Even the loss of Steve McManaman, who will not be available for either leg having suffered a recurrence of his groin injury, and some pointed questions about his relationship with Andy Cole, failed to disturb the England captain's sense of well-being.Instead he positively glowed with optimism, like a Ready Brek kid after breakfast. Now he is supremely confident, so much so that he happily took Kevin Keegan's place in front of the media yesterday, allowing the England coach to take a break from the relentless build-up to the coming European Championship play-offs.Shearer, who has scored 18 goals this season, looked ahead to the first leg at Hampden Park tomorrow with such relish it almost seemed the Scots might as well not turn up. Since Robson took over at Newcastle United in September, Alan Shearer has rediscovered the art of scoring goals. The impact of this revival has been akin to the effect eating a tin of spinach has on Popeye. Two months ago Shearer saw enemies at every turn and was suspicious and defensive. BOBBY ROBSON may no longer be the England manager but the next six days could show that he has performed one last service for his country. "But if we sign an agreement, we stick to it."It was as close as the phlegmatic 59-year-old came to displaying any sign of tension.

Pressed as to whether he had thought ahead to next Thursday, once it was all over, Brown said: "You won't find me hanging from the rafters or jumping from a bridge. I'll either be very happy or very disappointed, but if we play to our capabilities we'll be very hard to beat.". "I'm used to going into every game as an underdog," he said, "but I always expect to win."Brown, meanwhile, was reluctant to resurrect the David Johnson saga, despite reports that the Ipswich striker was, after all, eligible to represent Scotland. However, that rule is transcended by a written agreement between the four countries, signed in 1993, under which the Jamaican-born player can turn out only for England, his natural mother's birthplace.To fuel the controversy further, there are claims that England unilaterally broke the pact by fielding Jamie McMaster, a Leeds United midfielder who was born in Australia of Scottish parents, in a Uefa Under-16 championship "It would appear that England are unrepentant," Brown said. His understanding is that under Fifa regulations, Johnson's British passport means he can play for any of the UK nations. The Scotland manager has already decided whether the Derby-bound defender will face his former Blackburn colleague, Alan Shearer, yet he has no intention of availing Kevin Keegan of the information. So it was left to the Troon army, the media swarm that descends daily on the squad's retreat on the Ayrshire coast, to pick their way through Brown's cagey comments in search of clues about Hendry. www.skysports.co.uk.

HIS WORDS may have contained an element of bluff, even double or treble bluff, but Craig Brown gave a strong hint yesterday that he will not gamble on the fitness of Scotland's human claymore and captain, Colin Hendry, against England at Hampden Park tomorrow. Hendry's talismanic status with the Scots, not to mention his leadership qualities, have led to Brown allowing him an opportunity to prove his recovery from a knee injury that ordinary mortals might have been denied. These are early days for the technology but we're moving on it. And as the match is not live terrestrial TV and of immense interest, it's a good game to start with."Sky has the rights to show the game only in the UK. The only cost to viewers will be the local call charges to connect to their Internet service provider.The action will be shown via a screen just a couple inches square and is liable to be jerky unless the viewer's computer has a high-speed modem."Realistically it's going to be a standard Internet streaming feed," Andrew Sholl of Sky said yesterday "But then it's not television.

TOMORROW'S EURO 2000 qualifier between Scotland and England will make broadcasting history when it becomes the first football match to be screened live on the Internet. "We will look at it and probably send it off at some stage to the French federation," Gordon said, adding that the New Zealand Rugby Union was also preparing a report after several All Blacks complained of foul play during their semi-final against France. "We'll definitely have a look at their report. It may not be a joint submission with New Zealand, but it will certainly be done in conjunction with them." he said.Gordon said there was no mechanism for sending a complaint to the International Rugby Board because neither the match referee nor the citing commissioner had taken any action during or after the match."We want to say to the French: `You've got a problem in your game and you've got to deal with it'," he said.The Wallaby fly-half, Steve Larkham, who kicked the winning drop goal against South Africa in their semi-final, has returned to Canberra for an operation on his injured knee. AUSTRALIAN OFFICIALS are preparing a dossier on allegations that French players gouged the eyes of Australians during the World Cup final. An ARU spokesman, Strath Gordon, said yesterday that the Australian team doctor John Best had examined players, including the Wallaby captain, John Eales, and was preparing a report.

Arabidopsis could be a very helpful model for modifying plants to increase output, if such techniques are in fact permitted to be used. The writer is professor of biology as applied to medicine at University College London. Recent work on arabidopsis has shown that this is the result of mutations in genes that code for proteins, which activate the growth of the plant when the gibberellin binds to its special receptor, and so results in a dwarf form. The green revolution was based on conventional plant breeding, but it is hard to see why there should be worries if the gene controlling height of the plant had been knocked out by genetic modification (GM) using molecular techniques. There are those in green and anti-GM movements who think that there is no real food shortage in the world, and that famine and hunger are due to grossly unfair distribution of food, and to war. Selecting for such plants enabled farmers to add more fertiliser and get greater yields without the undesirable increase in height. The basis of this reduction in height is the reduced ability of the plant to respond to a growth hormone, gibberellin. One aim of the plant-breeders was to produce dwarf plants whose height was reduced, so they didn't grow tall and fall over, but whose pods stayed just as big. Homeotic mutations convert stamens to petals, and so give larger and more beautiful flowers.