Do you have to kick Bolton to beat them?

It's raining irony in the Premiership right now. Cocking-well pelting it down, in fact.

Arsenal's Abou Diaby was sent off at the weekend for a high lunge every bit as ugly as Martin Taylor's pin-snapper on the Gunners' Eduardo. The challenge, lest we forget, Arsene Wenger initially declared worthy of a lifetime ban, before downgrading it to a mere disgrace that needed to be stamped out of the game.

Wenger's reaction to the Diaby shin-splitter:

"I knew the injury was not bad and not comparable with Eduardo."

Nothing other than sheer good fortune prevented Bolton's Gretar Steinsson from following Eduardo on to the surgeon's table, and Wenger knows it. But will he impose a lifetime ban on his own player, or even publicly upbraid him in the way he's slated Taylor several times? More chance of him splashing out £50m on Titus Bramble.

And which side was the victim of the Arsenal player's assault? None other than Bolton, the side that Wenger has accused of kicking his team off the park several times. I trust an apology is on its way to the Reebok. Along with a a guidebook to the Coca-Cola Championship.