"Hello Michel, Raymond Smith from the Sunday Independent in Ireland. Good to meet you, I just wondered if you had a few minutes to talk about next week's match against Ireland in Paris? It won't take long and I hope you don't mind, but before we go on I just want to make sure? Do you speak English?"

And Platini, so the story goes, took a drag on his Gitane, blew the smoke in the air and replied, "Yes. Do you?"

CATTY COMMENTS UNFAIR ON TOP CAT Poor DJ. Bad enough for him to be confined to the "And those we'd leave on the bench" sidebar in the Tribune Magazine's feature on sexy Irish sportsmen last Sunday.

And as for the addendum that "the Kilkenny colours wouldn't do much for anyone". . . Don't worry, DJ . Sideline Cuts knows those who contributed to the feature.

Some of them are the last people who should be condemning the dress sense of others.

AMERICANS ARE READY TO PLAY BALL Major extravaganza of handball coming up in Cavan next weekend (10-11 February), when seven of the top alley artists from the US will descend on Kingscourt for a tournament partly sponsored by Martin Donnelly. Among them is Naty Alvarado junior, the American number one who will be gunning for revenge after losing to Cavan's Paul Brady on home turf in California last year.

Brady, who is to handball what Roger Federer is to tennis, will spend part of next weekend lining out against Wicklow in the NFL on Saturday. Let's hope the effort doesn't take too much out of him.