The Calcutta Cup - it could have saved a lot of bad blood

Scotland's John Jeffrey and England's Dean Richards took the Calcutta Cup - the trophy that these two giants of running rugby compete for - on to the streets of Edinburgh in 1988. The poor old cup suffered quite a few dings in the process.

The omens were never promising, since the pair had earlier filled the trophy with whiskey and poured it over England hooker Brian Moore's head.

Memories are said to be hazy but Richards confessed that the pair had played a game of football with the cup. There were no reports of them actually passing it to each other.

It needed about $3000 of repair work and led to Jeffrey being banned for six months by his union; Richards copped only a one-match ban.

If only English rugby had been a little stricter with Deano back then it might have saved itself an awful lot of embarrassment over the Harlequins "bloodgate" scandal.

A smashed-up trophy today, a fake blood bin disgrace tomorrow.

The Borg-Warner - knobs and knockers

The Indy 500 trophy is probably the biggest of them all, at nearly 1.65m and 50kg. It is so huge that you wouldn't even fit it in the boot of your average American family saloon, which is saying something.

It might also be the only trophy in which the winners get their faces etched on to the trophy (I'm prepared to be corrected on that one).

The overall effect is... drum roll... uuuuuugly. It's tempting to suggest that someone should knock all the knobbly bits off with a sledgehammer, until you find out that they are the sculpted faces of the winners.

The winners get to take away a little replica, which must be an enormous relief.

The America's Cup - breaking tradition

The Auld Mug is commonly referred to as the world's oldest sporting trophy and it represents a competition that has been filled with protest.

But yachting, New Zealand, the world weren't prepared for the sort that occurred in 1997, when a loony with a grudge and a sledgehammer walked into the Royal New Zealand Yacht Squadron and gave the trophy a right smashing.

Famous trophies have been subjected to all sorts of things over the years - some of which cannot be repeated in this family newspaper. But it's doubtful if one has ever been beaten up like this.

Months of painstaking work by the original makers in London - it was crafted in 1848 - put the cup back together again. No wonder America was so reluctant to let anyone else get hold of the America's Cup when it gets looked after like that.