Please forgive our inability to service your La Liga needs as we barely know enough to keep our Ronaldos and our Ronaldinhos apart. (All you need to know about both, house burglars: filthy rich.) However, please allow us to prepare your Strongbow and your six kinds of sausage as you settle in for a long morning of cursing at the telly (but without the gaiety in your language, please):

Newcastle v Liverpool (7.00 am ET) - We assume this one's already 4-1 by the time you read this, considering the injuries for Newcastle and the competition and all. If not, have another Strongbow on the house; you'll need it to survive what promises to be a strange morning.

Arsenal v Portsmouth (9.00 am ET) - If you choose to slide down the dial on this one, we'll happily break this one down for you in advance: Arsenal makes the extra extra pass and fails to attack except when they do and injure patrons in the 23rd row. Portsmouth confuses Tony Adams for Gerry Adams and refuses to come near the ball. After an appalling 1-1 tie (both goals by Adebayor), Wenger attacks the home groundskeeper for mixing 10% too much Kentucky bluegrass into the seed combination. This has been your Arsenal v Portsmouth early final.

West Ham v Stoke City (9.00 am ET) - If they must. On the other hand, the safest place in Britain this afternoon has to be Upton Park as Craig Bellamy won't be allowed in.

Fulham v Chelsea (9.00 am ET) - Unfortunately, John Terry couldn't make this match as an emergency meeting of the Gritty Gutty Short White Men's Club has been called in St. Louis to discuss David Eckstein's continued unemployment and the possible weakening of the mental powers of the organizating. Also, Wes Welker's snow angel penalty and Craig Biggio's upcoming bid for governor of Texas will be considered.

Blackburn v Manchester City (11.15 am ET) - Sam Allardyce and late sleepers should beware what they wish for.

In stark contrast to last year's meeting Barca is sitting atop the league (and six points clear at that) while Real is struggling to crack La Liga's top four. They haven't even played yet and the game has already cost one coach his job. You hate to see a guy get fired for speaking the truth, but hey, Juande Ramos has a new job! Real is plagued by injuries and Barcelona has displayed brilliant form within the league. The match can be seen at 4 pm EST on GolTV.

Other televised matches of interest...

EPL - Middlesbrough vs. Arsenal In Progress on Setanta
Waaaay too fucking early to care.

EPL - Manchester City vs. Everton at 10 am on FSC
Hey, Buffon will leave Italy to take over the Citizen's net, and it will only cost them £250k a week! Of course that's on top of the £20 million they'll have to fork over to Juventus for the potential transfer. Serious Arab Money.

EPL - Liverpool vs. Hull City at 10 am on Setanta
The Scousers have a scant one point cushion over Chelsea at the top of the Premier League and this morning they're up against Tigers side that is without a loss in their last four matches. Torres remains out with a bad hamstring, but everybody else is back in the lineup for Liverpool.

Bundesliga - VFB Stuttgart vs. Bayern Munich at 11:30 am on GolTV
Munich can work their way back into first place over Hoffenheim with a win this afternoon.

EPL - Tottenham vs. Manchester United at 12:30 on FSC
The Red Devils head into White Hart Lane to face a rapidly improving Spurs side, and they will likely be without several key players. Rooney and Evra will serve suspensions while Rio Ferdinand and Dimitar Berbatov are both likely out with injuries. Ronaldo's also a bit banged up (pussy), but he's a bit more likely to play. Manchester might just need another four goal performance from Tevez to win this week.

La Liga - Valencia vs. Espanyol at 2 pm on GolTV
Watching David Villa and his Valencia side is a pretty good warmup for the big tilt later in the afternoon.

Enjoy the games, and follow along with the fun in the comment section.

If the season were to end today Stupid Fucking Bolton would be going to the Champions League. A corner of the universe just started to fold in on itself simply because that sentence was typed. If...

If my aunt had a penis she'd be my uncle, and my actual uncle would then be a homosexual. Bolton has a better chance of winning the Eurovision Song Contest than than they do winning a Champions League spot.

I'm sure Chelski fans are already printing up t-shirts and Roman Abramovich's girlfriend has probably handed him a list of sculptors he can commission to immortalize Big Phil in bronze, but this weekend represents all of 2.6% of the season. And the last time I checked (about 10 seconds ago) Michael "Zweiter Platz" Ballack still wears a Chelsea jersey, so yeah, let's not overreact.

Similarly, Scousers are likely sweating their side giving meaning to the phrase 'subtraction by addition' as their new high-priced striker stopped a certain goal from their old (okay, last season) high-priced striker. But the latter bailed Liverpool out (again) and there's ample time left for them to assume and put a lock on their rightful fourth place spot.

Even United's decision to suck at home doesn't necessitate much hand wringing. Last year they opened by drawing against Reading—currently residing in the "Where are they now?" file (Answer: the Colaship)—and they still managed to, you know, win the league title. It was infinitely amusing to watch Sir Alex squirm as he slowly realized that, without Cristiano Louganis or Carlos Tevez, his side is just an overpriced Blackburn, but that's only because all my hatred of that man is derived entirely from the fear of his teams.

One week. Small sample size.

Unless your rooting interests lie in North London. And I'm not referring to a dull 1-0 win over West Brom.

I say this not because Tottenham are my supposed nemesis, I merely derive pleasure from saying this because they are my supposed nemesis. Now, I've never met Relegation Zone Mikey, I only know of him through my predecessor's lore, but I pity his mom, or whoever is still in charge of changing his bed sheets.

The second worst defense in the league last season spends $100M bringing in players and still can't stop anyone from scoring. That's probably because none of the high profile players brought in during the summer transfer were defenders. If I didn't know better, I'd think Tom Hicks had taken over at White Hart Lane, not Anfield.

"Hey, we've got no pitching. Let's say we trade Edinson Volquez for Josh Hamilton."

I can already here the retorts of "5-1." The only thing worse than being willfully ignorant is being predictable. Or maybe it's living in the past. I'm not exactly sure how to construct a solid existential hierarchy. I am sure how to construct an SAT analogy. Lucy:Charlie Brown::Reality:Tottenham's Top 4 Talk.

If you're a Spurs fan, there's no way to silver line a 2-1 loss to Boro, because it was actually more like a 3-0 loss. David Wheater's first half goal was just plain taken away from him, unless getting felt up like Michael Kors at the Pride Parade is now a foul on the person getting felt.

In case you had stopped watching by that point, you needed the other team to beat its own keeper just to get on the scoresheet. Oh, and this was Middlesbrough. There name translates into English as "Twelfth Place." They've cracked the top half of the table once this century. Boro. Destroyed you.

And to make it even worse (or better), you're trying to unload your only proven Premier League striker. Even so, while he's still on your team, he'd probably be more effective if he spent more time on the pitch than on the pine. Unless Juande Ramos knows something we don't. I mean I don't watch much La Liga, so maybe in Spain you're allowed to score from the bench.

So, it is only 2.6% of the season. It's just significant enough to be dismissive of until the season ends and you're two points short, or you're Tottenham.

I told you so. That's right, way back on August 6, 2007, five days before the start of this interminable but historic season, I correctly predicted the order of finish at the top of the league: ManU, Chelsea, Arsenal and Liverpool. If only the Lords of the EPL had listened to me then and awarded the title to United, think of all the pain and misery we could have saved ourselves, to say nothing of my liver.

But it had to play out, and for the first time in 40 years the Prem was decided on the final day — the final ten minutes of the final day, actually.

Otherwise, I'm afraid it would have come down to superdelegates.

