Look who's back

Apparently, yesterday some chap called Damien Duff put in a devastating shift in a pre-season friendly match against Hartlepool, scoring a hat-trick in a 4-1 win. Anyone know anything about him? Certainly can't remember a winger in black and white called Damien taking on his man and finding the back of the net...

In his post-match interview King Kev said he's fully fit for the first pre-season in four years, and has got his weight down to what it was as a teenager. Credit to Duff for knuckling down - there's nothing like the pressure of having James Milner, Charles N'Zogbia and new man Jonas Guttierez breathing down your neck, it seems.

Mention must also be made of Danny Guthrie, who within eight minutes of coming on for Jose Enrique at half-time, had set up Duff's second and scored the third himself (albeit with the help of a deflection and some charitable goalkeeping). Before we get too excited, though, we'd do well to remember who also scored on his debut last pre-season...