Spitting...

Jamie Carragher, ex-Liverpool player and, until yesterday, a Sky pundit, was caught on-camera spitting at the occupant of another car, while both cars were travelling along a main road. A 14-year-old girl, in the passenger seat, was the target of his spittle. Once the video clip had been posted online, Carragher apologised unreservedly for his action, though he fluffed his lines when he said that although he knew the passenger was female, he didn’t realise she was only 14 years old.

Why do people do something as horrible as this and then insist, once they’ve been found out, that “it doesn’t reflect who I really am”?

Spitting at someone is the ultimate insult. I heard Robbie Savage, on Radio 5 Live, say that he didn’t mind being “clattered’ in a heavy tackle, but was mortified when another player spat in his face. I’m not sure why spitting is so uniquely offensive; it just is. And everyone is aware of this, including Jamie Carragher, who has also been on the receiving end. In a column in the Daily Mail in 2015, Carragher wrote: “I was spat at once in my career. It came during a Uefa Cup game against Celta Vigo in 1998 and the player in question was a Russian midfielder called Aleksander Mostovoi. I was shocked more than angry when he did it because I couldn’t believe what had happened.”

Spitting at an opponent or any other person, on the field of play, is seen by the FA as a sending-off offence. Sky have suspended Carragher from his million pound a year role as a pundit. But that’s a yellow card… and it should have been a red…

Not much of a shot - a nondescript barn in Swaledale - but someone thought it met their needs, because it was licensed today, for a better-than-usual price...