If you're a ManU fan, well done, ol' chaps. If you're a Chelsea supporter, ha ha, you rich fuckers; sorry you didn't get to pop the champagne, but John Terry's elbow will have to suffice. And if, let's say, you root for a certain team from North London that for the three quarters of the season had the look of champions only to choke balls deep down the stretch ... do you even bother with alcohol, or just snort heroin through that rolled up Matthew Flamini Wallbangers poster that you've ripped down last week when the ungrateful French bastard decided he'd rather lose titles in Italy than England?

Don't get me wrong. ManU deserved their championship; over the course of nine grinding months, they displayed the kind of steely commitment that the rest of the Big Four lacked. They also played some exhiliarating soccer that saw their attacking troika of Ronaldo, Rooney and Tevez score an incredible 79 goals. And yes, they had the best manager in the world. Sir Alex may be an insufferable blowhard, but he knows how to get the most out of his players. Fear, of course, is a great motivator, as is his benevolent despotism — like when he looked the other way after his Portuguese meal ticket went five-on-one with a group of young business women in his hot tub.

Believe it or not, I, too, have a magnanimous side and, believe it or not, it has nothing to do with condoning prostitution. So let me applaud Chelsea for making this such a memorable season. They fought right up until Ryan Giggs sealed the title with the second goal against Wigan in the 80th minute. In the wake of Mourinho, no one, especially me, expected Uncle Avram to do something special, and yet Chelsea came within two points of winning the league and now has a chance for redemption when they meet United in the Champions League final on May 21. If I were ManU, I wouldn't hire a second engraver just yet for that CL trophy. Based on the James Bond villain look Chelsea's owner Roman Ambramovich was rocking during the game, let's just say I would bring my own borscht to Moscow.

As zen-like as Ambramovich appeared after Chelsea's title hopes had ended, his fellow billionaire Mohamed Al Fayed was deliirous after Fulham pulled off one last miracle to avoid relegation by beating Portsmouth 1-0. So giddy was Fayed you'd have thought that he just seen evidence that Queen Elizabeth herself was driving that car that killed Diana and Dodi. His team had been officially declared dead on the operating table two weeks ago, but somehow they shocked themselves back to life with only 15 minutes remaining between Prem survival and long bus rides to Barnsley and Colchester. Fayed had promised the Fulham players a freezer full of Harrod's caviar and smoked salmon if they stayed up, but that hardly explains the eruption of joy and relief at the final whistle. There were all of Uncle Sam's boys — Deuce, McBride, Keller and Bocanegra — dancing around the pitch, stripped to the waist and hugging it out. You could understand the celebration of man-love after what Fulham had gone through to survive, but if they have any hopes of not finding themselves in this position next year, they may want to find a more macho mascot than Hugh Grant, who looked even more satisfied in the stands than he did when he got that $75 blowjob from Divine Brown.

So it's finally over, this season that gave us so much drama, suspense, anguish, joy and Ashley Cole vomiting on a woman who wasn't his wife. When I looked around at Kinsale yesterday, I saw the ManU fans chanting "Campeones, Campeones, ole ole," and I wanted to spread the love, too. So when the final EPL standings flashed on the screen, I put my arm Mid-Table Mikey and said, "Hey look, Spurs came within 38 points of the title."

Even I had a lump in my throat when I saw Chelsea take the field on Saturday in black armbands, honoring the recent death of Frank Lampard's mother. Turns out that my lump was just some undigested French Toast, but still you have to admire the Oprah-like sensitivity this bunch of preening, squabbling egomaniac multimillionaires showed for a brief, shining moment.

"We did it for Frank and his family," said Michael Ballack after Chelsea beat ManU 2-1 and drew level on points at the top of the Premier League. Ballack was referring to his midfield partner Lampard, who was on "compassionate leave" for the fractious battle at Stamford Bridge that ended in a total meltdown for United.

By now, we're used to seeing Sir Alex, his face resembling plush velvet, raging at the officials for perceived injustices, but it's not every day you see Rio Ferdinand kick a female usher (by accident, of course) and ManU's reserves exchange punches with Chelsea's grounds crew. It's still United's title to lose because of their superior goal difference, but considering how they've responded to the sphincter-tightening pressure of the stretch run, anything's possible over the next two weeks, even the sight of, God forbid, Chelsea hoisting the trophy.

To be fair to the Blues — something I've never been — they've displayed impressive resilience to get to this point but one big happy family? Yeah, maybe in a Texas polygamy cult sort of way.

Let's not forget that this is the same team who earlier in the season gave us:

— a bustup on the training ground between captain John Terry and an assistant coach over Grant's decision not to reveal his starting lineup til the day of the game.
— Drogba and Lampard declaring their undying love toward Mourinho and begging The Special One to rescue them from Stamford Bridge.
— Defender Tal Ben Haim saying he would never have come to Chelsea if he knew his fellow Israeli Grant would be in charge.
— a death threat in the form of a mysterious white powder toward Grant from the Chelsea faithful who continue to serenade him with "You Don't Have A Clue."

Chelsea is a family all right. Of course, so are the Lohans. And the Mansons. And yet somehow here they are, with a chance to win both the Prem and the Champions League, and you've got to ask yourself "How the fuck did this happen?"

Let's start with Drogba and Ballack, two world class players who lead their respective national teams and think they're each The Man. (Only Drogba is right.) On Saturday, they combined for the first Chelsea goal and then underlined the team's true family spirit by almost pummeling each other to death for the right to take a free-kick. Drogba had already made his mark on the game early on when he introduced his knee to Vidic's face, resulting in the United defender getting stretchered off with a bloody mouth. Then, just before intermission, Drogba, given enough time and space at the edge of the box to book his flight to Milan for the inevitable reunion with Mourinho, picked out Ballack at the back post. The German's powerful header had barely nestled in the net when he ripped off his jersey revealing a pair of nipples that would have made Heidi Klum jealous. Or maybe Simon Cowell.

Meanwhile, the rest of the Chelsea players celebrated by waving a jersey with the words Pat Lampard RIP printed on it.

It was such a touching gesture that there was hardly a wet eye in the house at Kinsale. "I hear that Lampard called Terry today and asked him to keep Drogba away from the funeral," Dublin Dave said "He was worried about him diving in the box."

We all cracked up, and by "we," I mean the mob of United fans I found myself drinking and chanting with at the end of the bar. "Don't you feel bad supporting ManU?" asked Cardillo, who got up at 5 a.m. to make the two and half hour pilgrimage from Connecticut to Kinsale. "Isn't it a bit like rooting for Palestine?" No, Mike, Chelsea is Palestine, ManU is only Saudi Arabia.

At any rate, I couldn't have been happier when Ricardo Carvalho gifted ManU the equalizer shortly after halftime . Normally Chelsea's most reliable defender, Carvalho was positively Riise-esque as he passed the ball directly to Rooney 30 yards out from his own goal. The United striker shrugged off Terry's challenge and a painful hip injury to lash the ball into the bottom corner. Rooney hobbled off soon thereafter and was replaced by Ronaldo, who along with Tevez, had been left out of the starting lineup in order to rest for tomorrow's Champions League return match against Barca. It was a gamble that would come back to bite Sir Alex in the ass.

The Best Player In The World had barely stepped onto the pitch when Ballack wrestled him to the ground inside the penalty area, only for the official to wave play on. But a few minutes later, the referee did call a penalty; this time it was against United, their first of the season. Essian's cross was generously ruled to have hit Carrick's arm, and Ballack slotted home the ensuing penalty kick before hugging it out with Drogba and the rest of Chelsea's dysfunctional family.

As for Grant, he had spent most of the game hunched forward in his seat like he was having an enema, but now there he was, dancing a little hora on the touchline. This was the second straight game in which Uncle Avram received an early Chanukah present and he has to wonder if his good luck will continue to the end of the season.
.

If it does, I'll be the one wearing the black armband.

