It might not be the World Cup grudge match that England fans were hoping for, but the upcoming quarter-final between Germany and Argentina is a fixture that has a rich history of its own.

Britain's back pages won't be covered in Hand of God references, "Gotcha!" headline retreads or Richard Littlejohn reminding us how good old Maggie sorted the Argies out, but there is plenty of gold to be mined in the build-up to Saturday's match in Cape Town.

There is the small matter of the two consecutive finals in which the two sides clashed in 1986 and 1990, a run which ended honours even.

But there are

If only the FA had put Frank Lampard up in front of the media yesterday instead of John Terry.

The England vice-captain came out and denied any talk of a player rebellion, even a lone one from Terry, in such assured, relaxed fashion that he may have even convinced those who reported such an uprising yesterday that it were not true.

Lamps then went one step further and mildly chastised the media by reminding them of who held the power in the player/press relationship.

It was all very well handled by the Chelsea midfielder, who was open, erudite and intelligent. He's got an A* in Latin, you

It's not often
Early Doors agrees with Ian Wright. But even a blind darts player is going to
hit treble-20 sooner or later, and the Gladiators presenter has got it exactly
right calling England friendly against the Netherlands "ridiculous",
"a waste of time", "a hindrance", "pointless" and
"absurd" - he's obviously
been at the thesaurus.

Early Doors is too lazy to find out exactly who decided
internationals this week were a good idea, and why, but it can only assume the
scheduling was made as a forfeit resulting from some sort of bet.

ED has to confess it hasn't
watched an England friendly for

So, in the end it took £6 million for the Reds to rid themselves of manager Rafael Benitez.

He may have won them the Champions League, but ultimately it was losing their place in that very competition that cost him. In six seasons at the club only one was remarkably bad, but coming at a time of such uncertainty it was more than enough to earn him the chop. 

He never even got to say a proper goodbye. While his lawyers thrashed out his severance deal, Benitez remained afar, communicating to the fans who all once proudly declared "In Rafa We Trust" through a heartfelt statement.

Mind you, you can

Roy Hodgson's admission that Fernando Torres is not totally happy at Liverpool will be music to Manchester City's ears.

Hodgson has spoken on several occasions of the "disenchantment" at the club where he replaced Rafael Benitez at the start of the month, and it seems Torres is no exception.

He said: "Unfortunately, I cannot do much more. His beef is with the club and not me.

"Fernando's situation has nothing to do with me, he made that perfectly clear over the phone during the World Cup and when I met him face-to-face.

"He knows what I would like to do with the club. He knows how much I

It's not easy being the manager of Celtic football club. Just ask Gordon Strachan, who will not be missed by fans who never really wanted him there in the first place.

Despite winning three successive SPL titles, a Scottish Cup, two Scottish League Cups and three SPFA Manager of the Year awards in the space of four years, Strachan has failed miserably to endear himself to the masses.

Perhaps he should have expected as much when you bear in mind his first contact with Celtic fans came as an Aberdeen player in 1981.

That day Strachan scored a penalty against the Hoops and celebrated before

Now we have
a two-day wait that will feel so long that the third-place play-off will feel
like the final itself, how will the fans still in South Africa keep themselves
occupied?

Being in
Africa, it would be rude not to go for a trip on safari, but if watching
various animals laze around in the sun isn't exciting enough for you, then you
can watch a man walk amongst crocodiles and goad them into action by poking
them with a stick. Wonder what the health insurance plan is like on that job.

If you're
based in Sun City then you can emulate the Black Star heroes of Ghana by
hanging around the

When recounting Arsenal's injury predicament ahead of last night's match against Porto, Early Doors made a glib remark that while the Gunners were missing Arshavin, Song, Gallas and Eduardo, the good news was that so was goalkeeper Manuel Almunia, in a cheap bid for sneery LOLs and ROFLs.

Well, who's ROFLing now? Porto, that's who.

Arsenal reserve keeper Lukasz Fabianski put in a calamitous performance that greatly helped the Portuguese side to a valuable 2-1 win in their Champions League last 16 first leg match.

Fabianski's first error - allowing Silvestre Varela's cross to beat him at the