THIS is the column which won't mention you know Roo. Except, that is, to observe that the Croxteth Kid has obliterated the Ashington Express from the headlines.

Stephen Harmison has been a sensation this year, and it is going to be fascinating to see whether he remains the world's best fast bowler or whether Glenn McGrath and Jason Gillespie can shake off their injury problems to topple him from the summit.

Croxteth probably makes Ashington look like Palm Beach, but it's somehow reassuring that real talent can still flourish out of adversity in this country. The old hungry fighter syndrome may have vanished, but mean streets can still spawn tough and talented competitors.

It's what happens to them once fame and fortune lifts them out of their natural environment which is the worry, and it's a spookily timely warning that Croxteth Kid mania should coincide with the release of Gazza: My Story.

Paul Gascoigne has gone back to his roots and is currently occupying Jimmy Five Bellies' spare room in Dunston. It is no doubt infinitely better than the Chinese hotel room in which he finished his third bottle of whisky of the day and wanted to die.

It is impossible to envisage this sort of thing happening to Harmison, who apart from being happily married with two young daughters, realises that getting into excellent physical condition has played a huge part in propelling him to the top.

He'd be a fool to let it go and, unlike Gazza, he is not as daft as a brush.

TALKING of you know Roo, is he the greatest natural talent to have hit our headlines in the last week, or should the accolade belong to a racehorse?

They don't breed racehorses in Croxteth, but again there's an element of triumph forged in adversity as Attraction had humble parentage and had to wear corrective leg braces before becoming a supreme three-year-old filly.

After her all-the-way wins in the English and Irish 1,000 Guineas, she again left the field for dead in the Coronation Stakes at Royal Ascot to register her eighth successive win.

Trained at Middleham by Mark Johnston, she is owned by the Duke of Roxburgh, who must be sitting very contentedly in his estate near Kelso as he gazes out on fields of fillies, plus salmon leaping in the Tweed.

He has also had a superb golf course, known as The Roxburgh, built in his grounds and any North-East golfer who hasn't yet sampled its delights should do so forthwith.

THERE was not much delight with the state of the course at Shinnecock Hills for the US Open, where competitors faced with four-foot putts found themselves playing their next shot from the rough if they missed.

While the majority struggled to break 80, South African Retief Goosen won because of an amazing knack of getting the ball to hit the hole, taking only 24 putts in his final round.

"Drive for show, putt for dough" may be an old truism, but no golf competition should be decided on putting skills alone.

Aside from that, it could be argued it was the same for everybody and it was alarming to find that Europe was the only continent not to have a top 16 finisher.

It's the major in which Monty has come closest, but he wasn't there and we need him to get back to his best if we are to put up a fight in the Ryder Cup.

AUDLEY Harrison brought down the curtain on his BBC career with his 17th straight win against an unknown Pole.

The newsprint devoted to this less-than-riveting episode would not exactly have cut a swathe through Hamsterley Forest, yet Audley felt obliged to take a swipe at the Beeb for ditching him.

The fact is that while he may be a mountain of a man, the BBC have far bigger fish to fry in terms of capturing an audience.

AS it's difficult to see whether other British athletics medals are coming from at the Olympics, it was good to see Paula Radcliffe back on track with the third fastest 5,000m of all time at the European Cup.

Hopefully it has put our golden girl in good heart for a crack at the world 10,000m record at Gateshead on Sunday, but otherwise it was a fairly depressing tale in Poland.

Our penchant for relay cock-ups was continued by the men's 4x400 metre team, and after the shame of Dwane Chambers' drug scandal Mark Lewis-Francis did nothing to enhance the reputation of our sprinters.

His disqualification for two false starts went a long way to costing the men's team overall victory, and he was left in no doubt of that by the management.

It all adds to the notion that our stock of male athletes with both talent and bottle is depressingly low.

So we'll have to rely on the cyclists, the rowers and the clay pigeon shooters to bag our medals in Athens. Not forgetting Paula, of course.

Published: 25/06/2004