When will I be famous?

When was the last time Arsenal played a Champions League game on terrestrial television?

Early Doors reckons they have not been on at all this season, their last appearance coming in last year's quarter-final against Liverpool, when they were presumably deemed worthy of ITV1 by dint of being the other team in a Liverpool tie.

Anyway, for those Gooners still using a traditional telly with a bent coathanger sticking out the top, life must be a little frustrating.

Arsenal have played on the same night as Manchester United all this season, meaning ITV make the lazy assumption that more people will want to watch Clive Tyldesley's brave boys, even if they are playing Aalborg.

Admittedly, it is a lazy assumption based on extensive study of ratings and decades of experience, but it doesn't make it any easier to bear for any analogue Gooners.

Arsenal can be particularly galled today because their trip to face Villarreal in Spain looks a good deal more interesting that United at home to Porto, although both fixtures are a little bit old hat.

Not as much as Liverpool v Chelsea, of course, but the two ties have been done before.

Only the potentially excellent Barcelona v Bayern Munich tie seems fresh, and even they have almost certainly played before, just without ED noticing.

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One reason to tune in to the United game is the possible appearance of Federico Macheda, who has been subjected to more unwarranted hype than Lady Gaga since his goal on Sunday.

Last week he could have gone on a drunken rampage through Manchester city centre and nobody would have recognised him - they would probably have assumed he was a Rangers fan who never made it home - now we are supposed to believe he is the new Ruud van Nistelrooy (or, as our poll suggests, the new Ole Gunnar Solskjaer).

Yesterday, Early Doors saw Macheda's goal replayed roughly 3,000 times on Sky Sports News, who showed it so frequently they must have been taking part in some wacky charity challenge to get as many Aston Villa players as possible to gouge their own eyes out.

Then came the live shots of him at training, narrated with a giddy breathlessness befitting, say, Nelson Mandela's release from Robben Island.

Here he is! In real time! A man who 48 hours ago we thought was a youthful groundsman! Now he's talking to Paul Scholes! I wonder what they are saying! Fascinating!

Basically, the world has become heartily sick of Macheda even though the poor lad has only played 29 minutes of first-team football.

Source: Eurosport