Say this for John Arne Riise. As diving headers go, it was textbook, a classic, one for the year-end highlight reel. The Liverpool defender launched himself at the ball with fearless abandon and rocketed it into the top of the net. The keeper never had a chance.

Wait, did I mention it was his own keeper? And that instead of carrying him off the field, his teammates probably wanted to finish what Craig Bellamy started last year and take a nine iron to his face.

In fairness to the ginger-headed Norweigan, it was the most exciting moment in an otherwise coma-inducing Champions League semifinal between two teams for whom a 1-1 draw is a veritable goal-fest. Even Chelsea manager Avram Grant, who for most of the game looked like he was eating bitter herbs left over from Passover, managed a smile at the end. In fact, when Riise put the ball into his own net in the 95th minute, Grant resembled Moses after parting the Red Sea. Yes, Avram, it was a helluva miracle, but you had fuck-all to do with it.

"We took a big step toward the final today," said Grant afterwards, loosening the noose around his neck and looking forward to the return leg at Stamford Bridge where Chelsea hasn't lost since Neil Armstrong took his first steps on the moon and Liverpool hasn't scored in four years under Benitez. Clearly, the Blues are now the favorite to reach the Champions League final against the winner of Barcelona and Manchester United. This is especially good news for Chelsea's billionaire Russian owner Roman Abramovich, because the game will be played in Moscow, where I'm guessing he knows how to arrange to have his eventual opponent killed. But if I were Roman — and of course I'm not or I'd be banging a Russian supermodel half my age — I'd hold off putting a down payment on a hitman just yet.

Let's face it, Chelsea could have easily lost by three goals yesterday, and the only reason it didn't was because Fernando Torres, of all people, wasted a handful of the kind of chances he normally buries with insolent ease. It took Dirk Kuyt, the hardworking Dutchman whose first touch makes him look like he's wearing wooden shoes, to give Liverpool the lead and, like Riise's blunder, it was the result of some comical schoolboy defending.

The culprit was Lampard, and how happy does it make me to write those four words? Fat Frank, back from a two-game leave of absence due to an illness in his family, looked rusty from the start, and when he dawdled on the ball at the edge of the box, Kuyt stripped him. The ball ping-ponged to Mascherano whose scuffed shot looped over Makelele and Kuyt was in the right place to hammer it through Cech's legs.

Even though that happened in the 43rd minute, who in their right mind didn't think the lone goal would stand up? After all, in their last six previous meetings including an overtime game that went to penalty kicks, the teams had managed to light up the scoreboard for a grand total of three goals. And it was hard to see where a Chelsea score would come from other than off the foot or head of Drogba. But the Ivorian marksman whose two goals against Arsenal had buried the Gunners season — along with my will to live — had his hands full with Carragher and Skrtel who took turns grappling with his pace and power. For the most part, they kept him in check, though sometimes by means that would have made Kimbo Slice proud.

Meanwhile, the Blues were being overrun in midfield with Ballack, except for a late header on goal, basically useless, and Joe Cole, normally Chelsea's most lively attacker, strangely muted. Finally, in the 61st minute, Benitez and Grant made the moves that would turn the game. The Spaniard was forced to bring on Riise when Aurelio was stretchered off with a groin injury, and Grant countered by substituting Salomon Kalou for Cole. It was Kalou's dipping cross in the fifth minute of stoppage time that, along with the looming presence in the box of another Grant sub Nicolas Anelka, caused Riise to shit the bed and give Chelsea the away goal they hardly deserved.

So now, considering that Liverpool faces the daunting task of winning at the Bridge next week, their fans are curiously Zen-like. Take Lingering Bursitis, who in addition to being the brains behind Unprofessional Foul, now works two doors down from me and is my office bitch. While I watched the game in a nearby bar, LB was stuck at work cleaning dirt out of my old Umbros, so I magnanimously offered him the chance to steal glimpses of the match on my office TV. When I returned to work, I was surprised to see my office intact and my television unharmed. I found LB sitting quietly at his desk in lotus position, chanting " 2005, 2005, 2005."

"I feel sorry for Chelsea ," said the Scouser Buddha. "They needed a spectacular own goal to stay alive. But the path of enlightenment has many false starts. I am at one-one with everything."

And it was only then that I noticed the industrial-sized bottle of Oxycontin in his bottom drawer.

In the U.S., giving away baseball tickets to recovering heroin addicts might make other fans fear for their safety. In England, those people are called "soccer fans."

The DAATs may then hand the tickets to addicts seeking to tackle their problems - even to criminals classed as "prolific and priority offenders".



A Government Office for the North East spokesman said the tickets were given only to those who had shown a "genuine commitment to living a normal, structured life", and were not a reward.

We are thinking of quitting smoking — by "thinking," we mean "considering the possibility of sometime down the road, an indeterminate time that's presumably far, far off" — and would like some free Cardinals tickets, please. We'll sit next to the pale gaunt guy with the sunken eyes.

Drug Addicts Given Tickets To English Premiership Soccer Matches As Incentive [Machochip]

Go ahead, bow down. Heel before Manchester United like you would a certain overdressed German guy with a pointy hat who's playing to a sold out Yankee Stadium this week. They deserve it. They stand on the cusp of pulling off an astonishing double championship, and they have done it with style and panache. So why am I not ready to genuflect?

Because for all the beautiful soccer they play, they are an ugly club, and I'm not even talking about the pitbull mugs of Rooney and Tevez. My bitterness doesn't even stem from the fact that United administered last rites yesterday to Arsenal's trophy-less season in a game that will be enshrined in the ManU-Arsenal pantheon right up there with the 1999 classic that saw Ryan Giggs slalom through the entire Gunner defense in the 109th minute and then display more chest hair than Robin and Venus Williams combined.

No, what makes United so unloveable to me is their relentless gamesmanship. Of course, like the rest of the planet, I'm in awe of Ronaldo's wondrous gifts, but I want to drown him in his own hair gel when he starts performing his Harlem Globetrotter tricks in the middle of a breakaway. I am impressed by the tactical genius and shopping talents of Sir Alex, and yet I pray his head will explode every time he unleashes one of his purple-faced rants at a referee.

All of ManU's best and worst traits were on abundant display yesterday at Old Trafford, as they opened up a six-point lead at the top of the Premier League and dared Chelsea to catch them. Even though Arsenal's season had essentially been buried alive at Anfield earlier in the week, the Gunners were determined to make this more than just another validation of United's majesty. They began as they did against Liverpool with Fabregas and Hleb threading the needle into the tiniest of spaces, only for Arsenal to waste chance after chance. In fact, had Adebayour not turned into some kind of U-11 girl in front of goal and rolled candy-ass shots into the grateful arms of Van der Saar instead of powering them past him like, say, Fernando Torres would have done, Arsenal might have been up by two or three goals at the half.

"I think when Adebayour cut his hair," Dublin Dave said, "he also cut his dick off." Dublin Dave is the leader of the Kinsale Reds, and even before the match you could tell he was nervous by the way his United scarf was wrapped around his neck like a noose. "I'm not feeling good today," said the normally ebullient Irishman. "I had a dream last night that Ronaldo broke his leg."

You can hardly blame him for his dark premonition, given that defenders are now starting to go on record that Ronaldo risks being Eduardoed if he continues to humiliate them. Just last week, Roma's David Pizarro accused the Portuguese showpony of doing "spiteful things" after the United midfielder had taunted the defender by bamboozling him with his repertoire of step-overs and backheels rather than simply taking the ball past him on the run. Yesterday it was Justin Hoyte's turn to be tormented late in the game, and the Arsenal defender responded by clattering Ronaldo to the ground. In other words, the message opponents are sending to Ronaldo is that they can deal with him beating them on the dribble, but if you rub their faces in it by stopping and performing your look-at-me-aren't-I-simply-amazing antics, prepare to eat some turf.

