If it stands, the quickest he could return to the international side would be the second game of the 2002 World Cup finals, assuming the Scots qualify. His worst scenario is a wait of up to two years if the Scots finish third or lower in their qualifying group as he would then have to miss three European Championship qualifiers. Hendry was found guilty of having elbowed San Marino's Nicola Albani in the throat.The Italian Football Federation yesterday charged Roma and two of the club's former players, the Brazilian Fabio Junior and the Argentinian Gustavo Bartelt, with allegedly using false documents to circumvent league limits on foreign players.The Federation accused Fabio Junior, who now plays for the Brazilian team Palmeiras, of using an irregular Portuguese passport so he could be registered as a European Union player. Bartelt, who is on loan at the Spanish club Rayo Vallecano, is accused of obtaining an Italian passport by submitting false claims showing he had Italian ancestors.. So, Pat Rice, it is May 1971, your Arsenal team have just beaten Liverpool in the FA Cup final to complete the Double and someone tells you the teams will meet again in the 2001 final, at Cardiff, each with a French manager. What would your reaction be? Ars? Wenger's assistant did not need long to consider the question before replying: "I'd say you're crazy". So, Pat Rice, it is May 1971, your Arsenal team have just beaten Liverpool in the FA Cup final to complete the Double and someone tells you the teams will meet again in the 2001 final, at Cardiff, each with a French manager.

What would your reaction be? Ars? Wenger's assistant did not need long to consider the question before replying: "I'd say you're crazy". Then again, 30 years ago, the possibility of the Gunners sacking their manager for taking a bung, paying £13m for a striker or leaving Highbury for a larger stadium would have seemed a tad unlikely as well. And as for the team's star midfielder (a Frenchman, naturally) describing a season in which they were second in the League, Cup finalists and European Cup quarter-finalists as "average", well... These days, at the age of 52, with 31 years of service to Arsenal in two spells behind him, Rice must sometimes feel he has seen it all.He has not, of course, which is one of the reasons he pulls on his track-suit with such relish every morning alongside the French manager. Superficially, they make an odd couple, the down-to-earth Belfast boy whose accent is still almost as pronounced as when he first arrived in north London, and the cosmopolitan economics graduate from Strasbourg University; interestingly, Liverpool, with G?rd Houllier and Phil Thompson, have chosen exactly the same combination of footballing man of the world and passionate former captain and loyalist.There is little doubt, either, about which members of those respective pairings will be making most noise during Saturday's game.

"I've never heard him shout," Rice said of Wenger, before correcting himself. "Oh, once, at Manchester this season, the only time I've ever seen him really, really have a go." That was the infamous occasion on which Arsenal ­ without Tony Adams, Martin Keown and Lee Dixon ­ trooped back to the dressing-room at half-time 4-0 down to Manchester United. The players, as shocked by Wenger's outburst as by the scoreline, recovered a little pride in the second half.In retrospect, the combination is not so different from 1971, when the headmasterly demeanour of Bertie Mee contrasted with that of his rasping Black Country deputy, Don Howe. For Rice, that was the first of no fewer than eight FA Cup finals as a player and coach, a more memorable one for what it signified than for the drama or the quality of the game, which many observers described as the worst final since the war (they should have waited for Arsenal's bore-war against Leeds 12 months later).Having won the League at Tottenham, of all places, five days earlier, Arsenal were in a position to match their neighbours' achievement in recording the only previous modern Double. The chance appeared to have been snatched away at the start of extra-time when Liverpool's Steve Heighway went past Rice down the left and beat Bob Wilson at his near post. "I remember it was blistering hot and when they scored I was feeling really tired," Arsenal's right-back recalled. "I was so deflated but Frank McLintock, our captain, picked the team up.

Then we had the controversial equalising goal ­ did Eddie [Kelly] or George [Graham] score it? ­ and then Charlie [George] hits the winner. Frank said he was the only one with the strength left to hit a shot like that because he'd done sod-all during the game." By the time of Arsenal's three successive finals from 1978-80 (two defeats, one victory) Rice had succeeded McLintock as captain, drawing on his vocal and motivational style of leadership.Wembley or not, and even after seven previous finals (one of them as Watford's right-back in 1984) Pat Rice's chest will be swelling with pride at 3pm on Saturday and his contribution to Arsenal's performance will be as committed as ever. If there is a microphone in the usual close proximity to the dug-outs, listen out The players will have no option.. The Middlesbrough manager, Bryan Robson, has revealed that he will sit down with Terry Venables and the club's chairman, Steve Gibson, to work out the former England coach's future at the Riverside.