Hi and hello football fans, it;s your old pal Roko The Football Guy, what's going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! It's decision time here at Football Guy towers. What decision? I hear you ask! Well about this time last year your old pal here decided to take a time out from the rigours of Full-Time sales that I was accustomed to and basically bum around working in the charity sector. I took a big wage cut but I got a lot of free time back to have some fun and...... Well not do much. I feel I've bumed around long enough and it's time for me to get back to earning some real money, but with the current financial climate I need to decide which sales sector to return to..... One that let's be earn good money with minimum effort would be nice! But regardless of where I work or how much I earn, one thing I won't ever be spending my money on is watching England play on the internet!

Don't get me wrong, I'm a big fan of the net and think it's the way forward for viewing sports, tv shows, movies ect, but paying to watch the national team of the country I was born in is not one of those. I've always thought it was bang out of order that an Englishman could not watch his national team on terrestrial telly (I think every other country in Europe would not stand for it) but I guess having it on Sky aint to bad as you can always go down the pub and let's face it, we need excuses to do so!

I know for all you who read blogs and such paying for things on the internet is nothing new, but believe me, there are tons of people out there who think a mouse is a rodent and wonder why an IP Address does not have a postcode! What are these people meant to do if they want to watch the England v Ukraine match? They can't watch it at home, they can't watch it at the pub and have you ever tried to fit four or five guy around a monitor to watch something? It's ridicules if you ask me.

I hope nobody pays to watch the match and if I was El Presidente I would ban selling the right to England matches, they should be available to all to watch from the comfort of their own homes as the National team is not a product to be sold, but a symbol of National pride that should be viewed by all for free should they desire.

Unfortunate for you that I'm not El Presidente, but next time the rights are up for sale, hopefully it will be my new sales job to sell them.......

How to celebrate a goal against you former team.

It's was great to see Richard Dunne score on Monday night against Man City and it was also a testament to the guy by the way he didn't celebrate. I bet Adebayor thought the goal had been disallowed by the way Dunne reacted. Check it out here.

I never really rated Dunne that highly as a player, but as a person he seems as good as they come. Have to say I'm a little gutted he didn't run the length of the pitch to celebrate in front of the City fans but then again I'm also disappointed that Adebayor can still use both his legs...... I guess you can't always get what you want!

Speaking of this match......

The Football Guy Prediction League

The result of Monday night's match has not yet been updated to the table so I think I show rectify that!

The FootyDoc and The SportBoys both picked a winner for the match and as it ended 1-1 they were both wrong. This result meant The Sportboys actually finished the week with a shocking record of Zero Perfect Results Two Correct Results Eight Wrong Results...... I guess the International break will do them good!

Me and Jamrock both went for a 2-2 draw so we at least get a correct result, but it was the great Lawro who pick 1-1. I'm quite embarrsed to say that I'd made a mistake on Lawro's scores and had forgot to update his results from the week that his scores were not posted on the BBC. He acuatlly is doing way better than what you think and is now tied with the Sportboy, I feel a little better about missing this error as nobody else did!

Heres the complete table -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

JamRock         11        34       31       360     

Football Guy     7        40       29       320

SportBoys        11       30       35       280

Lawro               10       32      34       280     

Footy Doc         7        32       36       170

Anyway, glad that's sorted.

See you tomorrow, take care

Football Guy

Hi and hello football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, what's going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! It's been a good weekend here at Football Guy towers to say the least, I've gone 48+ hours without any internet problems, my favourite team smashed six past one of my least favourite team/manager combo's and I'm thoroughly enjoying playing Fifa 10! The bad point of the weekend was that my fantasy team still sucks but that was mainly down to not having Cesc....... When will I realize that our old pal Jamrock is right when he says "Cesc is God"?

In non-footballing matters I had a party to go to on Saturday night which was basically a leaving drink for a good friend of mine called Tracy who is leaving the country to go live in Dubai, so on behalf of the blog - Take care Tracy, you will be missed! Also at that party my buddies the Sportboys and "fantasy king" Amer got to meet the new Football Gal and from what I understand she got a big two thumbs up despite the fact she supports Spurs....... Hey, we all have our flaws........

Chelsea beat Liverpool to go top

In a game of few chances you've got to take what your given and when Glen Johnson and Insua went M.I.A. on the hour mark that was all Chelsea needed to take the lead and bag three big points.

All in all I thought it was quite a tight match with very little between the two side. Liverpool slightly edged the first 45 minutes and might well have had a penalty right on halftime Drogba appeared to pull back Martin Skrtel during a corner..... Actually Appeared isn't the right word, Drogba DID pull back Skrtel and Liverpool should have had a penalty.

