IF you ever find that following your favourite football team becomes too depressing or even boring, then you could try and go ‘virtual’.  According to a report in The Sun Newspaper, the Manchester City defender Joleon Lescott try to get one over on Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney after Rooney’s spectacular goal won the Manchester derby.

I don’t think the powers that be who run Europe’s top football clubs have done themselves a favour by declaring that they are opposed to their players taking part in both the European Championships and the London Olympic Games in 2012.  The Olympic football event is for players aged under 23 and gets underway a month after Euro 2012 takes place in Poland and Ukraine.

A good friend of mine is currently awaiting news of whether he will lose his job. He works for a local authority which employs over 7,000 people and is looking to axe 600 by the end of March.  That scenario is being acted out in both public and private organisations throughout the country as the financial crisis sweeping the UK tightens its grip.

PLENTY going on in football this week with the fourth round of the FA Cup and the final few days of the mid-season transfer window, but the big talking point has been the row over sexist comments made by two Sky TV pundits about female officials.

MOST young boys who dream of becoming a footballer want to be a star striker, and it is easy to see why – they grab all the headlines and quite often most of the money:  Struggling Premier League side Aston Villa splashed out £18million (the deal could eventually rise to £24million) for Sunderland forward Darren Bent last week.

THE fixture list was extremely kind to Sky TV on Sunday, providing their football subscribers with three local Derbies in one day.

And the viewing public were not disappointed. Liverpool and Everton served up a cracking 2-2 draw, Sunderland and Newcastle battled it out for a 1-1 stalemate and in the Midlands, Birmingham and Aston Villa also tied 1-1.