The legal basis of super-injunctions protecting the rich and famous from having their indiscretions exposed is crumbling by the second.

The ban on naming the Premier League footballer involved in an alleged affair with former Miss Wales and Big Brother star Imogen Thomas was already a farce long before the Sunday Herald named him in Scotland this morning.

Millions had accessed his name via the internet. Anyone who knows a journalist has been texting them, asking for the identity to be confirmed.

The name has spread like wildfire, making any injunction preventing newspapers from publishing the name surely unsustainable.

So in Scotland, where the injunction is not valid, what was sto stop a newspaper like the Sunday Herald confirming the player's identity? Absolutely nothing.

Once the internet grapevine is in action, there is only one way out: do what Gabby Logan did when she was accused of having an affair with Alan Shearer: go public and tell the world you are innocent.

So far, the footballer named by the Sunday Herald has not followed Mrs Logan's lead. Instead, he has tried to take further legal steps to stop the damn bursting, with the result that he has drawn more and more attention to the story and his identity.

What is the Attorney General going to do - jail everyone who has re-tweeted the Sunday Herald front page?

It is time for the footballer to accept that the game is up and tell the world that he is not a love cheat.

Unless is he is, of course.