. I was pretending to be Gordon Brown, a dour Scots man, who labours under the misconception that he is the Prime Minister!

Suddenly Tommy my cat banged a dustbin lid on the wall and yelled. "CARAMBA!. He's back! Gerry Anderson is back!" "I knew Gerry would come back for D- day," I said. "A lot of Andersons fell at Normandy" "Clumsy!" said Tommy. "Listen you feline fiend!" I roared, "Only for the brave men who fought at Normandy, we would all be Germans now. Can you imagine how horrible that would be?" "Of course I can," said Tommy. "We would win the World cup on a regular basis. Our car industry would be the envy of the world and we would drive on super high speed autobahns." "Just you remember that," I said, "when you eat your gruel tonight and thank Winston Churchill that you live in Northern Ireland where losing three nil to Italy is a reason for national rejoicing." "At least we got nil," said Tommy. "We had nil before the game and managed to hold on to nil. I call that a result."

"You're so right," I said, "But we must build on that result. We can't always expect to get-nil." "The team is in transition and has been for the last 100 years." "We were at a disadvantage," said Tommy. "The game was played with a round ball. We are more used to the long ball or the short ball."

"The boys did good," I said. "We were able to contain Italy in our half for most of the game." "We were unlucky," said Tommy, "If the ball had crossed the Italian goal line, we would have been well within our rights in claiming a goal." "It was a game of two halves," I said, "and ifs, buts and maybes." "We must not be down hearted," said Tommy. "Nil Desperandum. We can bank that nil, safe in the knowledge that F.I.F.A can not take it away from us." "I would like to see them try!" I yelled. "If they did, the Andersons would be on the beaches of Normandy before you could say, "One, two and you're in!"

All this and more have I seen in the Priory clinic, where Susan Boyle is busy sticking pins into an effigy of Simon Cowell and Piers Morgan, the slimy refugee from the world of tabloid journalism. "I don't know how he can look at himself in the mirror each morning," said Tommy, with a self righteous look on his little feline face. Welcome back Kid, time to dust off Mr Coyle and put out some great shows.