I hate to say I told you so....

But I did! I said Hughes was the next to go and sure as hell he got the boot on Saturday night. Even after a 4-3 win against fellow top 4 upsetters Sunderland. Let's be fair though we all saw it coming and knew that Hughes was out of his depth at City with all that money. Good luck to Mancini who said 'it had always been my dream to manage in the Premier League since I played for Leicester' errr ok!

Rich was spot on with his predictions for the weekend, especially for the United game. My pal Dave even predicted a 3-0.. But didn't stick any cash on it! Football365.com offered 40/1 for united and Liverpool to lose on Friday.

So the title race is well and truely back on now and the battle to stay up is hotting up even more now also with Pompey's emphatic win Sat lunchtime.

Going to be a crazy week kids.

Awesome result in the cricket also - another last wicket stand saves the day but this time it was Collingwood and Onions! Get in!

I'm out of the country over Xmas so will miss the boxing day clashes, I sure hope Arsenal can keep Villa out! So I hope everyone has a fantastic Christmas and will see you all in the new year.

Mark Hughes gets sacked for Christmas.

So after a thrilling game between Man City and Sunderland Mark Hughes waved goodbye to the fans. Hughes has confirmed he didn't find out he was going to be sacked until after the match.
If this is true why did he wave goodbye to the fans at the full-time whistle?

I think the sacking of Hughes is not a fair one as they have only lost two games all season.
Okay they haven't won many, but they are still in a prime position to break into the top four with a game in hand.

With so many new players it does take time for a team to gel. There main problem has been the defence and they have been on the cusp of more victories only to concede last minute goals.
None more noticeable than the Manchester derby with Owen scoring at the death.

The owners had obviously be planning this for a while as Roberto Mancini has taken over immediately. Do you think Mancini will do a better job? Should Hughes have been given more time?

At least he won his last game and Hughes will be back for sure....

Predictions for the weekend? Here we go again.....

So far none of the premier league games have been called off due to the weather, so here they are!

Arsenal V Hull
Aston Villa V Stoke
Blackburn V Tottenham
Fulham V Man Utd
Man City V Sunderland
Portsmouth V Liverpool
Everton V Birmingham
West Ham V Chelsea
Wolves V Burnley

Who do you think will drop points this weekend?

I think Man Utd will have a tough game at the Cottage? I can see an upset here with Fulham nicking the three points...

Liverpool face a tricky encounter at Fratton Park, Portsmouth pushed Chelsea in the week and will surely have a go against Liverpool who are still low on confidence despite the return of key players. Rafa has guaranteed Liverpool will finish in the top four, are these brave words or is this just to keep the wolves from the door?

Mark Hughes will be hoping for a win against Sunderland. Will Robhino be picked after storming off against Spurs ;) in the week. I can see Sunderland getting a point here and this could mean more pressure on Hughes?

Will Spurs put in a shift away at Blackburn? These are the games we must win if we want to play ball with the big boys. I think we can safely say Keano won't start this match after organising the xmas party!

Arsenal will not want a repeat result of last years fixture against Hull. I can see the Gooners taking all three points here.

Chelsea have leaked four goals in the last two games and face the Hammers at Upton Park. I think Chelsea will just come out on top in this London derby.

What are you thoughts on these games and the other fixtures?

The truth comes out

Well well well, as I sit on the district line on my way home, I pick up an evening standard to learn that Robbie Keane has gone behind Harry Redknapp's back and taken his Spurs chums to a £2,000 a head Xmas party last Wednesday, coincidentally a few days before their 1-0 loss at home to Wolves.

Come on lads, if you seriously want to break the top 4, you can't go boozing up in Dublin with your out of favour, turncoat, Liverpool reject (soon to be ex) Captain.

Especially don't lie to Harry and tell him your going to play golf!? I expect they did but still it's no surprise that Spurs failed to defeat Wolves with this attitude. Arsene would have lynched those involved!

Spurs showed on Wednesday that they can beat anyone on their day, so why don't they take this campaign seriously and try and win every game they can!?

