"We had our pants pulled down and our backsides slapped at Old Trafford. But we've come back from getting beaten by Manchester United and I thought the attitude and the application was first class" - Stoke manager Tony Pulis after his side bounced back from a 5-0 defeat to beat West Brom 1-0.

"Spurs had not won any in a long time and I honestly thought at that stage it was going to be the first in a line of successes at the club" - former Tottenham boss Juande Ramos wistfully recalls last season's Carling Cup triumph in an interview with The Times.

"Sometimes you want life to be sweet and rosy. It's great to be alive but sometimes you have to work through the difficult things" - Declan Kidney gets things in perspective as Ireland prepare to face Argentina.

"Do you spend time with your girlfriend? Do you go to the cinema with her? Would you like her to kiss you now and then? That's what Artur has done. I still go to the cinema with my wife. I still kiss her. She doesn't like it, but there you go" - Celtic manager Gordon Strachan makes light of the most recent controversy to surround goalkeeper Artur Boruc and he was photographed in the company of friends, drinking and smoking cigars.

"I think I still have a couple of his studs in my ankle I can give back to him" - West Ham boss Gianfranco Zola on the prospect of coming up against an old adversary from his playing days - Sunderland manager Roy Keane.

"He always tries to have a good relationship with his managers and if you are going to leave he always sacks you nicely." Walter Smith on Rangers chairman Sir David Murray.

"We want to get rid of the senior tour - Hopkins, Calzaghe, Tarver. Tiger Woods did it in golf and now it's Chad's turn" - Boxer Chad Dawson's manager talks up his charge as the next king of the light heavyweight division.

"Personally I don't like them and they'd probably say the same about me" - Ireland's Donncha O'Callaghan reveals the motivation behind his side's win over Argentina.

"Let's do it the other way around - I will ask the questions and you give me the answers. Kevin, why did you miss the goal twice like that? You have got to give me the answer because I really cannot think of anything" - Kevin Kuranyi is lost for words after his poor performance against Borussia Monchengladbach, for which he was booed off the field.

"Back in England, there's a recession on, there's a credit crunch and we've got new year coming up. We've had two of our other world champions, Joe Calzaghe and David Haye, fighting in the space of three weeks, so bearing all that in mind, for so many Brits to come over and support me was fantastic" - Ricky Hatton is delighted at the support he received for his victory over Paulie Malignaggi.

"I told him 'you want to beat these guys, man, you want to continue to beat these guys like Oscar De La Hoya and Floyd Mayweather Jr? You can forget about whupping those kind of guys if you're going to continue that kind of life, drinking and Ricky Fatton and all that'," - Hatton's new trainer Floyd Mayweather Sr lays some new ground rules for the 'Hitman'.

"Forty years ago, America put a man on the moon. So the technology is there" - former Arsenal vice-chairman David Dein on the introduction of goal-line technology.

"I do not sleep with him. Where he was last night? I don't know. I am not a policeman for my players" - Luiz Felipe Scolari can't deny that Didier Drogba played cosy bedfellows with Inter Milan amid rumours of a meeting with representatives of the Italian club.

"It's probably the most prestigious game this club will ever play in" - Tony Adams sets his sights high before Portsmouth's game against AC Milan.

"We like to think that we are a big club and that we can handle defeat.

"It was there for us but our inability to keep a clean sheet has been the downfall in our run away from home - and until we get that sorted things like tonight are possible" - Celtic manager Gordon Strachan, after his team had lost at Aalborg and gone out of all European competition this season - leaving Scotland with no remaining representation.

"There is no celebrity lifestyle. It is an easy stick to beat me with. It was my girlfriend's birthday. You still have to enjoy yourself" - discarded England fly-half Danny Cipriani dismisses suggestions that his career is being hampered by the high life.

"He didn't intend to be malicious, but it put his team under enormous pressure.

"It was a witch hunt - and everything that he did, even when it was good, was bad. In these conditions, the player had no chance" - Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger's take on the remarks made by William Gallas which meant he had to strip him of the Gunners captaincy.

"Yes, you can say that - it has been really tough in the last six months.

"But I've been through difficult moments before, so I know how to get myself out of this" - Didier Drogba, on the tough times at Chelsea, is nonetheless confident he has a gameplan.

"Now we need to beat Cluj - but if I thought my players did not have the quality to beat them at home, then it is better I go back to Brazil and stay there" - Scolari appears confident too, about Chelsea's Champions League prospects.

"What has made it particularly disturbing is the fact that we were going to stop at the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel.

"If we had gone 24 hours earlier then that would be the place where we would have been - so that's really brought it home.

"That would have been the Middlesex team holed up there. It could have been us" - Middlesex captain Shaun Udal's initial reaction to the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, subsequently leading to the postponement of the Champions League, in which the Londoners had been scheduled to take part.

"New Zealand pull their trousers on one leg before the other like the rest of us," England attack coach Brian Smith insists there is nothing special about the All Blacks.