There wasn’t much to smile about in those medieval times of yore. Have a look at an old wood carving, for instance, and you don’t see folk beaming from ear to ear.

It’s hardly surprising. If you weren’t being cleft in twain by a boggle-eyed brute with a battle axe then you were being drowned in the village pond for heresy. Similarly grisly procedures continue to this day in the broom cupboard of the SFA compliance officer after a damning disciplinary hearing.

This week, in the shimmering surrounds of Scone Palace, the fun, finesse and general merriment of life in the Middles Ages will be celebrated when 500 competitors descend on Perthshire for the International Medieval Combat World Championships.

At nearby McDiarmid Park, meanwhile, St Johnstone and Ross County players will perform their own re-enactments of primitive, murderous clatterings on the final day of the Ladbrokes Premiership. Forget a set-piece, a cod piece may prove more effective.

It’s been quite a week for the Scottish game. Craig Levein and Brendan Rodgers have been embroiled in the kind of petty squabble you used to get during an AGM at the Lawn Society as they bickered over the length of the Tynecastle grass, Neil Lennon and Willo Flood both went into meltdown mode and it was revealed that Kilmarnock’s Jordan Jones had been sidelined with a twisted testicle.

Jeesh just doesn’t do that last one justice . . . 

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The bare necessities. Mark Williams celebrated his World Snooker Championship win over John Higgins by appearing for his winner’s press-conference with no clothes on.

Goodness knows what whispering Ted Lowe would’ve made of it. “For those of you watching in black and white, it’s behind the pink.” Or words to that effect.

Higgins went down fighting as the Wishaw Wizard delighted the crowds with his wand. Or was that Williams?

The longest ice hockey game in the 82-year history of the American Hockey League finished on Thursday having spanned two days and over six hours of play while featuring five periods of overtime and almost 150 shots on goal.

The Lehigh Valley Phantoms finally beat the Charlotte Checkers 2-1 as the coach bellowed a tactical masterstroke. “C’mon boys, get yer bloody skates on.”

The Claret Jug. Five and a bit pounds of solid silver that’s, er, worth its weight in gold. The diarist was reminded of the spelling error on the Golf Champion Trophy.

When Fred Daly won the Open in 1947, the engraver mistakenly etched Holylake as the venue instead of Hoylake.

Meanwhile, Celtic fans who still revel in the liquidation of their old city rivals reckon the spelling of Rangers is constantly wrong.

All aboard for Russia 2018. Each nation at this summer’s World Cup will have an inspiring slogan emblazoned on the the side of their official team bus which fans can vote for from a short list on the FIFA website.

Oor neighbours England, for example, could see their coach bedecked with the phrase “send us victorious.” Let’s hope not.

As for absent Scotland? Well, there is a rusting double-decker forlornly parked up at the old Larkfield Bus Depot with the words “sorry, I’m not in service” displayed on it. A passing Graeme Murty saw it and was quite relieved. It’s the only bus he’s not been thrown under ...

It feels like déjà vu all over again. On this day in 1925, the great Yogi Berra was born.

Celebrated as much for his contributions to the American language as his shimmering baseball feats, Berra’s peculiar pearls of wisdom remain cherished.

“Even Napoleon had his Watergate”, “he hits from both sides of the plate, he’s amphibious”, “you better cut the pizza in four pieces because I’m not hungry enough to eat six”, “the future ain’t what it used to be”...

One of the diarist’s colleagues once used a Berra blethering in a piece and mistakenly called him Yogi Bear. You could say it was something of a Boo Boo.