Ask the Gaffer - football trivia

Got a football trivia question bugging you? Ask The Gaffer and he'll answer the best trivia teasers each day. Send in your trivia question below and include your name and location.

If you're an Orange mobile customer you can also get a free trivia question by text from the Gaffer every Monday. Text Gaffer to 247 to receive a free SMS linking to Orange World's 'Ask The Gaffer' section.

Here are the latest answers to your best trivia questions:

Mark, Ferrybridge: Which team lost fair and square in the second round of the FA Cup yet still went on to play in the third round? What was the year? What was the reason?
The Gaffer: This occured in the 1999/2000 competition. Darlington were beaten by Gillingham but as Manchester United didn't take part in the competition because they were involved in the World Club Championship, The Quakers were picked as the 'lucky loser' and pitched against Aston Villa in the third round. They lost 2-1 at Villa Park.

Ian, Doncaster: Is my source correct in saying that my team Doncaster Rovers hold the record for most wins and most losses in a season?
The Gaffer: Yes! 33 wins in a 1946/47 but 34 defeats in 1997/98.

Peter McKenna: Which current Premiership club did Diego Maradona once play for?
The Gaffer: This is obviously a trick question - did he play for a team as a one-off in some sort of charity fixture?

Harbour Bar: Dozens of English League teams have 2 'O's in their name but only 3 have 3 - who?
The Gaffer: Stockport County, Brighton and Hove Albion, Northampton Town

Darren, Portsmouth: Who is the only player to lift the Scottish Cup and FA Cup?
The Gaffer: Martin Buchan for Aberdeen in 1970 and Man United in 1977.

Glasgow Geordie: Alright gaff, mint page this - keeps distracting me from work. Could you let me know if Paul Ince has played in a North East derby, Manchester derby, Liverpool derby, London derby and Milan derby. And what has happened to the Geordie legend Tony Green - he could have been one of the best!
The Gaffer: Yes, Ince has played in each and every one of those derbies. Joe Harvey said of Green: "It was the saddest day of my life. He was my very best buy." Green's now a maths teacher in Lancashire.

Me: Has anyone ever scored directly from a throw in?
The Gaffer: Hello Me, it is against the laws of football to score direct from a throw-in.

To look back at the 'Ask The Gaffer' archive, click here.

Johnno on... World Cup final heartache

Hello everyone. Obviously I've just seen England lose the final to South Africa. I'm so disappointed for all the players as they had a chance to do it.

We gave South Africa the first six points and we couldn't afford to do that. If you take two of those out of the ball-game, we're right in there. At 9-6 we still could have gone on to win, but then we concede again so it's 12-6. But that penalty award to make it 15-6 was very iffy. That was a killer one for us. Once they got to nine points ahead, they could sit back and defend and kick the ball into touch because their line-out was never under pressure. But I thought we had just about enough territory and possession to make it a bit more difficult for them.

The big talking point was the Mark Cueto try. I've only watched it on a monitor 15 yards away, but his left foot did look like it touched the line. But anyway, he's not given it - you can't keep harping on about it. I thought the far worse decision was that penalty at 12-6 - that was a huge sway in the game.

South Africa have now won two World Cup finals without scoring a try. We got to the final by only scoring twice in the knockout stage. Games aren't always won by tries. You saw today it was won by a team with a very good kicking game, lineout and defence. It's very difficult to break these sides down. We defended pretty well for most of the game and they didn't make many breaks.

You've got to very proud of what that team has achieved, but we had a genuine chance to win it. All the players were genuinely disappointed - they weren't happy to just have played in a close final.

Looking forward, the RFU need to put in place the right coaching team to make sure we get the most out of our team. The good thing about this tournament is that we've got some guys like Toby Flood, Dan Hipkiss and Matthew Tait who have now had the experience of playing in the biggest game in the world. Some guys are at the end of their careers and there will obviously be a big transition.

But remember, we were 10 points shy of winning the World Cup - just imagine what it might have been like if we had got it right the last three or four years...

The final: no advice necessary

I won’t be giving Phil Vickery any advice as he prepares to lead England out in the final at the Stade de France on Saturday.

I didn’t give a team talk before the 2003 final. Team talks are over-rated. These guys will have been talking all week about what needs to be done. They'll be talking specifics, about all the little points in the game that will make all the difference.

They're in a World Cup final so you don't have to say too much. If we can put constant and relentless pressure on South Africa, not let them have anything easily and don't let them get too comfortable too quickly and keep playing into that last ten minutes then we have more than a chance.