Still, there are times when you have to admire Ronaldo's sheer audacity. Yesterday, he had basically been kept in check during the first half by the heroic efforts of Clichy and Eboue, who tracked him tirelessly whenever he switched flanks. But after Gallas was whistled for a hand ball (sad to say, it was a legitimate call ) in the box, Ronaldo stepped up to take the penalty kick. And then he stopped mid-runup. And then he blasted the ball high to Lehmann's right for his 38th goal of the season. But wait. A ManU player, fooled by Ronaldo's stutter-step approach, had run into the box before the kick was taken, and the goal was disallowed. Ha!

Except that only made Ronaldo more determined to prove why he's the best player in the world. Without missing a beat, he nervelessly stepped up again. And stopped again. And scored again, this time with an inch-perfect kick inside the right post. It is a toss-up as to who Lehmann would rather have knee-capped at that moment: Almunia, the man who kept him on the bench for most of the season until an injury yesterday afforded the German a rare start in goal, or Ronaldo who TWICE beat him with the same infuriating technique. Can you imagine Chad Johnson walking backwards into the endzone after juking a cornerback? Oh wait, you can.

Anyway, with Lehmann talking scheiss at Ronaldo, not to mention his defenders and the ref, Ferguson sensed Arsenal's implosion and went for the throat by bringing on Tevez and Anderson. How incredible is it that Tevez, who is one of the key members of the world's no.1 team, Argentina, isn't a regular starter for ManU? That is down to United's depth, which Ferguson brilliantly provided in the offseason, when he added ol' Scarface as well as Anderson, Nani and Hargreaves. By contrast, Wenger brought in Eduardo and a box of croissants.

So deep is United that Hargreaves, who starts for England, can barely get in a game at Old Trafford and lately has been in Ferguson's doghouse for turning up late to practice and team meetings. But given a chance to redeem himself yesterday, the Canadian-born midfielder showed all the guile and composure of his friend and countryman Steve Nash dishing a no-look behind the back pass in crunch time.

After a silly foul by Silva just outside the box, Ronaldo and Hargreaves stood equidistant from the ball. Surely, everyone in the stadium, including Lehmann, expected the Portuguese winger to take the free kick; he had scored some astonishing dead-ball goals this season. But it was Hargreaves who wrapped his foot around the ball like a certin Armani underwear model and sent it swerving over the wall (Damn you, Van Persie, for not jumping!) and into the lower left corner of the net.

Old Trafford erupted in song and Dublin Dave was kind enough to translate the lyrics .

"You hear that?" said Dublin Dave, now jumping up and down with his United brethren at Kinsale. "They're serenading you, Hirshey. 'you're gonna win fuck-all' 'you're gonna win fuck-all. ' "

True, we will win fuck-all, but at least we won't rub it in.

I blame myself. I fucked with my own mojo this week, and, in doing so, cursed Arsenal.

Sure, there are co-conspirators in the Gunners' epic collapse — Chris Douglas Roberts, Peter Frojdfeldt and a pub that shall remain nameless all come to mind — but mostly it's on me. Which is why I slouch before you today a broken man. Let me explain.

On Monday night I was one goddamn free throw away from winning $1,000 in my office NCAA pool and ready to spring for those Manolos that Leitch has had his eye on for months. (Ed. Note: Woo-hoo!) My delirium quickly turned to despair as CDR caused me to have CPR by clanging brick after brick in the final minutes of Memphis' epic collapse. In the end all that was left of my grand was the rubber band around the bankroll that I now plan to hang myself with.

At least I had the comfort of knowing that the pain of Memphis' clocktease would be eased the next day by Arsenal's triumphant passage into the semi-finals of the Champions League.

So seeing as this was the biggest game of Arsenal's season that had promised so much and delivered so little, what did I do to help the cause? I blew off the inebriated comfort of Kinsale for a pub closer to work, where I was told by my friend Bigus Dickus of Unprofessional Foul that the beers would flow as freely as Arsenal's attack. I should have realized right then that I was giving the finger to the Gods of Guinness and Footy.

"Your lot is going to score two goals," Bigus predicted, which, given that the last 132 games between Arsenal and Liverpool had ended in 1-1 draws, seemed hopeful. Then, chirping like the Norwich City dickus he is, he added "But you'll still lose on penalty kicks."

Close enough. Arsenal scored twice — the second goal resulting from an Maradona-esque 80-yard run by Walcott through four Liverpool defenders in the 83rd minute that had me high-fiving and hugging everyone in the pub — and it was a penalty kick that sealed the Gunners' sorry-ass fate. A penalty kick that could only have been called by a man named Peter Frojdfeldt, which my Swedish friends tell me translates into Blind Douchebag. Lest we forget, in Wednesday's first leg at the Emirates, Kuyt tugged Hleb backwards in the box and received only a wink from referee Pieter Vink, a fellow Dutchman.

Yesterday's call was, to my fair and balanced Gooner eye, nowhere near as egregious as last week's non-call. When Babel broke into the penalty area seconds after Wolcott's masterpiece, Toure was shoulder to shoulder with him and might have breathed on him, causing him to lose his balance. A bullshit foul with that much at stake.

Penalty or no, the truth is that a side that is on its way to the semifinals of the Champions League after 85 minutes and loses by two goals nine minutes later deserves to be eliminated. In other words, Arsenal are out of Europe, as well as excuses.

Arsene Wenger, which my French friends tell me translates to Cheap Douchebag, can rail all he wants about all those "dodgy refereeing decisions" that cost his team victory, but the fact remains that Arsenal wouldn't have been at the mercy of them had he opened his wallet. Yes, he's brilliant at spotting young raw talent and molding it in the Arsenal image, but at this level you also need depth and experience, which cost money.

Had Wenger not been so convinced of his own genius, maybe we wouldn't have ended up with a defense yesterday that consisted of Gael Clichy and The Three Statues. Say what you want about Senderos — and he's an ungainly Swiss twat who lost his mark on the first two goals — he's not the only one at fault. Gallas and Toure were routinely beaten for pace over the course of the Liverpool series and crapped their pants every time Torres ran at them. The Spaniard proved once again why, for my money, he's the most lethal finisher in the world when he swiveled around the ponderous Sendoros and lashed an unstoppable rocket into the top corner.

It should be noted that Wenger tried to woo Torres over the summer, but his counterpart Benitez was the one who was willing to pony up the shekels. Now, God willing, Torres will stick a fork in Chelsea in the next round, which I'll be watching at Kinsale, just so I don't fuck that up, too.

Believe me, I've learned my lesson. There I was yesterday, covering my eyes in shame as Gerrard lined up the penalty kick, when who should come skipping into the bar but Relegation Zone Mikey, which my American friends tell me roughly translates into Delusional Tottenham Douchebag.

As soon as the Gerrard's shot bulged the net, RZM launched into a taunting chant of "Your season's over, la la la la." Only not as clever as that.

As for me, at least I won five large (or as you know it, one whole
Lincoln) on Tennessee over Stamford.

Knowledgeable eyes will be on West Brom striker and this year's Championship League POY Kevin Phillips, who's been this far in the FA Cup twice before (1998, 2007). Untrained eyes will be fixated on the corporate logos emblazoned on the jerseys and think, "Hey! This isn't NASCAR!"

The other semifinal is Barnsley and Cardiff City. (It's tomorrow morning, but what are the odds I'll remember it then?) Neither of these teams have winning records in the Championship League, and yet, here they are, one game away from the Shiny Trophy match.

