Back to work for our villains after the two week lay-off, with three red cards in the round of cup matches played midweek. Celta's young full back José Enrique was shown a straight red late in the game against Betis for a vicious off the pitch tackle on Dani. His coach Fernando Vázquez couldn't really give him a ticking off though, as he too was shown a red card for the second time this season after picking up two bookings for protesting. Vázquez is the first manager to enter our chart this season, although this was not the first time we have seen his name on these pages. Villarreal keeper Barbosa also saw red after bringing down Valencia's David Villa in the penalty area in their cup tie, a fact which caused a bit of confusion a couple of days later when the club left him out of their squad at the weekend assuming he was banned. The disciplinary committee though were still at home polishing off their turkey sandwiches, and as they only met at the start of the following week his suspension will have to be served out in the second leg of the cup.

Four more red cards at the weekend, including Sevilla's assistant trainer Antonio Alvarez who got his marching orders for "raising one finger in the air and waving it from side to side". Quite clear that one! A flying elbow from Getafe's Belenguer on Cádiz midfielder Fabiano Estoyanoff ended with both seeing red, the former for the foul and the latter after picking up a second booking for retaliating. Estoyanoff is in fact a wanted man, the police in his native Argentina putting out an order for his arrest after an altercation with a police officer during the Christmas break. And Málaga midfielder Hidalgo was also sent off in the match at Sevilla after a hard tackle on an opponent only a half an hour in to the game. They will be joined in the stands next weekend by eight players who completed the five yellow card cycles, including Zaragoza's Alvaro, who picked up his tenth yellow card, and Belletti (Barcelona), Andrade, Capdevila and Munitis (Deportivo), Juanfran (Espanyol), Helguera (Real Madrid) and Gonzalo (Villarreal), all of whom were shown their fifth. (10.01.06)