We cannot give them points easily. One huge, last effort is what the players will be asking of each other. The start is absolutely vital, as is the period before half time. That was when Australia scored against us and that was the most dangerous point against the French in terms of them doing something, but they changed their game slightly and stopped piling in, letting us hang in there until half time.

They have got to stay in the game and make South Africa go the distance. That's the key. I'm not necessarily expecting another tight encounter without much running rugby. I think both teams have achieved the right balance whether to keep the ball or go into wider areas of the field. I expect both teams to do it on occasion. It's just picking the right moment. South Africa have got Habana, Pietersen and Montgomery, we've got Robinson and Sackey, so if there are chances to give those guys the ball in space obviously both teams will do it and pull the trigger. It's just finding that space. In tight Test matches that space is not always easy to find.

I think the guy we really need to shut down on is Fourie du Preez, their scrum-half. He's a big playmaker for them and hurt us in the group game. We'll need to have pressure on him. If that pressure can get past the line to Butch James then all the better. We certainly can't let du Preez make those runs across the defensive line and then make breaks or put people into gaps because that can be lethal. As we've seen they can go 50, 60, 70 yards really quickly.

Putting pressure on their forward pack and around the fringes, not letting du Preez get quick ball in his hands and running with it, that's all key for us.

England's spirit has been the key

We're now just a few days away from the World Cup final. There's been a lot of talk this week about how England have achieved this extraordinary renaissance since being thrashed by South Africa in the group stages. My answer would simply be 'look at the players'.

They've sat down and said 'Right, let's sort this out'. They've decided, 'we can either go out of the tournament without a whimper or we go out and give it a go and make ourselves difficult to beat'. That's been good enough to win them the last four games.

I don't know why people are searching for some sort of magical button that's been pressed. It's down to the attitude of the players.

A lot of people have been hopping on the back of the bandwagon in the last week or so. Obviously the coach has helped but it's the team that have got themselves back in it. You have a point after you've lost 36-0 when you come out fighting or you disappear.

As for England's preparations this week, it's just about the detail; doing specific work on their play, set piece and line-outs. A lot of the week is mental, getting themselves in the right frame of mind. It won't be a big physical week for either team.

England may have exceeded expectations already but once you're in the final that changes. The expectation this week will be higher than it has all tournament because you're in the final and people will want to come over and watch England win. It's as simple as that.

The level of expectations is certainly more on South Africa as they're favourites but we just showed in the last three games that when you're in a match you have a chance regardless of the opposition. Can we do it for a third week on the trot? Hopefully we can.

England have made just one change, with Mark Cueto coming in for Josh Lewsey. It's very tough on Josh but these things [injuries] happen in rugby, unfortunately.

Mark has not played a game for a long time so that is possibly an issue but obviously it's a World Cup final so Mark just has to slot in there and do a job. I'm sure the Springboks will try to give him a high ball early on to test him out.

I'll be back on Friday with my thoughts when I'll be focusing on exactly how England can beat the Springboks and retain the Webb Ellis Trophy.

Johnno on...England's win over France

Greetings after another night of glory for England. We're in the final after a hard-earned victory over France - and what a night it was in Paris.

So how have Brian Ashton's side done it? We've had two games now that have gone pretty much just how England wanted them to go.

We had to get a good start, and we did just that through Josh Lewsey's try. But France bounced back and led at half time. There were so many critical periods when they came back into the game. They made headway when they held on to the ball, but then they stopped doing it. They started kicking.

It was a strange game in some ways. The French became very cautious, and I thought they could have pressed home their advantage, but our defence held.

They started to kick desperately and Jason Robinson made a few comfortable marks. One of the key moments came with the cross-kick in the second half, when we kept them out with some great tackles.

Then Jonny Wilkinson kicked a penalty and England were back in the game. France brought on Michalak but he didn't make much of an impact. And Chabal having to come on fairly early in the first half was a big factor in upsetting the French at that stage.

When England's replacements came on they did really well, with Hipkiss impressing at 13. He and the others who came off the bench gave England the boost they needed in the second half. And I thought Sackey was one of our best defenders.

As for Jonny, he was probably beaten in the kicking game out of hand, but when the chances came late on with the penalties and drop goal, he took them.

You can talk tactics all day, but when it comes to the crunch the guys have to go out there and make it happen. England did that in another gutsy display.

France, Australia and New Zealand will all be sitting back and kicking themselves, no doubt thinking that they're better teams than England.

But we're in the final once again. It's amazing - and I can't wait for next Saturday.