For those who aren't into all that "trophy winning" business, the morning also brings us Arsenal and Liverpool. The Gunners still have a chance to win the title, despite ties in their last three games. But they are a single point behind second-place Chelsea, and if Chelsea loses to Man City, Arsenal can move up a dilly in the standings.

Premier League
7:45 a.m. ET: Arsenal-Liverpool
10 a.m.: Aston Villa-Bolton
10 a.m.: Blackburn-Tottenham
10 a.m.: Fulham-Sunderland
10 a.m.: Newcastle-Reading
10 a.m.: Wigan-Birmingham
10 a.m.: Man City-Chelsea

FA Cup
7:15 a.m.: West Brom-Portsmouth

Phillipe Senderos scored an own goal in the 28th while Niklas Bendtner's tying goal came at the last possible minute. But the upsets today didn't come at the tippy top of the standings...

Manchester United 3, Fulham 0 — ...nor at the second spot. A field goal by Owen Hargreaves enabled Man-U to shave two points off Arsenal's league lead.

Chelsea 4, West Ham 0 — I guess when a team is out to prove something, a decisive four-goal victory isn't such a bad thing to accomplish. And if someone fancies to get a red card, it's probably best to do so after the first three goals have been scored, much like Frank Lampard did in the 35th minute.

Birmingham 4, Tottenham 1 — Relegate them, will you? Mikael Forssell netted a nifty hat trick against the Spurs as Birmingham is trying to scamper away from one of those relegation spots. The win helps, unfortunately...

Reading 1, Middlesbrough 0 — ... the Royals are equally shocking as they score a 90th minute goal on the road, maintaining keeping one point between themselves and Birmingham for that last relegation spot. This match also featured nine yellow cards, which just seems excessive. [Witty remark about soccer]

Well, that settles it then. Arsenal' s wonder season is over, lost in the Oceanic 815 wreckage of its two colossal Cup defeats , first to Tottenham and now to Manchester United. There is nothing to live for and the only thing left to do is to off oneself, like, say, Owen Wilson. This way, if you survive, there's always that chance Sir Alex will invite you to United's victory orgy at Ronaldo's place

At least that's what you would have thought had you walked into Kinsale Tavern after Saturday's 4-0 Gooner humiliation. Everywhere you looked, there were ManU fans clinking their pints, singing their stupid songs and waving a fistful of $20s in the air (at last count Dubliner Dave had won $120, which covered nearly half his bar tab). But what was odd was that they were joined in their delirium by people who normally steal their hubcaps rather than cheer for them. Yes, so many Liverpool supporters were whooping it up with their hated Manchester rivals, there was barely enough space on Arsenal's grave for the Tottenham scum to dance their pathetic Carling Cup jig. Ah, nothing like a good Arsenal dickstomping to unite the world. Maybe the Shiites and Sunnis would like to join in.

Of course, only 90 minutes earlier those two-faced Scousers were on their own suicide watch, after losing to Plucky Little Barnsley at the death. Lingering Bursitis and his mates were so desperate to take their minds off their own sorry-ass debacle that they took comfort in standing shoulder to shoulder with the United mob and bellowing "Same Old Arsenal. Always Cheating" when Adebayour dove comically in the box.

You couldn't really begrudge the United fans their giddiness. They had not only ass-raped their fiercest rivals in the FA Cup 4-0, they had trussed us up and put a ballgag in our mouth. (Forgive me, I've been reading the New York Post a little too much lately.) I mean, what could better than that? Uh, winning the league, perhaps.

Let's try to keep some perspective here, people. Arsenal sucked balls on Saturday, but last I
looked — which is roughly every thirty seconds — we're still five points clear at the top of the Prem and hosting Milan on Wednesday in the Champions League. Think of it like losing the ACC Tournament but ending up in the Final Four. That was the spin I was using with my Arsenal wingman Raj when things started to get ugly Saturday.

Raj is the former college linebacker who still looks like he could turn a bar into a parking lot at the slightest provocation. "This is the same shit we went through after the Spurs game," I reminded him, "and we didn't exactly fall apart, did we?" Unless, of course, your definition of falling apart is to win four straight games over respectable (OK, two wins were against Newscastle) Prem teams to vault over ManU into first place.

Raj was not assuaged. "I feel like hitting some motherfucker," he said, looking balefully in the direction of Relegation Zone Mikey singing "Arsene Wenger Is a Pedophile."

"Have another beer," I said, forgetting that it was barely 12:20 and he was on his fourth. "All this proves is that ManU's B team is better than our B team and that Wenger is saving our studs for Wednesday's Champions League match against Milan."

This is probably a good time to point out that Arsenal were missing a few key players Saturday — Clichy and Sagna on the flanks, Flamini in front of the back four, Adebayour spearheading the attack and Fabregas pulling the strings at midfield. Yes, I know that ManU was without Ronaldo, Tevez and Giggs, but United is so deep that they can throw on that little porn star Nani and the Scottish kipper Fletcher without losing their mojo. Arsenal, on the other hand, suffers a catastrophic drop-off when Wenger is forced to start his fetuses like Hoyte and Traore in defense. Nani turned Hoyte inside out more times than he did those hookers at Ronaldo's hot tub romp, and I never thought I'd live to see the day where the announcer in an Arsenal game utters the words "Darren Fletcher's on a hat trick."

Still, even with the weakened lineup — actually it turns out Fabregas did play according to the team sheet — and a waterlogged bog of a pitch, there are no excuses for Arsenal's limp-dick performance. Not that Wenger didn't do his best to find them amid the smoldering ruins of another Cup fiasco. Ever the gracious loser, the Frenchman went on and on about the field being a "disgrace," but how about Eboue's attempt to implant his foot into Evra's stomach. What would you call that, Monsieur? The ref called it a red card, reducing Arsenal to 10 men early in the second half. Had he seen Gallas poleax Nani minutes later, the Gunners would have finished with nine players on the field.

Not that it would have mattered. They were outshot 13-1, outcornered 7-0 and outthought for 90 minutes. Indeed, if Rooney had been at his predatory best instead of only scoring one of a half dozen gilt-edged chances, United might have hit double figures.

Did I mention we were five points clear at the top?

When I walked into Kinsale Tavern on Sunday morning, making sure to step lightly around the dried tears of Patriots fans right outside the entrance, I was expecting a raucous welcome. After all, I was rockin' my Giants Super Bowl Champions t-shirt and still recovering from reprising Fear and Loathing in Phoenix with Leitch who, among other things, offered to blow a state trooper — and give him a signed book! — if he didn't search our car.

But despite the fact that all the usual ManU wankers were three deep at the bar in their silly scarves and kits, the place was like a sepulchre. "Who died?," I asked Pauline, the pub's longtime proprietess.

"23 people," she whispered, and I thought to myself "Wow, these kids don't know how to hold their liquor, do they?" And then it hit my addled brain like a Jay Alford sack on Tom Brady. Of course the reason that Kinsale was so eerily quiet — indeed, the reason that 76,000 people stood hushed at Old Trafford on the big screens over the bar — was the one minute of silence to commemorate the 1958 plane crash that killed 23 people, including eight beloved Manchester United players.

Think "We are Marshall" but with Bobby Charlton in the Matthew McConaughey role.

The solemn prelude was the pre-game entertainment before yesterday's big ManU-Man City derby kicked off. Call me shallow, but I preferred watching Jordan Sparks sing the national anthem. After all, I used to cheer for her weak-ass Dad not to get burned by Michael Irvin back in the day.

But there was no cheering at Old Trafford where Sir Alex got all Rudy Giuliani on the Man City yobs and warned them that anyone who so much as tittered during the one minute of silence would be waterboarded — or forced to watch the Liverpool-Chelsea game afterwards. The irony, of course, is that the Man City fans were actually respectful, while the ManU faithful are coping with their grief by selling their commemorative scarves on E-bay (how much do I hear for my Cory Lidle bobblehead?).