Silly Robbie off to Celtic seems a sure thing now, place your bets....

Spurs V Man City and the defence problems at the Lane.

I think there is very little chance of us keeping a clean sheet again this evening. Tevez or Adebayor will surely be on the score sheet. I think it will be a case of us scoring more to win this game. We must take our chances, it's sure to be open as City won't be parking the bus.

I couldn't help but notice this link this regarding Tottenham's defensive frailties and the incredible relaxed approach about the biggest problem area in our squad:

http://www.sportinglife.com/football/news/story_get.cgi?STORY_NAME=soccer/09/12/16/manual_074222.html&TEAMHD=soccer

This is madness by Spurs yet again! We knew that we needed another centre half during summer along with the Bassong signing as King would hardly play. (Not to mention Woodgate didn't kick a ball all summer).

The article states that Harry thinks we could be in for a disaster month in Jan losing two of the current back four to African Nations possibly for a month. (We knew this would happen though).
Harry then says he doesn't have a "Clue" when King or Woodgate will play again….
But then to my amazement Harry says we are fine in that area and he won't be buying a defender come Jan as we have plenty of cover in the defence…! Er….No we don't!!!!! You can't include Corluka and Hudd as centre backs and Bale as left back is not worth talking about. What happens if Dawson gets injured???

Can you imagine a back four of (Hutton, Corluka, Dawson, Bale) that would concede even more goals then the current line up…?

If we don't buy a centre half or two come Jan we will be lucky to finish in the top 7.
If we don't do anything about this we would be bonkers and will blow our chance of achieving any kind of European football.

The African Effect.

This years African Nations Cup could have the biggest impact yet, with so many African players now plying their trade in the Premiership, many more teams than before rely on their expertise.

Here is a table from the BBC Sport Website that shows the impact this will have on each club.

As can be seen by this table, Portsmouth could be dead and buried by the time the end of Jan arrives. Chelsea could be bang in trouble too if they continue this dodgy patch they are going through. The problem Chelsea have also is that the players they are looking to lose for the tournament are key players in Essien, Drogba, Kalou and Mikel. Granted Essien is out injured  - but he will be out until the end of Jan/start of Feb anyway. As United won't lose anyone (and their injury list may have diminished by then) they will be looking to eclipse Chelsea during this time. Chelsea's goal tally will surely slow down during this time so unless the rest of the team pull their weight - Drogba will certainly be missed.

Arsenal only lose 2 players this year which is a bonus on previous years, however one of them is Alex Song who has become the king pin in the middle of the midfield allowing Fabregas and company to thrive. Losing him will be a great loss especially as he has been so instrumental so far.

Manchester City lose big names in both Attack and Defense - where Arsenal lost it last year.. Adebayor and Toure will be a huge loss in their bid for the top 4.

The main talking point though is Portsmouth - losing SIX players during this time. Their squad isnt huge as it is anyway let alone with 6 men down. If you check out the full list you will see that 3 of them are regular first teamers and the others feature regularly from the bench. It could well be all over sooner rather than later for Pompey

Here's the full list...

Number of players at the African Cup of Nations
Six: Portsmouth - Kevin-Prince Boateng, Nadir Belhadj, Hassan Yebda, John Utaka, Nwankwo Kanu, Aruna Dindane
Four: Chelsea - Michael Essien, Didier Drogba, Salomon Kalou, John Obi Mikel
Three: Man City - Kolo Toure, Emmanuel Adebayor, Kelvin Etuhu; Hull City - Kamel Ghilas, Daniel Cousin, Seyi Olofinjana
Two: Arsenal - Alex Song, Emmanuel Eboue; Tottenham - Sebastien Bassong, Benoit Assou-Ekotto; Everton - Joseph Yobo, Ayegbeni Yakubu; Fulham - John Pantsil, Dickson Etuhu
One: Aston Villa - Moustapha Salifou; Sunderland - John Mensah; Stoke - Mamady Sidibe; Bolton - Danny Shittu; Burnley - Andre Bikey; Wigan - Richard Kingson; Wolves - George Elokobi
None: Man Utd, Liverpool, West Ham, Birmingham, Blackburn

A weekend of amazing results...

