It was also a pleasure for me to sit next to former City great Tony Book at the pre-match lunch.

Older readers will recall he was a stylish right back in the halcyon days of Mike Summerbee (who was also at the lunch), Francis Lee and Colin Bell, and he astonished me with the revelation that he didn’t turn professional until the age of 30, joining Plymouth Argyle from Bath City.

Two years later he moved to the blue half of Manchester and won countless honours. You couldn’t imagine anyone making the grade at such a late stage of their career today, could you ?

TALKING of money, my other weekend assignment took in the Notts County-Wigan game, an equally rumbustious cup-tie, but overshadowed by the threat of extinction hanging over England’s oldest Football League club.

County face a winding up order for £600,000 taxes. They haven’t been able to pay Sven Goran Eriksson, Director of Football, either (he’s on £10m over five years).

Many deride his involvement at Meadow Lane, but he hasn’t missed a game all season – even Sol Campbell’s solitary appearance at Morecambe – and is a regular at training.

The players swear by him, but I still wouldn’t bet against him fleeing the nest and ending up at the World Cup Finals in charge of a Nigeria or even North Korea!

TALKING of players attitudes you might think I was alluding there to a certain Brazilian called Robinho. Well I was.

By the time you read this he might be winging (or should that be whingeing?) back to Santos or some other club willing to take a risk.

Outrageously gifted, he’ll probably be a star at the World Cup finals next summer because he’s a prima donna who only plays on the big stages.

A wet Sunday afternoon in Scunthorpe was not for him.

By all accounts Robinho has been moaning that he should play every week. Roberto Mancini was surely sending him a message in picking him for this match and giving the likes of Carlos Tevez, Shay Given, Gareth Barry and Craig Bellamy a rest.

Does he ever stop to ask himself if maybe he’s the one who’s got it all wrong?

It can be no coincidence that both Mark Hughes and Mancini are selecting other more consistent and reliable talents ahead of him.

The Scunthorpe fans were not far wrong in chanting “What a waste of money” for every one of his faux pas on Sunday.

If I were earning £160,000 a week for scuffing shots and strolling across the park for minutes on end I’d be ashamed of myself.