First Ade for Arsenal
Few of us like Monday but The Fifth Official does, for it brings with it a chance for him to point the finger and laugh. Here he pulls out the pretty, the puzzling and the downright pig-ugly from a week brimming with potential victims.
Ade's Gunner getcha
After his efforts on Saturday, Emmanuel Adebayor has unwittingly re-established himself as an Arsenal hero. He may have had the initial laugh, notching his first goal at the Emirates since leaving but, after one misguided lunge, you could argue that he also helped himself to five Arsenal assists. After his obscene celebration at the Etihad a few years ago, Arsenal fans rightly lapped up his lengthy walk of shame.
You'd have thought such a brainless, game-altering challenge would provoke a stinging rebuke from his manager - but Tottenham's capitulation left AVB baffling the universe by claiming that the sending off didn't alter the course of the game, one that Spurs controlled "from the first minute to the last". Such a preposterous statement will inspire nothing but contempt in fans who need no encouragement to hatch a plot to bring down yet another manager.
The second half was so comfortable that even the pointless introduction of Andre Santos couldn't stuff things up. Apparently Arsene Wenger only sent him on because he was in a good mood after swapping shirts with Adebayor at half-time. That's two in the Arsenal traitor collection he's got already, and the season's only 11 games old. He must be desperate to draw Barcelona in the Champions League.
Dead man walking
It must be getting pretty annoying for Mark Hughes to have to wander round London with the grim reaper in his shadow, always two steps behind him in his dark hoodie, scythe in hand, just waiting for a call from Tony Fernandes to instruct the deathly one that it is finally time to rest a gentle hand on Sparky's shoulder.
If a humiliating home defeat to Southampton doesn't prompt Tony to get dialling, I don't know what will. The Loftus Road (not so) faithful made their feelings known, with a banner asking 'Arry to come and save them.
Redknapp, watching the match for UK television, said: "Sit down Sandra," when he saw it, joking that it was his wife who'd been at the arts and crafts. The truth is he's already instructed his erstwhile chauffeur Kevin Bond to find the fastest route between Sandbanks and Shepherd's Bush.
But Hughes isn't the only man who should be relieved of his duties. Whichever wag came up with the ridiculous moniker 'El Sackico' to describe Hughes and Nigel Adkins' face off towards the season's first P45 should also be canned. It sounds horrible, and it doesn't even work. So there.
Hugh genius
Foolish, foolish Fergie. He should have known not to tempt fate by admitting in midweek that he couldn't remember former Manchester United trainee Anthony Pilkington. Now he'll never be able to forget him. The winger's face will be the last thing he sees before drifts off to sleep after the Norwich man's sublime glancing header consigned United to their third defeat of the season at Carrow Road.
Fergie's mood won't have been improved by the slice of luck afforded to title rivals Manchester City on Saturday either, as Roberto Mancini got the helping hand he thinks he deserves. After a few testy weeks in front of the press corps, the Italian 'treated' them to a laugh by walking into his Friday briefing wearing a David Platt mask. Looking at the state of it, the gathered hacks might have had less of a shock had he arrived in an Elephant Man mask.
I imagine Mancini is still on the phone trying to lobby UEFA to employ Adrian Holmes as a linesman in every game Manchester City play after the hapless official conjured a handball out of thin air to give City breathing space against Villa. The key is conviction - present in his face until a swarm of Villa players charged 20 yards to get all up in his grill. Then his expression changed to that of a toddler who has just soiled himself. And when his chance came to right his wrong by wrongly denying City a definite penalty, he got that wrong too.
The Torres cliff
Now President Obama has been re-elected, all the talk in the United States that doesn't involve General Petreaus's pants surrounds the country's huge debt and the prospect of dropping off a fiscal cliff.
In football terms, this is something Chelsea have to deal with around this time every year, as a lack of goals and continued pitiful form encourages them to let themselves fall over the Torres cliff.
With just one goal in seven games, Torres is facing the prospect of being reunited with his favourite slice of wood after he managed to turn in a performance at West Brom that was so insipid it made Daniel Sturridge look potent. Wasteful and greedy, of course, but at least he had chances to miss. Torres trotted round the Hawthorns like a racehorse put out to stud. An impotent racehorse.
No manager likes getting mugged off by his former employers, but perhaps Roberto Di Matteo's gift to his former club for propelling him towards the Champions League trophy was fielding an impossibly weak team at one of the Premier League's most difficult places to visit this season. Steve Clarke, a former Chelsea assistant of course, couldn't disguise his glee - and few could blame him.
RDM will no doubt spend the next 48 hours before the trip to Juventus trying to convince Andriy Shevchenko to return as a replacement for Torres.
The eight-year itch
Oh well, Newcastle fans, at least you've only got eight more years to endure until you get a new manager. After the splendour of last season offered us all a chance to laugh at naked Geordies dancing in the aisles, it is back to the familiar sight of naked Geordies crying in the aisles. They'll be doing plenty more weeping if the Toon continue to play like a Sam Allardyce team on Temazepam.
Alan Pardew, his ego ever so slightly dented after two home defeats on the spin, had a cupboard full of excuses, one of which included being shorn of Papiss Cisse just 80 minutes before the game.
That smacked of clutching at straws given that Cisse has scored just once in ten games this season - and that one came off his arse while he was facing his own goal.
Newcastle have been so wretched of late that they are in danger of being overtaken by arch-rivals Sunderland, who scored more goals against Fulham than they have in the last six Premier League matches.
Their season turned on a red card - and yes, Lee Cattermole was involved. Amazingly, though, he wasn't the one lunging in with studs showing. Is he (whisper it quietly) maturing? Or did he just forget?
