The Roker Roundup: February 10th 2012 - McClean Snubbed & Bendtner's New Look

Howdy partner. Well I do hope you've enjoyed these evening news bulletins. They've been pretty easy to do from our side of things, and have even found them useful, so we can only hope you have too. We'll be having the weekend off from doing them, but Monday's one will include anything of note from the weekend.

So it's February 10th, and on this day in 1996 a computer beat Gary Kasparov at chess for the first time, in 2005 North Korea announced to the world they do indeed have nuclear weapons, and perhaps bigger than all of that, in 1973, Vic Halom made his debut for the club in a 1-0 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday...

So that's your history, but what's in your present? Here's today's SAFC news...

After plenty of hype and hopefulness, it would appear James McClean's dream of going to the 2012 European Championships with Ireland is all but officially over after he was snubbed by Giovanni Trappatoni in his latest squad announcement. With games running out, it would take a couple of injuries for him to make it now. More - CLICK HERE

That said though, Trap has been talking up McClean in all this. Stating on the record today that whilst he's not in the squad, and unlikely to be in the Euro's, he will be calling him up in the future. Top stuff to hear - CLICK HERE

In what's becoming a little bit of a 'court roundup' rather than Roker Roundup, Titus Bramble has been in court, and denied all charges of sexual assault. Heres hoping he's right to do so. For more - CLICK HERE

For those not at the Riverside on Wednesday, you couldn't help but be annoyed by ITV's coverage of thet game, which tended to revolve around Fabio Capello's resignation, and our game seemingly an inconvenience for them. This blog has summed up the thoughts perfectly - CLICK HERE

John Hartson has been talking about Martin O'Neill, and in fairness it's a very decent read over on Goal.com. Hartson's been singing the praises of our Northern Irish messiah and noting that makes players feel special, and with that they don't want to let him down. Seems to be working so far. There's also comment from Doug Ellis and Ian Marshall too - CLICK HERE

Nicklas Bendtner's returning to action soon, and he's looking better than ever in his new facemask. The buy-one-get-one-free with Simon Mignolet's obviously cma in handy, but to avoid confusion over which one is which, he's handily customised with with flags, numbers and initials. I wouldn't expect anything else from the man of many polo-neck jumpers and pink boots. Wanna see it? - CLICK HERE

To ligten the tone, here is the Sunderland v Arsenal prediction we wished we were clever enough to write, but just simply are not. CLICK HERE