“This situation is my fault, and it’s obviously embarrassing to my family and me. I'm human and I'm not perfect.”

Nah, this started as embarrassing, Tiges. Now it’s a bit more.

There’s a view from one corner of the Alpha office, that Mike “Senor Cricket” Hussey has “gone”. Not gone to the shops or gone in the head, but whatever it is that made him a dependable rock in the Australian middle-order has left the building, leaving a puzzled, ageing batsman, scratching his way to 20-odd runs off 80-odd balls during a run “chase” against one of the less threatening attacks in the game. Shame, but when it goes it goes. And as the Bucket knows only too well, there’s no getting it back again.

World Cup draw over, there’s been a lot of grumbling and mumbling and pondering in here. Big Mag Alpha will cover the whole thing in expert depth, but the feeling on the floor is that there are four teams in the Socceroos’ group with a reasonable expectation of getting through. Only two can. Does Tim Cahill know how much of our fate rests on his tiny shoulders? There may not be too much pretty football in our three group games, but the tension will be unbearable, you can bet on it.