Like many I’m sure, the late Gianluca Vialli came to my notice as part of Sampdoria’s strikeforce alongside Roberto Mancini in the eighties and early nineties. Those who don’t realise soccer existed before Sky mightn’t know what I’m on about, but back in those days the Welsh station S4C was beamed into places like Butlerstown from Billy Kirwan’s deflector system in the Comeragh Mountains. The Cymru operation showed Serie A soccer four years before Channel 4’s Football Italia.

Sadly, succumbing to pancreatic cancer at age 58, Luca’s soft-spoken, open, good-humoured, and intelligent personality complemented his stunning skill and power. He came from Cremona, that part of the Po Valley where Celtic tribe the Cenomani settled in 400 BC. An artistic mecca, it’s known as Italy’s ‘City of Violins’. They would have played a mournful tune last week.

I’ll always have a soft spot for the latter-day Juventus and Chelsea legend for another reason. Luca made being bald fashionable, and while I was a bit tardy getting to the beard, it’s staying put.

Numbskull Anthony Stokes appears to have a fine thatch these days, though it looks suspiciously more like a combover. Prematurely balding and his value receding, the much-travelled ex-Ireland striker spent some of his wealth on a hair transplant. His latest (alleged) travails with the law recalls the old rural adage “Grass never grew on a busy road.”