If there's one thing that makes the Mill's life easier, then it's a bottom half of the Premier League more overcrowded than a Uefa buffet queue. Because with just three little points separating, er, high-flying Fulham in 10th from basement boys West Brom, pressure on managers is never far away.

Take Mark Hughes, for example: one win in seven league games, capped by yesterday's Richard Dunne-inspired 2-1 defeat to Spurs, has propelled Manchester City to within one point of the drop zone and today the Welshman finds himself splashed across the back pages "on the brink" of dismissal by his cash-happy paymasters. After barely a third of the season Robinho, Elano and Jo have reportedly all got fed up of Hughes's unique brand of touchline whingeing and "WANT HIM OUT". And according to a Sun source "close to the club's Arab owners", "Hughes has not got long. Even if he had beaten Spurs his job was in jeopardy - now losing has taken him to the edge." It's probably also worth noting that at this stage last season, Sven-Goran Eriksson's City had compiled 25 points from their league games, almost double the 13 that Hughes and his near-£75m outlay has produced thus far.

Also slaloming their way towards the foot of the table are 19th-placed Sunderland, where boss Roy Keane will take his frustrations out on Pascal Chimbonda, who was allegedly dropped and disciplined for breaking a curfew and attending Obafemi Martins' birthday last Thursday. Expect the glove-wearing Frenchman to be outward bound come January.

Good news for gold-diggers at Portsmouth, where a South African mining company will buy out Alexandre Gaydamak for a fee in the region of just £20m - around £40m lower than the original asking price. And boss Tony Adams' scour through his old contacts book will lead him to the appointment of Gilles Grimandi as coach. Or former Wimbledon manager Terry Burton.

Whether or not Adams can cling on to leading scorer Jermain Defoe in the forthcoming transfer window remains to be seen, with conflicting red-top reports suggesting he will - or won't - move to Spurs at the next available opportunity. Ultimately, Defoe's future could hinge on Harry Redknapp's ability to prise Wagner Love from CSKA Moscow instead.

And finally, news of some, ahem, fowl play at Manchester United, where the club's training sessions are being interrupted by dive-bombing Canadian geese. Apparently, the Carrington HQ also has to share its grounds with all hosts of wildlife, including frogs and toads. A comical United insider then saved the Mill from providing the inevitably hackneyed pay-off, telling the Sun: "The geese have been returning for the past couple of years and can dive better than Cristiano!"