I TRUST Ronan O'Gara. If I needed someone to land a conversion from the touchline with the last kick of a vital game, I'd pick him.

So I guess I should trust him if he tells me to buy a house abroad as well, but it's not exactly his field of expertise, which is why the current ad campaign for Iberian International is so wonderfully bizarre. It's one of those ads that starts and just as you're about to flick the channel you think, "Wait, is that Ronan O'Gara?"

And then 30 seconds later you think, "Wait, is that Ronan O'Gara trying to sell me a dream property in the Mediterranean?" It is you know.

He's sitting on a white-sand beach, squinting into the sun and playing with a rugby ball that has a massive Iberian logo on it, and in general looking terribly pleased at being so far away from the mud of Thomond. And at being able to tell us about this terrific investment opportunity. "When I've got great news, I like to pass it on, " he explains before flinging the ball away.

Don't you see? He's giving us the ball and this is our chance to score (a house in Cyprus)!

The Celtic Tiger has a lot to answer for here. Our most respected sportsmen now tell us of foreign property investment opportunities, where years ago they advertised cures for liver fluke.

Those ads made a bit more sense though. Maybe O'Gara knows lots about buying property but I'll bet Joe Cooney knows more about Ivomec.

Ahh, All Ireland final day ads. They used to always start with an inter-county star hitting a sliotar, then they'd quickly cut to a shot of him carrying two buckets across the yard before a solemn voiceover came in to say, "Joe Cooney, hurler and farmer, uses Ivomec." I wonder if he got paid for those ads or just given a year's supply of Ivomec Pour-on?

Cork's John Fenton (right) featured in a similar ad around the same time, or more accurately his surface-to-air missile goal against Limerick in Thurles in 1987 did. In an ad that lasted little more than 20 seconds they managed to fit the goal in three times, but who's complaining about that when it's one of those moments of sporting genius that leaves you slightly incredulous it ever happened.

If memory serves (since YouTube let me down) the ad also featured Fenton hammering a sliotar through panes of glass that said things like 'fluke' and 'liver fluke' in large black lettering. And at the very end, after the final showing of the goal, they cut to a smiling umpire waving a green flag, clearly in a deserted rural GAA field somewhere and very definitely nowhere near Semple Stadium. Fantastic.

GAA ads are a lot cooler these days of course, less Ivomec, more isotonic. And they seem to be obsessed with water. The Club Energise ads had Henry Shefflin and the lads hurling on a lake, like Jesus going for a puckaround, while the current Lucozade campaign has Colm Cooper taking a free in what appears to be Kerry's monsoon season. If Cooper has to face weather like that in reality before the championship season is over we should all go and buy one of O'Gara's villas.

Adverts for sports drinks are all the rage these days. Apparently top athletes need to stay hydrated. But why? Sure didn't Stephen Roche chase down Pedro Delgado at La Plagne on just a few slices of Galtee cheese? Still though, times change and now modern-day athletes need to watch their dairy intake and cholesterol. "I can't get my handicap any lower, but I can certainly keep my cholesterol down, " as Padraig Harrington tells us with a smile while munching into a slice of bread that had Flora spread on it with a trowel.

In general ads with sportspersons are either kitsch or cool, and if they're anything in between we forget them straight away. The big companies like Nike and Adidas tend to make their protagonists look impressive, all icy glares and slow-motion action, but the kitsch ads are much more fun, like when Denis Hickie goes playing rugby with a piece of Wavin piping. I could go either way on sportswear, but the next time I'm laying piping I know who I'm contacting.

We need more of these kinds of ads.

Let's have Shane Byrne tell us why his barber is the best. Let's have Ciaran McDonald dispute it. Paul O'Connell's pyramid scheme, Damien Duff 's ergonomic pillows, Bernard Dunne's tractor hire, whatever, it's more interesting than David Beckham flogging us aftershave.

And dammit, somewhere in the country there must be a hurler/farmer just itching to do an Ivomec ad on All Ireland final day.