War of Words not Helped by Bogus Quotes

It seems like there has been quite a war of words going on around former Scotland football captain, Colin Hendry, who – according to today's press – is at the centre of a police fraud investigation.

And, says the likes of today's Scottish Daily Mail and the Daily Record, police are believed to be also investigating Hendry's daughter, for an alleged threat – made on social networking site, Facebook – against two former friends of the ex Rangers and Blackburn Rovers player, who now find themselves calling in the police in pursuit of a reported £95,000 debt.

Not that relations will have been helped when remarks attributed to one of the former friends last month were found to have been bogus.

According to a press agency report published a few weeks ago in a number of Scottish newspapers, one of the two former friends was quoted criticising Hendry following the tragic death of his wife, Denise, last year.

Except that he hadn't, prompting the papers to issue an apology, the most hard-hitting coming from the Scottish Daily Express at the end of last month, which said it had been supplied quotes attributed to a Hector McFarlane from a local press agency and “used by us in good faith”.

It even names the agency concerned.

It continued: “We now accept the comments attributed to Mr McFarlane were wholly inaccurate.

“We apologise to Mr McFarlane and his family for any distress the article may have caused.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, the Express, among others, steers clear of the most recent developments.