Luke Young intends to take every opportunity to impress for Charlton this season as he tries to force his way into the World Cup plans of the England coach, Sven-Goran Eriksson. The right-back was part of the full international squad for the first time over the summer in the United States, and was capped twice. With the Addicks striker Darren Bent the latest member of Alan Curbishley’s players to be included in Eriksson’s squad, hopes are high at The Valley that at least one of their players could even make it into the final World Cup party, should England qualify.

Young – signed from Tottenham for £4m in July 2001 – was named Charlton’s player of the year last season. But he knows he will have to raise his game if he is to be in Eriksson’s thoughts next summer.The Addicks have made a positive start to the new Premiership campaign, winning their opening two matches, when Young has been captain because ofMatt Holland’s absence.Young, 26, said: “I’d be lying if I said the World Cup wasn’t in the back of my mind.”I know I’ll have to pull up some trees and play even better than I did last year but at least, having been called up, I know you do get noticed at Charlton.”It started with Chris Powell’s call-up a few years ago. “The first half was as good as we have played since I have been here, and our reaction after conceding the equaliser was good as well.”We kicked on and got stronger after their goal, and I was delighted.”However, Rovers’ mini-revival will be strongly tested by a Tottenham team who will travel north with a 100 per cent record this season and ambitions of elbowing their way into the Champions League shake-up this season. Substitutes not used: Jones (gk), Doriva.Referee: P Dowd (Stoke)..

Portsmouth chairman Milan Mandaric’s pre-match comments, in the style of Captain Mainwaring’s “Don’t panic”, proved sound advice last night as the home side picked up the first points of their Premiership campaign. But the jury is still out on a collection of talents only just getting to know each other. The best came from a curling free-kick by Pennant which bounced out off the outside of the far post.Birmingham City (4-4-2): Taylor; Melchiot, Cunningham, Upson, Lazaridis; Pennant, Tebily (Forssell, 45), Butt, Clemence (Izzet, 45); Jarosik, Pandiani (Gray, 67). Substitutes not used: Vaesen (gk), Clapham.Middlesbrough (4-4-2): Schwarzer; Reiziger, Ehiogu, Southgate, Queudrue; Morrison (Bates, 89), Parlour, Boateng, Downing; Hasselbaink (Maccarone, 73), Viduka (Job, 78). Boro had two men over beyond the far post and, although Ugo Ehiogu tried and failed to get his head to it, Queudrue followed up behind him to stab home.Birmingham had a smattering of attempts, although most of them lacked conviction. Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink stole yards on his markers to reach Franck Queudrue’s through ball but his powerful cross shot beat the far post by inches.It was not a costly miss. Bone Machine may have its moments, but forcing the whole thing on assembled aunts, nephews and grandchildren does not strike me as particularly therapeutic.Meanwhile, I shall put a bit more thought into what I should do with Timothy Leary because, knowing my friends, I am going to have to get used to awkward last wishes.jh johnhiggs The author’s ‘I Have America Surrounded: The Life of Timothy Leary’ will be published in 2006.

He was the one who saw it, because he was behind me and saw everything.”. Mark Viduka did more than just break Middlesbrough’s scoring duck for 2005-06. But I told them, ‘who robs a robber, is pardoned for a hundred years.’”We knew that we were facing the English, and they’d done all sorts of things to us,” he said, in veiled reference to the Falklands War of 1982.Maradona also scored a second goal with a brilliant weaving dribble in the 2-1 win in the Azteca Stadium. Gary Lineker headed England’s goal.Maradona, who has hovered on the brink of drug-induced death on various occasions, described how Shilton later reproached him for the invalid goal.”And I told him, ‘yeah well, obviously I’m going to lose sleep over that.’ What do I care?” he reflected.”I never regretted scoring that goal with my hand,” he went on, “and what’s more, I scored another one like it playing for Napoli against Udinese.”Zico, who was playing for them, asked me if I didn’t feel it was wrong and I said absolutely not.I’d often done it before, when I was starting out.”As if speaking directly to Shilton, he looked into the camera and said: “Peter, you didn’t see a thing It was [Terry] Fenwick who told you that it was handball. Speaking on his chat show that is enthralling Argentinian viewers, the former Argentina captain confessed that he did indeed score the first goal of the quarter-final “with my left fist”.
He deliberately planned the manoeuvre “from the start”, because the English goalkeeper Peter Shilton was so tall, while Maradona was only 5ft 7in.

“I knew I’d never get past him with a header,” said Maradona.”I want to tell this to Argentinians, and the world; why not?” he boasted, with no trace of remorse, on his chat show La Noche Del 10 (Tonight with 10), where millions of Argentinians have witnessed the comeback of a man who until recently had been reduced to a barely coherent buffoon by drugs.Breaking a silence of nearly 20 years, Maradona detailed exactly what happened in one of the most controversial moments in footballing history.”When I saw the linesman was halfway down the pitch, I called on my team-mates to embrace me and make a big show of acclaiming the goal, to make sure it was confirmed They were hanging back a bit timidly They embraced me, but as if to say, ‘we’re robbing them’. “Here you have a kid who is bursting at the seams and hitting blokes on the head left, right and centre,” he said. Tait, who is a 90mph plus bowler, later shook hands and had a conciliatory hug with Langer.. Diego Maradona has finally come clean about his “Hand of God” goal against England in the 1986 World Cup in Mexico, confessing publicly for the first time that he punched the ball into the net with his fist, and that he has never regretted it. As to who should replace Gillespie, Warne favours Tait’s pace against the control of Kasprowicz. The England fast bowler Simon Jones wasted no time in rejecting that view “We don’t see how the pressure can be on us,” he said.