THERE is as yet no launch date for The Sportsman, the new publication aimed at gamblers, but they are already reaching for m’learned friends to defend themselves from the established publication, the Racing Post. Charlie Methven, the publisher, has taken counsel’s opinion over reports that one big bookie has been offered cheap advertising in the Post if he agrees not to put any business the way of The Sportsman.

“That’s them abusing their dominant market position,” says an insider. I ask Trinity Mirror, which owns the Post, if such a deal was offered. “We have very clear and robust procedures regarding competition,” Trinity tells me.

“Even if someone in their enthusiasm has suggested such an arrangement we wouldn’t endorse this kind of deal or allow it to become a reality.” That’ll be a yes, then.

JAMES EDEN, banking analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, famously branded Sir Fred Goodwin, chief executive of Royal Bank of Scotland, a “megalomaniac”. RBS’s much-admired figures yesterday have prompted an abrupt change of heart. “Fred is not a deal junkie, Fred is not a megalomaniac,” he writes. “I was going to name my new baby Gemma but I’m now thinking about Frederica.”

Poor signal

A BAD omen for the great transformation that John Pluthero, the chief executive, pledged to achieve at Cable & Wireless? A conference call for analysts and investors yesterday was hit by gremlins and the entire introduction from Richard Lapthorne, the chairman, was rendered inaudible.

About par for the course for a telecoms company, then. Perhaps he simply didn’t want to be the bearer of bad news . . . and those 3,000 job cuts.

AN AUSSIE mining merger is announced between two existing companies, Buka Minerals and Danae Resources, to create Scarborough Minerals. Why the name, I ask? It’s a long way from Yorkshire. “Scarborough was one of the vessels which sailed to Australia as part of the First Fleet in 1788.” Indeed. And Danae was the mother of Perseus. Fifteen-all, then.

That’s rich

A PUBLICATION drops through a wormhole from a parallel universe where people are happy to pay £3,500 for a pair of cufflinks. Brummell is another flash magazine aimed at traders with more money than sense, offering items such as a custom-made trunk containing three chilled bottles of Krug, mother-of-pearl caviar spoons, a designer ice bucket and a truffle grater. A mere £29,000 and listed, without apparent irony, under “Essentials ”.

A JOB with a difference: the House of Commons is seeking a clock mechanic. You have to be on call one week in three, during which the phone could go at any time and you could be dragged out of bed to fix Big Ben.

city.diary@thetimes.co.uk

Times Recommends

• Lies and cover-up at MG Rover exposed by report
• High oil prices push manufacturing costs up
• Primark founder steps down as chief executive