1. Rami’s dirty dancing results in foot fault

When Valencia let blister-blighted Adil Rami travel to an April fundraiser at former club Lille, they might have expected the French centre-back to put his feet up. Instead, the 27-year-old leapt to the stage to dance to Gangnam Style, infecting his wound and missing the next three games. “What an idiot,” trilled one disgruntled Che fan, accurately.

Adil Rami

"Adil Rami, he plays when he wants"

 

2. One in the eye for Jari

He was standing next to Malmo’s sporting director, who opened a can of Coke and the top popped into Jari’s eye

- Roy Hodgson

Fitness concerns, heart complications and Ricardo Batista missiles “struck from four yards away” – Jari Litmanen’s six months at Fulham in 2008 yielded zero appearances. “When I first went to the Finnish FA,” recalled then-Cottagers boss Roy Hodgson, explaining the Finn’s bad luck, “he was standing next to Malmo’s sporting director, who opened a can of Coke and the top popped into Jari’s eye.”

3. Richard makes a Wright idiot of himself

It’s the 2006 FA Cup fourth-round replay between Everton and Chelsea and Toffees keeper Richard Wright walks serenely onto the Stamford Bridge pitch to warm up. Ignoring a sign telling him not to practise in the goalmouth, the hapless stopper promptly falls over said notice and twists his ankle. Three years earlier, Wright had damaged his shoulder falling through his loft. His middle name is not, in fact, Clouseau.

Richard Wright

A season at Ipswich aside, Wright's barely played since injuring his ankle in 2006

 

4. “But I had toothache – why would I put it up there?”

Brazilian midfielder Ramalho had a hurty fang, so he went to the dentist and swallowed the pill he was given. Unfortunately the tablet was a suppository and he spent the next three days in bed. For all the good it did him, he may as well have shoved it up his arse.