Allison and Docherty unite to doctor the peerless past : SIDELINES

The Crystal Palace fan on the front row of the audience had been desperate to ask Malcolm Allison his question all night. He held his arm ramrod straight in the air, like a schoolboy in class, for more than half an hour before he finally caught the eye of the man wandering the aisles carrying a roving microphone.

"What I've always thought about you, Malcolm, is this," he said, as the microphone was thrust under his chin. "I reckon you was the best coach in British football... and the worst manager. What do you say to that?"

Allison looked back in the direction of the sort of verbals which are clearly current round Selhurst Park way and replied: "Yeah, I'd probably have to agree with you on that."

It has become something of a fashion among retired British sportsmen to cast themselves as entertainers, to go out on the road and offer themselves up to their former public in this way. The scam runs like this: hire a theatre, sit on stage for an hour telling anecdotes about your hilarious sporting life, have an interval, then, in the second half, play to the audience's John Motson fantasies by inviting them to ask you questions. And, at the end of the evening, go home with your pension considerably upholstered. Generally this is done in pairs - Ian Botham with Allan Lamb, George Best and Rodney Marsh - although Freddie Trueman goes out on his own which, perhaps, tells its own story.

The latest to jump the gravy chat train are Tommy Docherty and Malcolm Allison or, to give them their stage names, "Mal and The Doc".

"Miles better doing this than doing after dinners," said Docherty before the pair's performance at the Ashcroft Theatre in Croydon earlier this week. "For a start you get to go home early."

"S'right," added Allison, filling his glass from the bottle of Moet perched between them. "And, unlike your dinner work, it gives the punter the chance to ask the question he's always wanted to."

"Like the geezer in Derby," said Docherty. "Remember him, Mal? Asked me if I lived my life again would I do everything the same, or would I spare Derby that time."

Despite a publicity leaflet which promises they are "the funniest double act since Little And Large", the pair seem to be doing rather well at their new trade: the theatre in Croydon was almost full for their "evening of football wit and wisdom". This, like the statement in the programme that "Bobby Moore played his last game for Manchester United in 1973", was clearly a misprint.

Though Docherty in particular had a large portfolio of neatly delivered one-liners ("teenagers today, you have to be careful not to speak to them too quick otherwise they start dancing") this was actually an evening of rose-tinted nostalgia and absurd post-rationalisation.

For an hour, the pair told stories about how marvellous it was in their day. So marvellous, in fact, that Docherty decided to tell a couple of his stories twice. Then for an hour they answered questions about the state of the game, about how much it has deteriorated since their time, when there were better players, better managers, better times. As Docherty put it: "The game today lacks the personalities and characters of our day."

It transpired that what constituted character and personality in the Mal and the Doc orbit appeared to be one of the following: being a fouler ("Jim Holton had one of the best right feet in Britain: didn't know who it belonged to, but he ripped it off somebody"); being a drunk ("some of my Chelsea team in the Sixties, phew, they drank for Great Britain); being a womaniser ("we'll answer any questions you like, on divorce, alimony, we're the experts"); or being insubordinate ("people ask me why I never won the Manager of the Month award: well you've got to be manager for a whole month to win it").

This contrasts with today's game when Vinnie Jones is a thug; when Tony Adams is a criminally drunk driver who should never have been allowed to keep the Arsenal captaincy ("Mind you," said the Doc, "they say he wasn't really drunk when he crashed the car: he just wanted the wall moved back 10 yards"); when Paul Merson should be fired from the game for the appalling example he set; and when the general ill-discipline among players is symptomatic of a society at large which has "gone mad". Oh, and transfer fees have also gone mad.

"Seven million for Cole?" winced Allison. "God, what would Denis Law have fetched these days?" Which was an interesting assertion from someone who once paid £1.5m for Steve Daley.

"I've not fallen out of love with the game," Docherty said afterwards, as the audience left, generally nodding in agreement at the pair's insights. "But frankly I wouldn't care if I never saw another football match."

Probably just as well. If Docherty spent some time in the company of Cantona, Le Tissier, Klinsmann, Shearer or Bryan Roy he might have to rewrite the entire script.