ON THE COUCH:Italy have their troubles too as Ossie reckons they are bery bad, just like Eamon Dumpy said, writes MARY HANNIGAN

WHO SHOULD pop up on our screens yesterday in the Semple Stadium stands watching Cork v Limerick? Roy Keane. The timing was spooky because only down the road in Knysna the merde was hitting le fan, after a tete-a-tete with a manager resulted in a player leaving on a jet plane.

Equally timely, or, perhaps, flukey, was the presence the night before on the BBC’s Match of the Day panel of a fella who knows a thing or eight about this class of bust-up. Colin Murray scratched his chin. “So, a manager sends a player home from the World Cup, who to go to first? Eeny, meeny, miny, Mick!”

“What are you asking me? Whether I’d send him home?” Colin nodded, half-nervously, half-rascally. Mick’s thoughts were with Raymond Domenech, if Nicolas Anelka had abused him then he’d every right to turf him out. Besides, he’d played for Domenech at Lyon, “liked him . . . no-nonsense . . . but I didn’t understand a word he said”.

You’d have to assume the communication difficulty was mutual.

Next day ITV’s Adrian Chiles read out the French players’ statement, the one about them refusing to train because their buddy had been sent home. Gareth Southgate was appalled.

“Itz fair enough,” said Marcel Desailly, with a quite majestic shrug of the shoulders.

“FAIR ENOUGH?” asked Gareth. “Yes,” said Marcel.

Perhaps fearing Marcel would question Gareth’s Ma’s nocturnal activities, Patrick Vieira intervened. “All of zis iz really, really, really sad for French football,” he said.

Meanwhile, there was an exclusive on Sky News from another troubled World Cup camp, the channel showing us footage of an interview with the man who “invaded” the England dressingroom after the Algeria game.

The truth is that the poor fella was only looking for somewhere to powder his nose.

“I’m Pavlos and I actually need the toilet,” he’d said to the players, among them a naked Joe Cole. “He glanced at me and then did a massive double take,” the mortgage advisor revealed. Seriously, if you started printing T-shirts with “I’m Pavlos and I actually need the toilet” emblazoned across the front Fabio Capello would be asking you for a loan.

At troubled times like these, Sky News, of course, always tries to get to the deeper bottom of the problem, if you know what we mean, so they brought in sports psychologist Rebecca Symes to tell us what England needed to do to get their heads sorted.

“They have to get their confidence back . . . they have to understand what they’re doing on the pitch,” she told us. You just had to hope Fabio was taking notes.

Back on the field, Denmark’s Simon Kjaer was Saturday’s man of the day, the fiery little bowsey barely missing a tackle. Except the one that earned him a yellow card and ruled him out of the next game. “Whenever you see blonde air flappin’ about like that you’re attracted to it,” said Graeme Souness, who clearly assumes Kjaer has a whole heap more fun than his brunette team-mates.

As for Italy and New Zealand. Beyond wacky. “Italy were appalling,” said RTÉ debutant Ossie “Tott-ing-ham” Ardiles, “as Eamon Dumpy said, they are the worst Italian team ever.”

By then he’d told us his World Cup medal is in the bank (would it not be safer under the mattress?), that he was a “bery lucky man” to own one, and his abiding memory of South Africa would be it’s “bery noisy”.

“These New Zealand guys will feel today every bit as good and as joyous as you did in 1978,” said Darragh Moloney.

“Not so much, don’t exaggerate,” said Ossie. You have to love the fella.

Quick ITV update from the England camp. John Terry addressed the nation and told them that the squad was “disappointed, obviously”. Sorted. Ad break. “Follow England’s World Cup progress with Rio, Tel, Harry and Wrightie, only in the Sun.” Quit chuckling. Right now.

Speaking of chuckling. Apres Match. That interview on the Capital Channel about the economy? "You have a chance to win €100," said our host. "All you have to do is guess who I'm talking to. You've 10 seconds, and those 10 seconds start now."

Hmmm. Give up. “I’m Seán Doherty, in charge of monitoring protocol in the coastal zone management division of the Department of Fisheries,” said the guest, while the breaking news ticker below his chin revealed a cat had been “burnt by exhaust pipe of stationary Honda Civic”. After Kaka’s stomach-wrenching red card we’d needed a smile. That did the trick, nicely.