WHILE the fat cats of the Premiership scratch around for a new backer to cough up the loot in place of Carling, the Football League quietly went about their business in tying up a new sponsorship deal with Nationwide.

The Premiership has had almost as many fallers in their great sponsorship race as last weekend's Aintree lottery.

And while the Football League were chasing nowhere near the same lucrative prize, credit to them and Nationwide for finding another £12 million spread over the next three years.

It would be nice now if the League could emerge from the shadow of the Premiership in other areas too.

To my mind the almost total obsession with the top-flight is unhealthy and mis-placed.

Once again the title race was over by Christmas and the whole point of the Premiership now seems to be about qualification for the cash-laden Champions League.

Admittedly Fulham have turned the Division One title assault into a one-horse race and Blackburn are odds-on to follow them.

But the play-off race is fascinating in two of three divisions while for real drama and gut-wrenching tension the bottom of Division Three is the place to be.

In recent times, Hereford, Scarborough and Chester City have all been relegated from the League -- arguably the worst loss of any kind -- on the final day of the season.

This season there are still half-a-dozen clubs who could go, while Yeovil and Rushden and Diamonds slug it out to replace them. From Rotherham to Hartlepool to Torquay there are fantastic stories unfolding with more supporters watching the Nationwide League clubs than their wealthier colleagues in the Premiership.

Of course the kudos and finance make the top-flight THE place to be.

But there is now way the Nationwide shouldn't be looked on as the poor relation of its big brother.

WELL, that's done it. International bosses the world over will be cursing Australia after their World Cup record rout of Tonga.

No longer can any over-cautious or under-fire coach claim: "There's no such thing as an easy game in international football" as all too evidently there is, as the Socceroos put 22 without reply past the hapless Tongans.

Yet rather than throw himself off said harbour, Tongan coach Gary Phillips proudly declared these as "good and exciting times" for the rookie footballing national.

And why wouldn't he. After all Tonga apparently WON just a couple of days earlier when they beat American Samoa 1-0.

That despite the fact that they are only used to playing half-an-hour each way and have rarely seen a perfect grass pitch.

Such results do raise questions about a preliminary round to the qualifying round for these minnows of world football.

But on the other hand everyone has to start somewhere and without them who would the Aussies have to play ?

For Tonga, learning curves don't get much steeper than that.

But I wonder if they'd give Oxford United a game ?

REGULAR readers will know that rugby union doesn't register too highly on my list of sporting favourites.

I confess to only a passing interest in the oval ball game so I thought that surely some mistake had been made when young pup Jonny Wilkinson emerged from their predictable win over France as England's greatest ever points scorer in internationals with 396 points.

The young pup from Newcastle Falcons passed his club gaffer's tally of 396 point with the umpteenth penalty of his still fledgling career.

Wilkinson has hardly been playing for five minutes yet I distinctly remember Dusty Hare filling the England number 15 shirt for decades and never missing a kick . What a travesty.