Wearing the retro sponsorless jerseys in honor of their fallen heroes, United wandered around the pitch like Britney at the MTV awards as City shredded their lazy defense for two goals en route to its first victory at Old Trafford since 1974.

"They were overwhelmed by the occasion," lamented Dubliner Dave who , according to Pauline, was himself so overwhelmed by the Giants Super Bowl victory that he was doing an Irish jig on top of the bar at 4 a.m. last Sunday.

But what excuse did Liverpool and Chelsea have for their coma-inducing display yesterday? Is it possible Alexi Lalas is right when the Galaxy GM says, in defense of MLS, that, "we don't have a monopoly on crap soccer." Certainly, this nil-nil draw at Stamford Bridge could serve as Exhibit A the next time some British tabloid hack calls the Galaxy a pub team. How eye-bleedingly awful was the match between two of England's alleged super powers? Let's put it this way, it made me hunger for a Kansas City Wizards-Colorado Rapids midseason game played on the football-lined field at Dick's Sporting Goods Park.

Why, I wondered, was I even watching the Liverpool-Chelsea borefest when I could have been in Accra, Ghana thrilling to the joyful and dazzling play at the African Nations Cup? (If only Leitch wasn't such a cheap bastard, I could have pimped his book to all the Deadspin readers from Cote D"Ivoire.) Still, on the face of it, who could have foreseen that with so much high-priced talent on the field at Stamford Bridge, the soccer would be so soporific?

Yes, the Blues were missing Drogba and Essian, but for the first time since Christmas they had Lampard (welcome back, you fat fuck) alongside Ballack (nice open goal miss at the end, you whiny Kraut) in midfield with everyone's favorite mercenary Nicolas Anelka spearheading the attack. At least that's what it said on the lineup sheet, though for most of the game the $120 million troika was largely invisible. And what about all the hooey that Chelsea under Avram Grant was playing so much more attractive soccer than it did under Mourinho? Maybe that was the case in the Israeli's first few games in charge, but Chelsea's style has now become as dour as the black on black ensemble that Tony Soprano-witz flaunts on the touchline.

By comparison, the beleaguered Rafael Benitez looked positively jaunty, even though it's only a matter of time until Anfield observes a minute of silence in his honor. Liverpool may be a sad husk of the team that bestrode Europe only a couple of years ago, but is it his fault that Torres went away for international duty and came back injured? Without their lethal and stylish marksman, the Reds couldn't finish a sandwich, let alone a goal at Stamford Bridge where Liverpool has gone scoreless in its last eight visits.

Let's face it, Liverpool's attacking tandem of Crouch and Kuyt is not going to make defenders crap their shorts no matter how many high balls the Reds hoof into the box aimed at the head of the 6'8" beanpole striker. It never fails to amaze me how useless in the air the robotic Crouch is, and yesterday's three pathetic headers on goal were just more evidence that he will never be a force in the Prem.

Benitez can stroke his poor excuse for a goatee all he wants, but unless he finds a better partner for Torres upfront, Liverpool are in danger of the unspeakable happening — not qualifying for Europe. And if that were to happen, how long do you think their talismanic captain Steven Gerrard would stick around? Yesterday, Gerrard played like a man whose mind was elsewhere, possibly in Dubai where his girlfriend and her two friends were vacationing.

Let's bow our heads and have a minute of silence for them.

Maybe this is like how the Christmas spending increases every year. Perhaps other teams begin running commercials for JanuChristmas months in advance featuring husbands buying their hot middle-aged wives a new striker, wrapped up in an oversized ribbon. And with the advent of Paypal, player acquisitions are only made easier. How Black Friday occurs at the end of the season and not the beginning is beyond me, but it's evident that it's part of the equation.

So now all the teams are content with who they have — okay, most teams — and must mush onward to Saturday's action. The top game might be the earliest one: Manchester City/Arsenal. But it might not be. The only thing I can confidently deduce is this: there will be multiple ties.

7:45 a.m. — Man City v Arsenal
10:00 a.m. — Birmingham v Derby
10:00 a.m. — Blackburn v Everton
10:00 a.m. — Portsmouth v Chelsea
10:00 a.m.- - Reading v Bolton
10:00 a.m. — Tottenham v Man Utd
10:00 a.m. — Wigan v West Ham
12:15 a.m. — Liverpool v Sunderland

English Football Transfer Window Spending Sets New Record [AFP]
Jewell Transfer Rage After Mills Injury Blow [ESPNsoccernet]

Let me begin by saying that people who live in pint glasses shouldn't throw stones, but even the 14 beers I consumed at Leitch's party the other night (did anybody know he had a book out? Has he mentioned it?) didn't put me in the same league as Ashley Cole.

My favorite Chelsea player was apparently caught with his kit down last week with a woman who wasn't his wife, the pulchritudinous Girls Aloud singer Cheryl Tweedy. Think poor man's David Beckham meets rich man's Posh Spice.

According to the always-reliable Sun, Cole who had previously shown his class by bolting Arsenal for our bitter London rivals because he felt that his weekly $110,000 wage wasn't worthy of his supreme excellence, cheated on his bird, Tweedy, with a 22-year-old blonde hairdresser, Aimee Walton. And Cashley being Cashley, he did it in high style.

According to young Aimee, Smashley was so drunk during their special night together that he pulled a move out of Big Daddy Drew's playbook and threw up on her on their way to their assignation. Then, for good measure, while having sex he vomited "all over the nice cream carpet." Undaunted, Trashley excused himself and went to the bathroom, swigged a little Listeren, and got stuck in again.

Now, as readers of this column know, I'm not one to praise Cole or, as I like to call him, The Cuntley One, but you gotta give the guy credit: He's a gamer. After an injury timeout, Mouthwashley slapped her "backside so hard his wedding ring left an imprint." (I don't know about you, but I'd bid for that ass on E-bay.)

And speaking of class (don't you love these lazy segues?), I find it rich that I was lectured on Arsenal showing an absence of it by Lingering Bursitis and the gang at Unprofessional Foul after a week in which it was revealed that Tom Hicks and George Gillett, the very classy American yahoos who own LB's beloved Liverpool — at least until they can con some Arab into giving them a few thousand oil wells and a small army to escort them out of Anfield — shopped Benitez' job behind his back while issuing public declarations of support.

Oh, and please don't talk to me about Wenger's arrogance in fielding his uncircumcised babies against Spurs in the Carling Cup when Benitez had such high regard for Liverpool's opponent on Saturday that he started such household names as Martin Skrtel and Charles Itandje. How sweet would it have been had the part-time garbage collectors and taxi drivers from Havant and Waterloo (isn't that a tube stop on the Piccadilly line?) actually held onto their two leads and pulled off the greatest upset in FA Cup history?

H&W is five leagues, 123 places, and a gazillion dollars below Liverpool in the English football hierarchy, yet for 45 glorious minutes they matched the five-time European champions tackle for tackle, pass for pass and goal for goal. When word came through to Kinsale Tavern that Liverpool was tied 2-2 at the half — in their infinite wisdom, the British TV feeds had chosen Wigan-Chelsea over Pool-H&W — the entire bar sang a mock chorus of "You'll Never Walk Alone." In fact, Benitez would surely have been walking alone right out the club exit had he not been saved by Super Yid Yossi Benayoun's hat-trick. Afterwards, the embattled Liverpool manager at least did two things that hinted while his owners may be bumbling fools he still retains a touch of class. He praised Havant and Waterloo on their "courageous" performance ,and he didn't throw up on the nice cream carpet.

