SO Sven and Mark Palios have finally found a diamond formation which performs to their satisfaction. But will Sven have the chance to make the diamond work for his England team?

It will be a blow for Middlesbrough if, just when Steve McClaren has assembled a squad capable of challenging for a top six spot, he is whisked away to replace the philandering Swede.

It's surprising that Sven has scored twice, with Ulrika and Faria, considering that he seems to discourage his team from scoring more than once in big games. Against Brazil, France and Portugal they went 1-0 up then rolled over and went to sleep.

This is the real indictment of a manager whose earnings of £4m a year are far more immoral than his pursuit of willing women.

There will be some old buffers at the FA who will want rid of him because they are appalled by the sleaze he has brought to their doorstep, but they will not want to cough up the £14m compensation he is entitled to demand.

Their best hope is that, like the last four occupants of the post, he resigns. And as long as the tacky tabloids keep taking the moral high ground like the hypocrites they are, there must be every chance that he will decide it's not worth the hassle.

It is an appalling reflection on our national obsession with football that the aggravation which goes with the England manager's job would surely make even the ambitious McClaren think twice about taking it.

In an ideal world he needs at least another season with Boro to prove that, having assembled what looks an impressive squad, he can mould them into a top side.

Without that doubts will remain about his credentials, so it's probably best to give Sven another year, by which time the good looks and charisma which make him irresistible to women will have left him too exhausted to continue.

SLEAZE and corruption in professional sport are a blight of our age, and the Tour de Lance is inevitably tarnished by the certainty that some, perhaps even the majority, of contestants are drug cheats.

Otherwise Lance Armstrong's record sixth successive Tour victory would be regarded as one of the greatest sporting achievements of all time. It is a feat of Redgrave proportions, and they don't come much higher than that.

Armstrong has threatened legal action following the publication of a book entitled LA Confidential, which accuses him of taking drugs, while another prominent cyclist has said: "Lance will do anything to keep his secret."

Armstrong did not enhance his own image by chasing down a little-known Italian who was making a bid for glory in one stage and warning him to get back in the pack, where he was apparently roundly abused because he has blown the whistle on the dopers.

Perhaps it's so endemic in cycling that it no longer matters and would give Armstrong no particular advantage if he did test positive. But it's a sad reflection on an era in which the French fans who enthusiastically line the route of the Tour complain that nowadays the participants are a race apart.

SOME pundits felt before the Lord's Test that England should not play a spinner, arguing that the ground is a twirlers' graveyard.

They think only in terms of Test matches, of course. But if they took any interest in county cricket they would recall that only ten years ago Middlesex pitches were prepared to suit Emburey and Edmonds.

I even saw forgotten off-spinner Phil Berry - last heard of looking after Redcar racecourse - take seven wickets in an innings there for Durham in 1992. And no Durham spinner has done that since.

Ashley Giles proved the pundits wrong with his nine wickets.

Cricket teams should always include a spinner to bring welcome variety. It is precisely because practitioners of his art are not encouraged enough that the much-maligned Giles is the best we've got.

Unfortunately three of his first Test victims were the result of poor umpiring, hotting up the debate about making greater use of technology. It seems inevitable that it will happen eventually, but will they be able to find any umpires willing to act only as hat stands?

ENGLAND Academy director Rod Marsh has been known to sink a few beers in his time, but his golfing brother Graham prefers wine. Which is just as well after he won 340 bottles from a wine distributor - one for every yard of the two holes-in-one he had at the same hole in the Senior British Open at Royal Potrush. It was a unique feat in professional golf on either side of the Atlantic.

CARLISLE'S failure to hang on to their Football League status will really hit home in their first match in the Conference. Their opponents are Canvey Island, who will no doubt bring a whelk-stocked supporters' bus.