Rangers stuck on the outside for Uefa’s last convoluted 32-team draw

While Spurs may not have had much to dust and polish lately (yesterday’s Football Daily), not so my family. In the early-1960s, when I thought I wanted to be a comedian, I was booked at a local Lancashire club for a charity night. The place was packed, not for me, but for Denis Law, who was to present a large cheque to the charity. He didn’t turn up, thus denying himself the ‘in appreciation’ gift of a gold-plated Ronson table lighter. I was brought on as substitute. So the local lad got the lighter, which took pride of place on the mantelpiece, and my proud granny took on dusting and polishing duties with great ceremony. When she passed, my mother took a shift with Mr Sheen. I got married, moved to Yorkshire and we persuaded ‘Denis’ to come too. Later still, my wife continued the ‘duty of care’ all the way to Sydney, where the sea air took its toll on Denis, especially since it was many decades since anyone in the household smoked. My wife passed away some years ago, leaving me and Denis in the Blue Mountains of New South Wales, where nobody has heard of Denis Law. He remains a very tarnished conversation piece in the paperweight department. And a memory of a Todmorden Working Men’s club” – Bruce Dennis.

Is it possible that Ange Postecoglou was playing most of the Spurs players at Fulham that he wants to leave, so made a good point if they can’t play in the way he wants?” – John Catton.

As narrative-rich as your piece yesterday undoubtedly was, it either chose to neglect or was shamefully ignorant of the club’s epoch-defining victory over Lion City Sailors in last month’s Tiger Cup. Indeed, it was presumably this major honour that gave Harry Kane the incentive to leave the club having finally delivered silverware to the Lane” – Gareth Patterson.

Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’ the day is … Bruce Dennis.

Uefa is struggling to keep the football world’s focus on its Big Cup draw as the scandal surrounding vice-president Luis Rubiales shows no sign of letting up. “What he did was inappropriate,” tooted its president, Aleksander Ceferin. “We all know it. I hope he knows it was inappropriate. This is enough for the moment because the independent disciplinary bodies will decide.” Pressed on whether Uefa should be taking its own action, he added: “He is suspended from all his functions, everywhere. There is no need to do so twice.”

It’s a case of Raheem Sterling out, Eddie Nketiah in for England’s upcoming matches. “It is a difficult call and Raheem isn’t particularly happy about it,” sighed manager Gareth Southgate, who also found room for Jordan Henderson and Harry Maguire.

Under-fire Germany coach Hansi Flick has ditched Leon Goretzka and Timo Werner from his latest squad, handing Brighton’s Pascal Gross his first call-up. “I am very disappointed with this surprise decision not to be there in September,” fumed Goretzka.

Colombia may be coming off their most successful Women’s World Cup yet, but they’ve still given manager Nelson Abadía the boot.

Manchester City are off to Newcastle in the Milk Cup third round after the draw set up a series of interesting all-top-flight ties. Also in the last 32: Everton, who came from behind late on to win 2-1 at Doncaster and now head to Aston Villa; and Chelsea, who came from behind to win 2-1 at home to AFC Wimbledon. They’ll host Brighton next, when they can presumably save their scouting department some money.

Rotherham have splashed out £1m on a player for the first time, bringing in striker Sam Nombe from Exeter. “We could have loaned a player from a Premier League club, but we want to progress,” cheered boss Matt Taylor.

Spurs are going to duke it out with Bayern Munich for the services of Chelsea’s Conor Gallagher.

Matheus Nunes. £53m. Manchester City. Done.

And Erling Haaland has revealed he goes to bed with his mouth taped shut. “I think sleep is the most important thing in the world,” he yawned. “To sleep good, simple kind of things [like] blue-blocking glasses, shutting out all the signals in the bedroom, I think is really important. Doing a lot of things is not good but doing small things every single day for a longer period really pays off.”

Chelsea’s disdain for matchgoing fans could be part of an ongoing strategy to send the club’s monetisation of themselves and their stars into the stratosphere, reckons Barney Ronay.

“I watched a lot of football and still do. I’m obsessed with the game. Every day I watch two or three matches. I played games with myself. What I would do if I was the coach? How would my team play and how would I react to certain situations?” Cesc Fàbregas writes about how moving into coaching has enabled him to learn new things.

Phil Ball on the “brutally high quality” he encountered when he captained the Basque Country team in the Walking Football World Cup.

And with a day to go until the deadline, a whole load of names, numbers and clubs have been tossed into the Rumour Mill to see what could be happening: among them, Spurs swooping for Eberechi Eze and West Ham picking up four more players.

Happy 30th birthday to Jay-Jay Okocha dancing around the Karlsruhe defence and giving Oliver Kahn nightmares with this iconic Bundesliga goal for Eintracht Frankfurt. Jürgen Klopp has since called it “the most spectacular goal in the history of German football”, while Kahn jokes that it still leaves him “feeling dizzy”. Sit back and enjoy.