While most sane people have spent the morning looking to the heavens trying to figure out where all the drizzle is coming from, the rest of us have been discussing London Elections, chomping back numerous bags of crisps, and keeping a casual eye fixed angrily on transfer rumours. Here’s what it found out.

Dean Ashton to Newcastle
Kevin Keegan is reportedly eyeing up Ashton to take over Mark Viduka’s role of standing perfectly still while Michael Owen and Obafemi Martin zip around in circles like dogs chasing a bumble bee. Ashton is rumoured to be keen.

David Villa to Tottenham
Days after emphatically declaring Arsenal as his dream destination, it looks like David Villa might throw caution to the wind and go to Spurs instead. Luckily for him, Tottenham fans are hugely forgiving - just ask Pat Jennings… or Sol Campbell.

Big Sam attempts to ruffle the Magpies’ feathers

King Kev’s palms are sweating a little more than usual, but he needn’t worry: according to Sam Allardyce, Newcastle aren’t a particularly big club and they haven’t realised their own ambitions. Oh, and the dismal form and potential relegation battle they face has nothing to do with him:

“I think you can accept it a lot more if you can come to terms with the fact that a good percentage of it was your fault - but that doesn’t apply to me at Newcastle.

“The usual rubbish that goes when someone like me is sacked from a club like Newcastle is that that job was too big for me. That’s just not true.

“If I’m honest the reverse is probably true. Newcastle probably wasn’t big enough for me - it didn’t live up to my ambitions in the short time that I was there.

Guess who the FAI met with in secret today? Not Venables, not Trappatoni, but SAM ALLARDYCE.

As the Newcastle monster devours the last morsels of its Big Sam meal, an unqualified local awaits his turn…

Were there such a thing as a map of national fiasco, Newcastle would be the biggest dot in the country. But if you think that hard-earned reputation will fade when Sam Allardyce’s rage-filled pantomime rolls out of town, as it surely must soon, think again.

An even greater calamity is set to take over at the North East’s Regional Theatre of Unintentional Comedy in the form of the Alan Shearer show, a short play in which a large group of beer-bellied proles grow increasingly bitter as they realize the man they believed was a messiah turns out to be beyond useless.

Richard Williams, writing in the Guardian last week, claimed Shearer was too grand to consider serving an apprenticeship before taking over at Newcastle, or even England.

Yet for all Shearer’s popularity - and gigantic sense of self-worth - Mike Ashley need only glance at Match of the Day each week to gain a sense that his reading of the game is unlikely to trouble the greater tactical brains of the Premier League. In fact, Shearer manages to pull off the improbable feat of saying nothing yet still managing to contradict himself.

His most recent display of insubstantial punditry came last Saturday, December 29. The “highlights” are as follows…

The best sports programming on the telebox this evening

It would be harsh to dismiss a manager upon losing to the undefeated league leaders, but nevertheless this is the kind of hot water Sam ‘I stole Christmas’ Allardyce finds himself in. If seeing the demise of a highly successful man isn’t your cup of tea, Everton are welcoming the Russians to Goodison tonight for some UEFA Cup jollity.

Newcastle Utd/ Arsenal (Sky Sports 1, 7.45pm)
Everton v Zenit St Petersburg (ITV4, 7.45pm)