This just in: Manchester United and Arsenal have been paired in the 5th round of the FA Cup on February 16-17. Holy fucking shit. Nice to see that the draw isn't fixed.

If I weren't so filled with the milk — ok, beer — of human kindness, I would loathe Cristiano Ronaldo almost as much as I hate Tom Brady. Here's a guy who after sustaining a small gash on his left eyebrow — oh, the poor baby! — in a Champions League game last year said, "I don't like to look like this, but in four or five days I will be beautiful once again." Here's a guy who in the first sentence of his new book proclaims, "My name is Cristiano Ronaldo ... and I know this name means a lot to those who love football." Yeah, it also means a lot to those who love hair-gel, half-naked Vogue layouts, winking at refs and diving more than Jacques Cousteau.

Is it some sort of cosmic joke that a player who literally prances down the field, albeit fast, can haunt my dreams of Arsenal winning the Prem this season? I mean, it was bad enough that I was busted by Pauline, the longtime Irish bartender/den mother at Kinsale, for brandishing the new Penthouse as soon as I walked in.

"Lots of good articles in there, huh, Dave? " Pauline said to gales of derisive laughter. Tragically, I actually did bring it for the articles; well, one article anyway, in which Leitch's new book is excerpted amid a tsunami of pink. That's the kind of dedicated book editor I am. If one of my authors is published in a skin magazine, I'm man enough to go to the newsstand and buy it (though I think his girl-on-girl pictorial was a little skeevy).

Leitch's issue of Penthouse — when I finally got it back from Relegation Zone Mickey who, as he headed off to the men's room, also claimed to be a book editor — was certainly less troublesome than the copy of "Moments" that I pulled out on the subway later that day. Let me explain. The book was a Chanukah gift from a woman I know in England who, after reading last week's column about my new Arsenal yarmulke, thought it would be funny to send me a tome that featured 150 "sumptuous" photos of Ronaldo, only seven of which appeared to contain any articles of clothing other than a thong. Of course, I didn't know this when I cracked open "Moments" on the no. 6 train and glimpsed an oiled up Ronaldo executing a Triple Lindy.

At least this time he was diving into a pool of water instead of a penalty box. How gay was this book? Let me put it this way: I would have rather had Ricky Martin's photo album of his last beach vacation on my lap than be seen flipping through "Moments." When a passenger across from me gave me a Ronaldo-esque wink, I realized it was time to break out Leitch's Penthouse. Thanks, Will, for keeping me from getting ass-raped.

This episode occurred shortly after I had watched the Portuguese Dancing Queen in his new Bugatti-racing gold boots tear apart Newcastle with his first-ever hat-trick and came to the unhappy conclusion that the Gunners are fucked. To be sure, our weak-ass 1-1 draw against Birmingham didn't help things — will Cesc ever be the world-class player again he was before his injury? — but I'm afraid it's not how pedestrian Arsenal looked Saturday but how scary-good ManU did. You can make the case that Newcastle were a demoralized, rudderless shell of a team after Big Sam was sacked earlier in the week but you can't argue with a 6-0 dick-stomping that could have easily been double digits had it not been for five goalline clearances and any number of heroic saves from Shay Given.

This was a statement game for United, which essentially said "Anything Arsenal can do we can do better." You want sexy football? How about the lightening fast positional interchanges between Rooney and Tevez and the audacious skills of Ronaldo, who somehow cushioned Tevez's hard pass with his first touch, and, in one seamless movement, cooly jinked the on-rushing Given before slotting home to make it 3-0?

There really isn't any way to defend against this kind of improvisational genuis other than to kick Ronaldo up in the air, and even that is useless because he will flop a nanosecond before the tackle can scythe him down. And because he is moving at such warp speed and his legs are such a blur of stepovers and pullbacks, it's well nigh impossible for the human eye to distinguish between him simply kicking the ground and losing his balance and a player barging him over. Far be it from me to feel sorry for pretty boy thug Alan Smith, but the Newcastle forward hardly grazed Ronaldo in the 48th minute, and yet a free kick was awarded at the edge of the penalty area. It's Ronaldo's ability to con referees into giving him the benefit of the doubt that may be the greatest trick in his repertoire. But it's hardly the only one.

On the resulting free kick, everyone in the stadium expected him to unleash one of his surface-to-air screamers, but he cleverly waited for the Newcastle's defensive wall to jump and then hammered the ball underneath their airborne feet into the goal. So effortless was the shot that Ronaldo had a look on his face not of unbridled joy but of smug satisfaction.

It was a look I fear we will see a lot more in the coming months as United prance to another title. The diving little bitch.

Meanwhile, Everton's Joleon Lescott seems to be coping all right after scoring an own goal in stoppage time against Chelsea in the Carling Cup earlier this week. Although it didn't help his psyche after he got home from the game, he unpeeled a banana and accidentally threw away the innards. Before that they lost a stunner in the FA Cup to League One (think FCS in college football) Oldham 1-0. Hmm. Oldham. Note to self: throw away expired Carl Buddig lunch meat.

So they're not doing so hot. But Man City hasn't won at Everton in their last nine trips, so this matchup here has tie written all over it. That has to be an interesting outcome for footie fans to experience over and over. Of the 209 games in the Prem League this year, one quarter of them (53) have ended with nobody winning. Can you imagine if MLB teams ended with 40 ties? Although I suppose salvaging a tie instead of losing in extra innings wouldn't be too bad of a change of pace for Cubs fans.

10 a.m.
Arsenal at Birmingham
Aston Villa at Reading
Chelsea at Tottenham
Derby at Wigan
Everton at Man City
Middlesbrough at Liverpool
West Ham at Fulham

12:15 p.m.
Man United at Newcastle

Everyone celebrates their 25th birthday in their own special way. Britney went on a Hollywood bender with Paris and flashed her ass to the paparazzi. Gilbert Arenas had Busta Rhymes, Lil SWayne, TI and The Game perform at the party Diddy threw for Agent Zero and 7,500 of his closest friends. And Harold Rosengarten got to watch Arsenal play Burnley in the third round of the FA Cup yesterday with me at Kinsale Tavern.

I'd like to think that Harold will look back on his big Two - Five with the kind of warm glow that I'm sure Britney and Arenas do ,but I know I will never forget our two hours together. After all, I've been going to Kinsale most weekend mornings for two years now, and while Deadspinners have bought me the occasional pint (ok, 234 beers at last count), no act of drunken generosity will ever compare to the stylish gift Harold presented to me
— my very own Arsenal yarmulka .

This is just the skull cap I've been looking for to cover the testosterone-fueled bald spot on my dome for the days (both of them) that I actually attend temple, and I'm sure it will come in handy in the unlikely event, say before the ManU showdown on April 12, that I should ever need to say a prayer for the Gunners.

It all started a couple of weeks ago when I got an e-mail from a Deadspin reader named Ben Muschel saying he had a friend whose "dream" it was to watch an Arsenal match with me, and he thought it would make a nice 25th birthday present for his mate if I agreed. Talk about setting your goals low.

Wow, I thought, my own make-a-wish foundation, and as far as I knew Ben's friend wasn't even terminal. He was, however, Jewish.

"He owns an Arsenal yarmulka," Ben said. "Really."

Now, that's a commitment that not even Unsilent Majority in his love of Chelsea has ever displayed. I had to see for myself. Because he is Orthodox, Harold couldn't make any of the regular Prem matches on Saturday, so he had to settle for a game against a team that currently sits 31 league places below Arsenal in English football.

