SKY'S ability to move from the ridiculous to the sublime is a thing of wonder. When Sports Stars See Red was a countdown of great sporting dismissals, a very hard idea to make a mess of, but they did their best in between making it raucously entertaining.

It was full of incidents that you had either forgotten or hadn't seen before. Or just wanted to see again, such as Harvey Smith, the bad boy of showjumping in the late '70s, completing a clear round to win the British Show Jumping Derby and giving a two-fingered salute to the judges as he left the field. Despite taking place in a minority sport the incident entered the lexicon to such a degree that Chambers Dictionary lists a "Harvey Smith" as a V-sign with the palm inwards, signifying derision and contempt.

Smith himself claimed, tongue in cheek, that it was a straightforward V-for-victory salute, while one of the officials he aimed his salute at snootily claimed that it was only right Smith had his title rescinded as, "We don't want to become like West Ham supporters." Jolly good.

Up next were Newcastle teammates Lee Bowyer and Kieron Dyer knocking seven bells out of each other in a Premiership match. And giving her expert opinion on this incident wasf Kate Lawler. If you don't know who Kate Lawler is, well done. And just to leave you in no doubt that this programme was being aimed squarely at those that buy Nutsmagazine, host Paddy McGuinness traded on the type of jokes you don't want to laugh at, but do. Sample link: "And now, like a Premiership footballer at a beauty pageant, we're going to enter the top five."

But the good easily outweighed the bad. Laugh as Tim Henman is kicked out of Wimbledon for whacking a ballgirl!

Guffaw at the uncoordinated collapse of that referee Paolo Di Canio pushed over!

Chortle as Jon Drummond stages a liedown protest after being disqualified at the 2003 World Athletics Championships.

"The only way I'm leaving here is y'all just gonna have to carry me off."

And of course, Roy had to be in there.

His attempt at maiming Alf-Inge Haaland looks worse the more angles you see it from. Peter Schmeichel turned up to talk the usual professional footballers' guff and say things like, "That was what he gave us." We can hope he was being honest and meant thuggery but it's far more likely he was referring to some kind of mythical competitive edge. Guess you have to be more competitive when you're down to 10 men.

Number one with a bullet, or at least a chunk of ear, was Mike Tyson. Aside from the actual act of trying to eat Evander Holyfield, the most remarkable part of his segment was the press conference at which he tried to justify his actions, claiming that he felt Holyfield had tried to headbutt him earlier in the fight so he "did what any athlete would have done".

Quite. Frank Warren was the talking head who berated Tyson's excuses, although he didn't exactly cover himself in glory, saying that Tyson "was like a woman, with all his crying and complaining."

The RTE panel on Wednesday at Croke Park seemed slightly off their game, John Giles being so perturbed by the team selected by Steve Staunton that he refused to give a prediction before the game, claiming he had no idea how it would all go. Even after the game there was a lot of confused talk, with the lads clearly still not convinced that Stan is the right man for the job, but having had their rhythm broken by the shock of a good performance from Ireland. Even The Dunph admitted there may yet be some hope for Ireland although whenever he mentioned what a good game Kevin Doyle had, he made a special effort to get a dig in about what a silly decision it was to leave him out for the previous game.

Old habits, and pundits, die hard.

But if the heat is off Stan for a while, people are still pointing flame-throwers at Steve McClaren. When the England manager stormed out of a post-match press conference after less than two minutes, Richard Keys on Sky Sports delivered the news of this event with a solemn tone that would have been more suited to announcing the assassination of JFK.

Glenn Hoddle managed to out do him though by telling us without a flicker of irony that the England manager's job is more difficult than that of the prime minister. "Everyone's got an opinion on football and the England manager's job, but a lot of people don't have an interest in politics, in fact at the moment they're just sick of it." The mind boggles.

Thankfully, Sky's producers were on their game, weighing up McClaren's refusal to speak to the media and playing Kaiser Chiefs over the closing credits, complete with the chorus, "When the heat dies down I'll be back in town, and until that time I'll be back at mine." From the ridiculous to the sublime.