And it was all going so well. Robinho loved Manchester City, Manchester City loved Robinho. The Premier League's most expensive-ever signing was perfectly content to flick balls around his head, turn tricks and showpony for a club where mid-table mediocrity was the aim. Of course. Never mind that Pele thought he must need counselling for going there or that, back home in Brazil, they say Mr de Souza signed for "the wrong Manchester", nothing was going to tear the two apart. Obviously.

So it is that, mere months into his City career, just days after telling the world quite how much he loves City, it turns out Robinho doesn't really like them at all. In fact, according to most of today's papers, he thinks they're all a bunch of small-time losers and, bewilderingly, aren't like Real Madrid at all. The remedy? To put WeightWatchers' Ronaldo up front with Kaká, behind him. Imagine, then, how much more in love with City Robinho will be when, instead of those two, he finds himself sharing the City showers with Wayne Bridge, Lassana Diarra and Roque Santa Cruz come January.

Now that Roman Abramovich is down to his last couple of trillion quid, he's told Chelsea they can't have any more pocket money. Perhaps that's why Didier Drogba doesn't much want to hang out with them anymore. Whether weirdly creepy comments from Jose Mourinho like "I have been special to him" will lure him to Inter, though, is another matter. His replacement should the Ivorian prefer to redistribute his wealth into Italian stands rather than English ones? Amr Zaki or Karim Benzema, all paid for by the hoofing out of Florent Malouda, Salomon Kalou and Paulo Ferreira.

So delighted by his team's shoeing of Chelsea is Arsène Wenger that he's taken leave of all his senses. Rather than simply sign the next 12-year-old whelpish wonderkid he comes across, he's decided that Kolo Touré's 26-year-old brother Yaya would make a far more sensible acquisition. That leaves just Liverpool and Manchester United to go around plucking the best of the world's youngsters for a career in youth team obscurity. They're furiously tugging away at Racing Avellaneda's Franco Zuculini, which is precisely the sort of thing teenage boys enjoy. When United have finished that off, they'll sign 21-year-old Serb Zoran Tosic now that he's been granted a work permit.

Jermaine Pennant's Liverpool career has suffered yet another indignity. After failing to have his house robbed by the burglars targeting the club's players, he may have received a snub too far. Still, it's probably not as humiliating as the treatment that 'Arry Redknapp is doling out to up-and-coming comedian Heurelho Gomes as the Spurs gaffer continues his attempts to woo every other goalkeeper in the world. The latest on the list: Reading's Marcus Hahnemann and Chelsea's Carlo Cudicini.

The next person to be on the receiving end of David Moyes' wild, staring eyes will be Henrik Larsson when he steps in to both cover for the injured Yakubu and to be massively over-praised by pundits despite not really scoring any goals as he's a bit past it now. Meanwhile, Martin O'Neill will have £18m to blow come January, which is a shame as he'll only waste it on Emile Heskey.

If the Mill could do Rocky-style montages, we'd be showing one of Triggs the dog running up Philadelphia steps, pounding refrigerated cow carcasses and chasing chickens round an alleyway as he gets into training for the inevitable heavy walking schedule ahead if Roy Keane fails to reverse Sunderland's form in the next three games and finds himself sacked. Ipswich's Jim Magilton will be another on the managerial casualty list when he's replaced by charisma's Alan Curbishley before Christmas.

And in other news: Tony Mowbray is going all fluttery-eyed over Doncaster's Brian Stock, Grimsby are doing the same over Robbie Fowler while Boro are tickling Armand Traoré just where he likes it. Yes, there.

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