World Cup playoffs riding to the rescue in this international break

Back in the day, before the BBC sussed out that they could fill their entire morning and afternoon schedule with looped footage of Dion Dublin running up and down the stairs of a house that hasn’t seen a lick of paint for decades, the corporation would stick up a testcard, or film of a potter’s wheel, or pages from Ceefax accompanied by whatever version of The Girl From Ipanema that came to hand in the library. It was a great way of filling space and passing time when nothing was happening and they had no content. Yes sir, a great way of filling space and passing time when nothing was happening and they had no content.

The Fiver, tall and tan and young and lovely, has no such luxury to fall back on when the going gets tough, and so on quiet days like these we just have to brazen it out. There are some friendlies on Tuesday night involving England, Wales, Norn Iron, Scotland and the Republic O’Ireland, it’s true, but even by tail-end-of-international-break standards, they’re all non-events of the very lowest stripe. John Stones has gone back home, Gareth Bale is putting his feet up again, 68-year-old Steven Davis hopes to build up his fitness after knack, Andy Robertson has recovered from Covid, Séamus Coleman will most likely be rested, and when she passes he smiles but she doesn’t see.

Just as The Fiver was about to bundle Granny Fiver into a photo booth with a packet of chalk, a blackboard and Bubbles the Clown, with explicit instructions to give that eerie little sod a good thrashing at noughts and crosses, we suddenly remembered that Portugal host North Macedonia to play off for a place in Qatar. With João Cancelo back from suspension, Diogo Jota in form, and Cristiano Ronaldo asking for “hell breaking loose” in the