Is he really asking me this? Portugal coach Paulo Bento

Winds of change

Some good news from Gdansk, where the decline of the shipbuilding industry decimated a yard that once employed 20,000 people. The birthplace of the Solidarity movement in 1980, the yard is now back in action making turbines for wind farms.

Really, Andrei?

Former Manchester United winger Andrei Kanchelskis made his fortune in England but clearly has no love left for our game. Ukrainian-born, he offered this damning assessment on tomorrow night’s quarter-final with Italy. ‘Both teams are equal, both teams are bad,’ he scoffed.

Thumbs up for...

The Germans. Recognising that one English journalist had attended seven of their press conferences here, they arranged for defender Mats Hummels to sit down with four UK writers ahead of last night’s quarter-final. Class, that.

Thumbs down for...

Portuguese legend Luis Figo. You may be famous but when an airline assistant gets you out of a pickle at the automatic check-in machine it is customary to say thank you. What a rude man.

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