Johnno on... holding your nerve

Hi, not long to go now. England are just one game away from another final.

This is a wonderful match to look forward to; France in Paris, in a World Cup semi-final, a repeat of four years, all the history of England-France games…

Having said all that, you can’t get carried away with the magnitude of the occasion. You’re losing the point. You must treat it as another game of rugby, achieve your basic aims and go from there. You can’t be worrying about the fact that it’s a World Cup semi-final. You’re playing France, 'what do you need to do to beat them?' That’s what you’ve got to worry about.

The build-up will be immense and the atmosphere will be incredible. Both teams will be nervous, but it’s controlling that anxiety and turning that into a performance.

France will be in a very good frame of mind psychologically after winning in Cardiff, but it was do or die for them. To go out of your own World Cup in the quarter-final would not have been nice and they turned in a great performance. But now they’re back at home and just one game away from the final so if England can turn that into frustration and desperation, that could be crucial.

Johnno on... how England can win

Hello again. So how can England beat France? Easy - they need to do exactly what they did against Australia.

England must stay close to them on the scoreboard, put them under pressure and make them feel nervous in the last 20 minutes. The French and their fans won’t like a close last quarter. It’s anyone’s game then as we’ve seen with Fiji-Wales, England-Australia and France-New Zealand.

Australia didn’t have an edge to their game last week, but we got on top of them psychologically and physically. Any team, if you let them play, will look class and they’ll kill you. We’ve just got to be on top of them. If you let them attack you and gain momentum, the crowd will be in the game and before you know it you will be facing waves of attackers. If we slow the breakdown and turn them over, France will get frustrated.

I think some people look at England games and see that Jonny Wilkinson has kicked the goals and assume he’s won us the game. But last week each guy contributed massively to the win. When we made a mistake, we scrambled back and made sure it didn’t become points that often. When you’re playing good players you know that they will make breaks and turn you over, but you’ve just got to make sure they don’t really hurt you.

I'll be back tomorrow with more thoughts on the big game.

Johnno on... the build-up to France

Hi everyone, I’m not surprised Brian Ashton has named an unchanged team for the semi-final.

I thought he might bring Olly Barkley onto the bench just because of his experience, but I think with what England have been through, you get to the point where the guys deserve to play because of what they did in the last game. Brian almost said that himself.

Unless there was a compelling reason to change things, you would have to go with the same team. The team has been changed so many times recently so it’s refreshing that Brian has just said to the same men, ‘Go out there and do it again’.

Our subs worked pretty well against Australia. We got them on pretty early in the second half and didn’t wait until it was too late for the guys to have an impact and it kept the pace of the game high. Hopefully the same tactics can be applied on Saturday night.

Although nobody should underestimate France, I do think England will be happier to be facing them rather than New Zealand. The All Blacks may be out, but they have had the best playing record in the world since the last World Cup - they lose very few games.

I see Jeff Probyn is hoping for a France victory because he feels they will have more chance of beating South Africa in the final and keeping the World Cup in the northern hemisphere. If that’s his thoughts then fine - what will be will be. Nobody can safely predict the outcome of these two games though. England have got a real chance though.

Johnno on... sensational Aussie win

Hello everyone. I hope all you England fans are as pleased as I am after seeing that amazing win over Australia.

I wasn't too nervous watching on. You knew that both sides would have the opportunity to win it in those latter stages and it was going to be whoever held their nerve would win. A few of the England players said it wasn't a pretty game but that is Test match rugby at the highest level - it's tense. It was a great game of rugby to be at.

Everyone in the team did their job, everyone put in a serious 80 minutes of effort. I don't think you can pick out one man for special attention. True, the front row played particularly well, but everyone on the pitch could say they produced at key moments.

Australia have said a lot this week about England not being a world-class team and I think they've almost talked themselves into thinking they would win it comfortably. We had more try-scoring opportunites than them even though they got the only score. Even in winning 12-10, we left about 12 points on the field.

Australia's scrummage game is not the strongest but you have to make that a factor. Today it was a huge factor in terms of turnovers and pressure. We got more turnovers than in all four of the previous games put together. We were so much better at the breakdown. In the second half, they didn't score a point. We played most of the second half not in our third and were much better on the penalty count. We got on the right side of the ref which became a factor.

We still had a pretty high error rate particularly from the pass but we were just so resilient. We moved the ball and held on to the ball pretty well and caused them some problems and defensively we got better as the game went along. We were working very well off the ball and snuffing out a lot of their attacks and making them look pretty disorganised.

