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Ian Plenderleith checks out online suggestions on how to survive Euro 2008 – avoid ticket touts and don't talk to Tina Turner

If you’re looking for something special in your Euro 2008 coverage, there are precious few sites around that are going to go the extra distance, especially with no home nations to justify added expense for a one-off tournament. With projected site visits down, and revenue from ads for those fantastic England replica away kits correspondingly low, you’ll likely have to be happy with standard results, stats, match reports and fantasy leagues. All in all, dedicated Euro sections at your favoured newspaper’s site, or at the reliable but dull portals at places such as the BBC and Soccernet, will fulfil your basic needs. Not that those are a recommendation.

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Helen Chamberlain’s former sidekick has celebrated leaving Soccer AM for 6.06 with a book. Taylor Parkes wants to know why anyone – anyone – thought it was a good idea to expose the presenter’s ego and prejudices across 288 smugly written pages

Soccer AM is a bad memory: hungover mornings in other people’s flats, disturbed by a crew of whooping simpletons, the slurping of pro and ex-pro rectums, cobbled-together comedy that made me long for the glory days of Skinner and Baddiel’s old shit. Yet Tim Lovejoy himself, with his fashionably receding hair and voice oddly reminiscent of Rod Hull’s, I remember only as an averagely blokey TV presenter – in fact, one of the few averagely blokey TV presenters to make me clack my tongue in irritation, rather than buff my Gurkha knife. Other than as a namesake of The Simpsons’ self-serving man of the cloth, he barely registered; just a bland, blond ringmaster in a cocky circus of crap. Almost a surprise, then, to find that his new book is not just ­tedious in the extreme, it is utterly vile.

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Thursday 1 Emre is accused of having racially abused Ali Bangura of Watford; the Newcastle player was previously charged with insulting Everton’s black players in December. Anton Ferdinand will face trial for alleged assault over an incident at an Essex nightclub last year. Alan Knill is dismissed by Rotherham, who are without a win in 14 games.

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Monday 1 Manchester United miss a chance to go nine points clear, drawing 2‑2 at injury-hit Newcastle. Liverpool’s 3‑0 win over Bolton takes them third. “They’ve shown me in the last couple of weeks why they are down there,” says Alan Curbishley as West Ham crash 6‑0 at Reading, their third successive defeat. Wigan drop to 17th after a fifth straight loss, 3‑0 at home to Blackburn. Antti Niemi is hospitalised with a serious neck injury in Fulham’s 0‑0 draw with Watford. Derby’s 2‑1 win at Preston takes them to within three points of Championship leaders Birmingham, beaten by a 90th‑minute goal at Ipswich. Torquay are six points adrift in League Two after losing 1‑0 at Bristol Rovers.

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Sunday 1 “We have something to hold on to now,” says Sir Alex as Man Utd go top, two Solskjaer goals beating Newcastle. Blackburn’s sub keeper Jason Brown saves a penalty and a rebound in his side 2‑1 win over Wigan. Mido is left on the bench as Spurs beat Portsmouth 2‑1; referee Chris Foy apparently apologises to Harry Redknapp for the dubious penalty that gives Spurs the lead: “The ref has gone home knowing people will be saying what a giant ricket he has made.” West Ham lose again, 1‑0 at home to Reading. Nigel Worthington is sacked by Norwich after a third successive defeat, 4‑1 at home to Burnley.

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