DETECTORISTS, BBC4, 10pm
“THE idea of what is considered beautiful changes through time,” explains Lance to scrawny Andy as they plod through the fields.
“Back in the Tudor period you might have been considered really attractive.Stick a rock around your neck and you could’ve been one of Lizzy the First’s favourites.” Andy, stung, sarcastically asks how far through time they’d have to go before little Lance would be considered beautiful. “My time is right around the corner,” he confidently states.
So what’s behind his sudden confidence? When Andy asks him to go out later he says he can’t because he has “plans.” Andy’s suspicions are alerted, and he asks what kind of plans. “Gotta pop into Screwfix,” says Lance, determined to give nothing away.
So later, when Andy spies him in the Lemon Tree
Café with a lady friend, he’s shocked and immediately jumps behind a wall to spy on his friend. He’s hunting not muddy treasure but his old pal’s secret love life. Andy rings Lance’s mobile but Lance insists he’s at Screwfix.
Appalled at the lie, Andy asks, “Can you get me some masonry nails? Galvanised.”
The sub-plots in this sitcom are all very well, but the relationship between these two friends is just fantastic.
CLASS OF ’92: OUT OF THEIR LEAGUE, BBC1, 9pm
WHEN a rich man buys a football club the first thing they usually do is bring in a new management team. That’s precisely what the ex-Man Utd players do with Salford FC, but they don’t use their millions to snap up an experienced manager in an expensive suit. Instead they get two sweary and “aggressive” men called Jonno and Bernard. Indeed, Jonno isn’t even allowed near the pitch, being banished to the stands for his bad behaviour, and they scream and shout at the players in team talks. “Get yer finger out yer arse, mate!” Jonno yells. Is this how “aggressive” managers inspire their team, and will this tactic pay off?
Indeed, the scary pair used to manage a rival team and when they played Salford it ended in “mayhem” with brawls on the pitch.
Watching footage of that notorious game, Gary Neville sees the managers rush on to join the fighting: “Jonno’s just slam-dunked ‘im!”
But the Class of ’92 are not naïve and say they knew what to expect when they took Jonno and Bernard on, and they are gambling on the pair transforming their rage into passion for the club and for success.
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