Whether it be Ryan Giggs winning Sports Personality of the year, Joe winning the X Factor or Bolton holding rampant Man City to a 3-3 draw - this weekend was one to remember!

All across the football leagues there were results that would have cocked up a lot of accumilators. Title hopes took a knock down on the south coast where Bournemouth were crushed 5-0 away at Morcombe,  Middlesborough lost at home to Cardiff and Man Utd lost to top 4 wannabe's Aston Villa.

There was a goal fest on Saturday in the premiership in 2 fixtures, both seeing 6 goals. Now that's some value for money! It shows why it's the best league in the world. Chelsea held at home by Everton who REALLY needed a result like that to kick start there season (see Richards earlier blog to see the troubles they've had!). Chelsea seem to be leaking goals at the minute and letting their grip on the trophy loosen, which is fantastic really as I had written off the hopes of their being a title race this year in my post about 2 weeks ago. Chelsea will have wanted a large margin ahead of the rest of the pack before they lose Drogba, Kalou, Mikel (& Essien if he wasn't injured) etc to the African Nations (Why they are holding it in a World Cup year I still don't know!).

Bolton had a fantastic weekend and would have hoped for a bit of a better defensive performance to hold out Man City - considering they were ahead 3 times in the match! It really did show though that anyoe can beat anyone in the Prem (or nearly..) However, it wasn't enough to drag them out of the drop zone and it was another draw for City...

Who is looking most likely for the drop now? Surely Bolton and Portsmouth showed this weekend why they won't be in there come May, but West Ham.. maybe. Wolves had a good weekend in that they toppled Spurs at WHL where the last home game saw the home side net 9 goals. Despite this though, I still think Wolves will go down, along with Bullard-less Hull who had a dull weekend without their talisman.

Elsewhere was a demonstartion of the midtable certainties surrounding Stoke, Wigan, Fulham and Burnley where points were shared.

The main talking point for me (in a 100% non biased way ;-D) was the result on Sunday evening where Arsenal came from behind to maintain Liverpool's run of poor results. Liverpool were by far the best team in the first half where Arsenal looked flakey and inconsistent. Manuel Almunia showed why Wenger will probably look for a keeper in Jan as he flapped at a free kick coming into the box which then ended up in the back of the net off Dirk Kuyt.

Apparently Wenger roasted the players at half time and it showed immediately after the break. Arsenal looked like a completely different side and held possession for most of the half. Liverpool still showed why they are a class act with threats from the likely names of Gerrard and Torres but Arsenal seemed like they had woken up a bit this half. A bad refereeing decision, a fortunate own goal from Glen Johnson and a wonderstrike from the pocket-sized Arshavin took the Gunners to within 3 points of United and 6 of Chelsea with a game in hand! Finally some luck for the injury devastated Gunners..

The title race is back on!

(Pictures from bbc.co.uk/sport)

Campbell to United? Owen off to the World Cup? Magilton to get the boot?

Well it's certainly been an interesting week so far and we haven't even seen Chris Kamara yet to say how Unbelievable! it's been!

Micky Owen scored a very nice hat trick away in Wolfsburg on Tuesday night which will have given Fabio Capello a slight headache - but lets be honest, and I am a big Michael Owen fan, but unless he does it week in week out and cements a first team place at United, along with staying injury free. I think its a bit of a tall order for the little man. It would be good for him and England as he has an impressive scoring record but maybe a stretch to far for him.

Elsewhere Chelsea may have suffered a HUGE setback in that they have shipped 7 goals in 3 games (2 of which were the first goals at the bridge since day 1 of the season) and they have lost Michael Essien until February. They planned to lose him for the whole of Jan anyway but as its an injury its a huge blow as rehab will take a lot longer than a plane trip back from Africa.

