Sweet Fancy Moses

But there is a worse, lingering harm done by those World Cup playoffs last week. There is the continuing soured relationship between the governments and the peoples of Algeria and Egypt that escalated into diplomatic rows and international accusations.

It started when hoodlums threw rocks through the windows of the Algerian team bus as it arrived in Cairo. Three players and the team doctor were injured, others were undoubtedly unnerved. Yet while FIFA’s man in Cairo confirmed that the wounds were not superficial and the distress real, FIFA ruled that the game must be played.

Egypt won, but lost a playoff in Sudan four days later that required an army of 15,000 security men to stage. Violence both in Egypt and Algeria continued. Two Arabic governments continued to use a sporting conflict as an excuse for disturbing rhetoric about each other.

Sport, in this case, is used as a catalyst for international disharmony. At its extraordinary meeting on Dec. 2, FIFA should examine its own failure to ensure the safety of players in its tournament — not the least with South Africa 2010 in mind.

As president, I believe that robotics can inspire young people to pursue science and engineering. I also want to keep an eye on those robots in case they try anything.

It is one of my pet hates. They [young footballers] don’t know how to set up their own bank account, they don’t know what they’re spending their money on and they can’t make their own decisions. Not every player is like that, but some are now totally dependent on agents and advisers. For me, life is an education and you learn things as you go through it. I think a footballer should sit down and negotiate with a club, even if his agent is sitting with him. It is in the player’s best interests to be there and see what is going on. There are some agents who do a good job looking after players, but there are others who stifle and mollycoddle players. Some agents will come into a player’s life when he is 20, leave his life at 34 and never want to know that player again. Every footballer needs an adviser at some point, but a player doesn’t need to pay between 5 and 15 per cent of his wages to a guy to set up a bank account, buy him a new fridge or ask his club’s chief executive for a pay rise.