We'll probably have to score two tries at least to beat the All Blacks, assuming they beat France, and break that 20-point barrier. England will not get the dominance at the scrum, they will have to reduce the error count, take opportunities when they are there and defend even better than they did today. We are capable of that sort of performance.

It's going to be a good night. Marseille is absolutely packed full of fans. When you don't think you're going to win, it makes it even more special.

Johnno on... the crunch quarter-final

Hello again - the moment of truth beckons for England as they prepare for their quarter-final against Australia.

This is a massive game for all sorts of reasons, but it's going to be tough for us to repeat our success of the 2003 final.

So how should Brian Ashton's side go about their job? England have a strong scrum, which is an important part of the game. But it's not going to win us the match if other parts of our game aren't up to scratch. To be honest, I think they'll also have to play well in every other area. Defensively we need to be faster getting forward and getting into people. Lewis Moody showed some real urgency and speed in defence against Tonga, and that's why he's in the starting line-up again.

We're going to have to be competitve at the breakdown, and we need to win more turnover ball. That's going to be crucial.

I think England can win, but our error count has to be lower than it has been so far in the tournament. If it isn't, the Wallabies will punish us, no question. I don't believe we can concede more than one try and win this game. If we concede a couple of tries, then we're in big trouble. And we need more things to go right than the Australians do.

We need to make things uncomfortable for them physically - with the pace of the game we play, the physicality of our game, the pressure of our defence, our set-piece play - all these have to be in good order to squeeze the Wallabies out of the zone they want to be in.

But it's not going to be easy. Australia will attack our midfield. That's why it's important that we need to be at our best defensively, and to be more competitive at the breakdown.

People love these England v Australia clashes, and I'm really looking forward to it. I'll enjoy it even more if England can raise their game and reach the semi-finals. Whatever the outcome, I'll be back to give my verdict over the weekend.

Johnno on... Six Nations failures

Hi there - as England and Scotland prepare for their quarter-finals, Wales and Ireland are left to lick their wounds after suffering early exits from the World Cup.

Wales didn't waste much time in getting rid of Gareth Jenkins after Fiji put them out of the tournament. The harsh truth is that if you don't reach the quarter-finals, your coach is under real pressure. Yes he went very quickly and there was talk of player-power, but I don't know if there were things going on that we on the outside don't know about.

I haven't heard anything on the grapevine as to who the next Wales coach might be. Wales always seem to be starting again; they never seem to have two or three years of continuity.

As for Ireland, I was surprised at their level of performance. They didn't play well in what was the toughest of groups. If they'd been in the same group as England, Scotland or Wales they would probably have qualified for the quarter-finals.

Eddie O'Sullivan has got a four-year deal and the Irish RFU say they're going to back him. Ireland have had one of their most successful sides in modern times and it would be a bit harsh to get rid of O'Sullivan now.

But the World Cup has become all-important. You can have two or three years of good rugby then a bad run in the World Cup and people will be calling for your head. It happened to Clive Woodward in 1999 when we lost in the quarter-finals, but the English RFU stuck with him and four years later we won the trophy.

Johnno on England's quarter-final line-up

So Andy Farrell's back in England's starting line-up at inside centre and Jason Robinson returns from injury for what should be a cracking quarter-final against Australia on Saturday.

I thought Brian Ashton might bring Farrell back in midfield because they need someone who can get them going forward and over the gain line. They didn't really play off Olly Barkley very much against Tonga - whether that was his fault or just the way the team played, I'm not too sure.

But Farrell has more of a physical presence and I'm not surprised he's back in, especially as he kicks with his right foot, giving England a right-left combination between him and Jonny Wilkinson.

But I'm a bit surprised that Mark Regan is back in at hooker for George Chuter. I think George added something to the team when he came in, and his line-out play has been pretty good.

Maybe they think Regan is a stronger scrummager and they're trying to pressurise the Wallabies' scrum. And maybe they'll bring George on later in the game when there's more space for him to run into. With Phil Vickery, Andrew Sheridan and Regan starting in the front row, England will be hoping to exert pressure and control early on.

Australia used not to have the greatest of scrums but they've improved that part of their game in recent years so it will be interesting to see what happens on Saturday.

I'm glad that Lewis Moody is starting at open-side flanker again. I thought he played himself into the team with his performance against Tonga.

It's good to see Robinson back in at full-back, and I'm not surpised that Josh Lewsey has switched to the wing.

Can England win? And what tactics should they adopt? Find out in another of my World Cup blogs later in the week. In the meantime, send me your thoughts via the link below.