Jim Magilton has rocked the boat at Loftus Road this week after apparently headbutting Akos Buzsaky after they lost away at Watford in the week, on the back of losing heavily to Boro at home last weekend. What is happening? Is the pressure of being a rich club getting to the manager? The rumour mill has been rampant putting up a few names to succeed big Jim - namely Paul Ince and Alan Curbishley. The boss' fate is to be decided after internal investigation.

Sol Campbell to United?!!? Whaaat?! Surely the most unreliable man in football now! His track record is a bit questionable.. Left Spurs for Arsenal - went a bit mental at Arsenal and left a game at half time just before he departed to Pompey, left Pompey for Notts County (£££) only to bin them after 1 game when he realised they were in League 2. I can only imagine that his demands for playing for United will be pretty big.. but Fergie is a bit of a beast and will take him down a peg or two.. but he does need a centre back.....

Big fixtures this weekend - United vs Villa, Liverpool vs Arsenal to name a couple!

NOW I've got World Cup Fever!?

Maybe it's because we missed out on the Euro's (thank's to Schteve!) or maybe because I had had a few pints by the time the draw was made but I am genuinely excited about the World Cup.

The draw ceremony seemed to go without a hitch last night and it threw up some wonderful surprises!
Rumour has it that Charlize Theron cracked a joke during the rehearsal and pulled 'Ireland' from the hat! 
As per tradition the 'group of death' raised its head once again but thankfully our boys won't be in it! It was so great to see that Ronaldo and his Portugeezer mates will have to fight their way past North Korea, Brazil and the Ivory Coast in order to ruin our campaign this time. It's a big ask.

Other groups that were interesting were Group D including Germany, Australia and Ghana: Group E including Holland, Denmark and Cameroon (a mini group of death) and Argentina won't have it easy against Nigeria and former European champs Greece.

So I'm now thinking, surely this is it, this time round England can do it. The first stage of the knockout stage will see England face either Germany or Australia depending on where we finish in the group and where they do - my guess is we win the group and so do Germany so we'll face Australia (or Ghana if they do well). Good news too for all those in 9-5 jobs is that England's first match is on Friday 12th June at 19:30 vs USA. So we'll all be three sheets to the wind in the local by the time they kick off! The third and hopefully irrelevant group game is at 15:00 on a Wednesday so you'll have to sweet talk your boss for that one. Usually, the knockout matches are in the evenings making it easy for everyone to watch.

It was great to see that New Zealand have a decent chance of getting out of the group into the knockouts with Paraguay (not been the same since they lost their top goal scorer goal keeper) and Slovakia (not exactly juggernaughts). Italy will surely walk the group.

France have got away with murder to get into the draw and it looks like the first few weeks will be fairly easy for them too - similar to the current holders who won't really be tested until the later rounds.

Here's the full draw for those of you who missed it (from the BBC website)

Group A	Group B	Group C	Group D
South Africa	Argentina	ENGLAND	Germany
Mexico	Nigeria	United States	Australia
Uruguay	South Korea	Algeria	Serbia
France	Greece	Slovenia	Ghana
Group E	Group F	Group G	Group H
Netherlands	Italy	Brazil	Spain
Denmark	Paraguay	North Korea	Switzerland
Japan	New Zealand	Ivory Coast	Honduras
Cameroon	Slovakia	Portugal	Chile

Well the Spurs players took that game seriously?

After a very bright start and some great possession by Spurs, Gibson for United popped up with a great strike to make it 1-0. Spurs had a great chance to level it up but Defoe shot straight at the keeper after a great cross by Bentley. Again Spurs continued to see plenty of the ball but didn't really do much with it. Then Gibson was found in the middle by Berbatov and curled in a great shot to make it 2-0 against the run of play. So at half-time the score was 2-0, could Spurs fight back? No is the answer, the second half was like watching a number of players who had practically zero interest. Players giving away possession so easily and taking extra touches. Spurs just didn't look like they believed they could get back in it. Harry did say the league was more important than the Carling Cup and it looks like some of the players believed this too. United nearly added to their lead in the second half but surely they were expecting a more competitve match from Spurs who just didn't even try and were just making up the numbers. Hopefully Spurs will turn up for the Everton game.