WHAT we musn't forget in this politically correct era of sympathy, compassion and tolerance is that the Newcastle flyweights, Bowyer and Dyer, are bears of very little brain who have been given no incentive to see beyond the confines of the degrading culture in which they exist. We musn't condemn them because the poor dears couldn't help themselves.

If you suspect I speak with tongue in cheek, you may be right. But I do have a shred of sympathy for Dyer, partly because he was the victim and also because he looks to me like the missing link. Yet I hear the King of Bling can charm the birds from the trees, so what do I know?

What I do know is that I wrote long ago that Bowyer believes he is above the law and should not be allowed on a football field. He should now be sent to Celtic, or better still Siberia, or better still the remotest region of Afghanistan.

His signing provided the biggest reason to question whether Sir Bobby Robson remained in full possession of his marbles, especially as he already had enough ferrets in the pack.

So Graeme Souness took on the role of ferret-tamer, and just when it seemed all in the garden was rosy, pop goes the weasel.

That's life, unfortunately, but Alan Shearer must have been apoplectic. Recent results plus team spirit on the second jaunt to Dubai convinced him to carry on for another season, but in the instant it takes for Bowyer's brain to blow a gasket the celebration was turned into a nightmare.

As all this happened on the day Jermaine Pennant took the field for Birmingham wearing an electronic tag as a condition of his early release from prison, there can be no doubt that someone will be daft enough to sign Bowyer. Newcastle will want to recoup whatever money they can for him, and even if he helps them win the UEFA Cup they must surely let him go. With such a short fuse he'll always be a liability.

WHEN the cricket season starts next week Durham should call in a spiritualist to lift the Riverside curse.

Or perhaps it dates back even beyond the Riverside days to when they chose not to re-engage Dean Jones because of the certainty that he would be in the Ashes squad the following summer. Except that he wasn't.

At the end of last summer they appeared to have pulled off a master stroke by signing Mike Hussey, 30 next month, as captain in the belief that his international chances had passed. Now he is in the Aussie one-day squad and will miss five weeks of Durham's season.

Of the three ex-Durham men in the Ashes party only Simon Katich has been spared the curse. Brad Hodge broke a thumb in the nets four days after arriving and Shaun Tait's run-up instantly went walkabout somewhere in the outback.

While watching the coaches trying to sort out Tait's problem last September it was impossible not to conclude that he would return this summer to haunt us. He has had a fantastic season back home, and if McGrath, Gillespie and Warne don't torment the life out of England's batsmen we can be sure that Tait will.

FURTHER evidence that our lives are now governed by TV schedules comes with the nonsensical decision to delay the Grand National because of a wedding. Well at least it will give Camilla time to nip out of the reception and have a small flutter.

Doubtless her 50p will go on Clan Royal, which will compete as the housewives' choice with Forest Gunner, on whom Carrie Ford apparently has the chance of becoming the first female winner of the event.

The National usually has some kind of fairytale attached to it, as with Red Rum's trainer Ginger McCain winning it again last year. Asked what he would do if Mrs Ford wins tomorrow, he said: "I'll bare my backside to the wind and let everyone kick it."

The omens have to be good for Clan Royal, especially with Tony McCoy on its back as his bad luck in the race surely has to end some time.

IT'S been quite a week for 18-year-old prodigies. Following Ding Junhui's 9-5 win against Stephen Hendry in the China Open final we can expect the 50 million Chinese snooker players to quadruple, while tennis courts will be springing up all over Majorca after Rafael Nadal took Roger Federer to five sets in the Nasdaq-100 Open final. Young players of this calibre merely serve to emphasise the pointlessness of Henmania.

THE fact that there are more indoor tennis courts in Paris than in the whole of this country was one of the things pointed out when the chief executives of the governing bodies for football, cricket, rugby and tennis met the Culture, Media and Sport select committee this week. They lambasted the lack of funding for grassroots sport, but unfortunately the Sports Minister was absent. He was in South Africa watching the England women's cricket team. Now there's a surprise.