MUCH consternation recently at the news that three football writers were denied the chance to ask Erik ten Hag a question over three consecutive press conferences.

The dismay did not stretch to myself despite being one of those placed briefly on the naughty step.

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I don’t agree with such ‘punishments’ for stories or opinions but Ten Hag has had to take a bucketload this season and has never been anything but polite and helpful.

So if he wanted to do something to have a go back for once, no problem.

It’s all sorted now and everyone is friends again.

Having been brought up on Sir Alex Ferguson press conferences and downright unfair bans of varying lengths, SEVEN in my case, you become immune to middle-aged men having a hissy fit.

Recent events reminded me of a lovely warm day at the Haydock Thistle Hotel some years back, where North-West based managers and writers were all invited to lunch.

Sir Alex was there on the main table laughing, singing and generally holding court when simultaneously all the writers’ phones bleeped with a message from United’s “no communication department”.

He had no doubt arranged for it to be sent bang in the middle of the lunch informing us all that relations would be suspended forthwith.

Our crime was to use his words from a local radio interview he had done that week and the controversial comments he made within it.

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We were all fuming so, when he got up to leave I followed him out of the luncheon suite.

As I ranted about how unfair his actions were, he ignored me and walked on ahead, entering another room.

I followed, still ranting, but he kept his back to me and looked down silently.

Was he having a rethink as his gaze remained concentrated, his head stooped?

No, he was having a wee! We had entered the gents but, in my own hissy fit, I hadn’t quite realised.

I’m not sure what the hotel guest two urinals down made of it but how absurd the whole scene must have appeared.

Defeated and deflated, I returned to the luncheon where the free red wine got a hammering and I sulked.

There would be more such incidents, told and retold to this day with laughter.

I always say covering United when Sir Alex was boss was like a stay at Fawlty Towers — not particularly comfortable but certainly unforgettable.

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Thirty years without Senna

THE anniversary never loses its sense of sadness.

It was 30 years ago last week that three-time F1 champ Ayrton Senna lost his life at Imola, aged 34.

The steering column on his Williams breaking is the most likely explanation as to what went wrong, as he entered the Tamburello corner and went straight into the wall.

A piece of metal in the car pierced his helmet and skull above his eye. An inch either side and he walks away.

There was a 2010 documentary called simply Senna, put together from footage you may never have seen. It’s like being there and bearing witness to his short life.

It is the greatest thing I have seen in a cinema.

Find it, watch it, and if you fail to shed a tear in the final ten minutes, you are not human.

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World Cup manager passes away

SAD to hear of the passing of Cesar Luis Menotti, manager of the Argentina side that won the World Cup on home turf in 1978.

It was the first World Cup I properly remember.

The vagaries of a strange group system up to the final meant Argentina had to beat Peru in their last game by four goals to reach the final and deny Brazil their place against Holland. They won 6-0.

Even at the age of ten, I found this strange, until I later learned representatives of Argentina’s military junta had been in the tunnel ahead of kick-off and unproven rumours of bribes followed.

It was the first time I realised sport is not all that it should be.

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Crucible memories

THESE past two weeks watching events unfold at the Crucible brought back great memories of when I covered the tournament in the mid-90s.

Nothing to do with what happened on the perfectly ironed green baize but instead the sport’s own version of off-piste, or totally on the piste as it turned out.

Sponsored by Embassy at the time, I have never covered an event with so much free ‘tabs and booze’, as we say in the North East.

Each day would end in the early hours in a place called ‘The Woopsie room’ upstairs in The Crucible, which was really supposed to be where the WPBSA entertained guests.

The best night was ‘judgment night’ when media representatives were brought before the association’s chairman and former world champion John Spencer and tournament director Ann Yates.

Spencer would be dressed in swimwear, a towelling robe, snorkel and paddles and the accused would be placed on a high chair in a paddling pool.

All would be found guilty of trumped-up charges and then, despite being dressed in a smart suit, would be blasted with a high-velocity water pistol to the delight of the assailant Spencer.

One colleague, after a long day at the coal face, had a late-night altercation with a fellow scribe and awoke with no memory of what had happened that previous evening.

Word got to Yates, who arranged for the make-up department to paint a black eye on the person he had argued with.

Returning the next day he was aghast at the injury he had inflicted on a friend who was sat there waiting for him.

Things got worse when Spencer called him in to a meeting to say he would be banned forthwith from covering the tournament.

He was nearly crying, as was everyone else, when the gag was revealed as Yates wiped the makeup off his giggling mate.

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