The beauty of the FA Cup is that it represents the one time all year that players from the small downtrodden clubs get to take a shot at the glamorous millionaires in the Premiership who spend more on hookers per hour ($600, according to Ronaldo's strumpets) than they earn for a month's sweat and blood on the pitch. That's why it makes my heart soar when you have a weekend like this past one where the big boys like Everton, Blackburn and Liverpool get their dicks caught in the buzzsaw of no-name clubs with nothing to lose. Of course, none of the Prem teams fielded their strongest lineup —Liverpool, for example, rested Gerrard, Torres and Reina, in their 1-1 draw with Lutonfuckin'Town — but really, is that any excuse? Would anyone be surprised if George Gillett and Tom Hicks, Liverpool's American yahoo owners, soon decided to rest Rafa Benitez after that horror show?

Harold, for his part, was concerned that his hero, Cesc Fabregas, whose jersey he wore to complement his Arsenal scarf and yarmulka, was nowhere to be seen at Burnley. And I thought his yarmulka might fly off when, six minutes into the game, Burnley crashed a header against Jens Lehmann's crossbar. "Why is he even playing?" he asked of the second string Kraut goalkeeper who has been rumored to be saying Auf Wiedersehn to Arsenal any day now.

I explained that the German is holding out because Borussia Dortmund has refused to pony up a Deutchemark more than $60,000 a week, which is $30,000 less than he earns at Arsenal. "And here he was almost beaten by a guy who probably makes 60 grand a YEAR," Harold said.

After getting over the initial shock of almost seeing Arsenal fall behind, both Harold and the Gunners settled down and the gulf in class between the two teams began to show as first Eduardo and then Bendtner breached the Burnley defense. The only question that remained was whether the Gunners' newest squad member might be given a runout. Alas, it turned out that David Beckham wasn't even on the bench, thereby ending all the surreal speculation that Wenger would sign Goldenballs on loan. After all, wasn't it a real mindfuck — Beckham in a Gunner kit? You'd get better odds seeing Lindsey Lohan photographed with underwear on than to see images last week of Becks in full Arsenal regalia training with the Gunners, looking for all the world as if were a member of the team. I mean, he even bleached his hair the same yellow color as Almunia's.

Wenger explained that Beckham, who you might remember had a few fitness problems last season with the Galaxy, was simply working out with the Gunners in order to get in shape for England's game against Switzerland next month, in which he hopes to earn his 100th cap under new England manager Fabio Capello. When not running drills with Arsenal, Beckham spent last week sucking up to his old Real boss, even going so far as to reveal that he wore ballet shoes as a kid, a clear sop to Capello who was famously photographed in a tutu back in his Rome days.

Becks said that it would be a "dream" to play under Capello again, but as someone who now knows a little something about dreams, it will take more than an Arsenal kit to get him that 100th cap for a quarter Jew like him. I might even loan him my yarmulka.

I used to think that I'd witnessed some wild-ass shit at my company's holiday parties back in the day. I mean, I once had an assistant who thought he had gotten the ultimate Christmas grab bag, having double-dipped with two different young ladies, only to be punched out on the dance floor by one of the girls. But now I realize that what I thought was outrageous behavior was actually kind of innocent holiday hijinks.

No, it turns out that in order to really experience the true spirit of goodwill toward men, you had to be at Manchester United's party the other night. You know the one where 25 players paid $8,000 each to rent out a hotel, drink and gamble for 15 hours and invite 100 women who were not their girlfriends or wives to play "Shag Your Favorite Footballer."

Trust me, the Minnesota Vikings party boat had nothing on these lads.

One woman claimed she was allegedly raped by 19-year-old reserve defender Jonny Evans. Yet another woman who had sex with THREE ManU stars "shrieking like hyenas and screaming 'get in there' had a perfectly fine time.

"Yeah, of course, why wouldn't it be," she said. "They said I was a great shag."

The English call this sort of group activity "Roasting." as in roasting a chicken, so you can stuff it (and here I've been thinking roasting involved a bunch of old Jews getting together at the Friars Club to tell dirty jokes while exhorting Uncle Miltie to whip it out).

ManU may still trail Arsenal by a point at the top of the Prem, but let's give the Red Devils their due. Coming on the heels of Ronaldo's pool party romp with three $600 an hour hookers, their balls-out performance all but locks up the Hedonism Cup with half a season left to shag. I say "all but" because a fellow Mancunian, albeit one who plays for crosstown rival Man City, 19 year old England star Micah Richards was recently caught on video in one of the city's spacious handicapped stalls having sex with a teenage fan who was multi-tasking his friend at the same time. To hell with Amsterdam's red light district, next time I want to fly my freak flag, I'm heading right to Manchester.

It should be pointed out that this spirit of giving also extended to the pitch. Both ManU and Arsenal were presented with unexpected — and some might say undeserved —gifts in their games this past weekend. You might have thought that United would be suffering from post-party " hyperextended penis strain" (or, as I call it, "a very high ankle sprain") in their first game back, a tough scrap against Everton, and indeed there were signs early on that some of the players were out of sorts. Rooney, for instance, who one British tabloid reported wore a white suit to the party and introduced himself to a fellow reveler with the clever come-on, "you can be Beyonce to my Jay-Z," waited only four minutes to earn a yellow card for going studs-up into Tim Cahill.

But no matter how disjointed and off their game ManU looked, they still have the world's third best player, and Ronaldo was in full Dancing Queen mode on Sunday. Having missed the team's X-mas festivities in order to attend FIFA's Player of the Year ceremony (where he finished behind Kaka and Mesi in the voting), ol' Twinkletoes tormented Everton with his stepovers from the opening whistle.

When he skipped past two defenders in the 22nd minute and unleashed a bending left-footed rocket on goal, Tim Howard had no chance. The Toffees, however, are nothing if not resilient and they harried United all over the park until they tied it up on a leaping Cahill header. That should have been enough to earn them a gritty draw but Stephen Pienaar, a talented young South African, invited Ryan Giggs to tumble over his outstretched leg in the box and the Welshman obliged with a theatrical flourish. Ronaldo —who else? — cooly converted the spot kick and ManU escaped their own "roasting" from Sir Alex who apparently now refers to himself in the required third person. He said of the teams' holiday orgy, "Alex Ferguson has been dealing with situations like this for 21 years and I know exactly what we'll do."

Just for the record, my beloved Arsenal's idea of a wild night out is to have an extra mince pie with their turkey. They don't serve pink champagne and lap dancers at Wenger's nursery school parties for his young team. That's not to say Arsenal didn't get their stockings stuffed. No threesome could have been any more satisfying than Robbie Keane's penalty kick in the 72nd minute; then again, it's been awhile since I enjoyed the company of Megan Fox and Katherine Heigl.

I can only imagine what deluded fantasies Relegation Zone Mikey was having when Keano stepped into the box to deliver what should have been Tottenham's first victory in 20 games against Arsenal. Of course, seconds later RZM buried his head in his hands as Arsenal's peroxided keeper Almunia dived to his left to smother the Irishman's weak effort. Then Kinsale erupted in high fives and shouts of "England's No. 1", an only half-joking reference to the Spaniard's attempt to secure British citizenship in order to play for England.

"Fuck off, you Gooner cunts," was all RZM could muster when we tried to console him. "Hey, consider yourself lucky that you got a draw at the Emirates," we said just as Wenger confirmed his genius when he substituted the tall 19-year-old Dane Nicholas Bendtner for Eboue. Bendtner's first touch went crashing into the net as Tottenham gave him all the space and time he needed to soar above their defense and powerfully head home Fabregas' corner for a 2-1 win which kept Arsenal on top of the Prem. Did I mention that the team in first place on Christmas Day has won the league the last four years?

As for me, I'll return after the New Year. Right now I'm off to Manchester where I expect to come down — and up — a few chimneys.

(UPDATE: And apparently it has been an active day in the EPL today as well.)