Chelsea finally got the breakthrough in the second half, Drogba gets the ball out wide (Johnson trotting back) crosses to the back post where Insua not bothering to follow Anelka's run leaves the Frenchman to tap in from six yards. It was the first real chance of the match and Chelsea took it and that's exactly what you need to do in these types of games.

Liverpool tried to push Chlesea back after the goal but could only muster a few half-chances of their own before Snoop Drog muscled off Jamie C to set up Maluda for the killer goal in injury-time.

I don't think Chelsea particularly played that well yesterday, but as they say, the "Got the job done". As for Liverpool, again this season they have lost to a good team and worryingly for me would be the form of Torres. Now I know that sounds strange considering he is the top goalscorer in the Premiership. But it seems to me that Torres is turning into the type of Striker who destroys poor defending and is kept quite by good defending and considering he's Liverpool main goal threat he really needs to up his game when Liverpool play teams who defend better than Hull.

Liverpool need to bounce back quickly, but with Sunderland away and United at home coming up the bounce might not be as high as they would like.

United steal draw of Sunderland

Football can be a cruel game sometimes and nobody this weekend will agree with that statement more than Anton Ferdinand. Not only does he have to live in his big brother shadow and has a mouth that makes him look like a stroke victim, but he cost Sunderland a historic victory at Old Trafford by trying to block a shot that was going well wide of the post...... Since his mouth also looks like it was drawn on by a Simpsons animator I think the correct phrase is "D'oh." 

It was really a shame for Sunderland not to pick up all three points as they put in by far their best performance of the season. They kept the ball well and hurried a very sluggish looking United side at all times. Very rarely will you see United play a whole match at home without creating a real chance but that's just the kind of performance Sunderland put in to limit the Champions to potshots.

Sunderland's opener was scored by Darren "I look an awful lot like NBA star Lebron James" Bent with a excellent shot in to the bottom corner from just outside the box. I hear some people were blaming Ben Foster for the goal..... BS...... You can blame Foster for a lot this season, but D-Bent's goal is not one of them, the second goal however........... Take a look at it here. Now I'm not a professional goalkeeper and I doubt anyone who is reading this is either, but I think it's quite clear that young Ben should be punching this clear not trying to catch it, I mean if it's that obvious to us how can a man who Fergie tipped to be in the England squad for next summers world cup not know? At this rate Foster's best chance of playing for England in a world cup would be to either a) Pay hitmen to take out every other English Goalkeeper you know off. b) Have a sex-change op and play for the ladies team........ I think even Christy Brown could play for a ladies team.

As you can guess, Sir Alex was less that happy with the Ref Alan Wiley's performance (I guess sending off an opposition player is not enough to please some). He complained that Wiley took too long to book players and was not fit enough to be a ref, harsh words indeed. Now whilst watching the match live I did think to myself that Wiley was taking an age when he decided he would book someone, I know ref's are encouraged to talk to players but Wiley seemed to be giving them life-lessons or something else that needed time to explain. Maybe Wiley had been on the white stuff right before the match and was in a talkative mood? Whatever his reasons were though I have to say I agree with Fergie on this issue (don't think it affected the outcome of the match though). As for calling Wiley's fitness in to question...... How dare you Sir, How dare you! 

Arsenal crush Blackburn

As some of my readers will know, I didn't always watch the Arsenal in the fine establishment called "The Old Red Lion." Back in my youth me and the Sportboys used to watch Arsenal games in a pub called the Pheasant. We had some bad times in there, like watching the 2000 UEFA Cup final, we watched Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink score the winner at Elland Road which ended our title chances in 99, but we also had some great times in there, like watching us beat Chelsea 2-0 in the FA Cup final and winning the league at Old Trafford. All in all the good time certainly out weighed the bad and when on Sunday morning I got a phone call from my old buddy Pat (and by old I mean literally, he's 46!) asking me if I'd like to take a trip down memory lane and watch the Arsenal v Blackburn match in there I jumped at the chance! It was only fitting then for Arsenal to put in the kind of performance I was used to seeing them show when I regularly watched games in there.

I really don't care anymore how bad Arsenal's defending is this season as I believe there isn't a great defence out there at the moment. But what i do love is that Arsenal have plenty of goals in them, six on Sunday and all scored by different players with three coming from outside the box. The Gunners are currently on pace for 129 league goals this season and let me be the first to say that should they come close to hitting that mark I think a title will be on the way!!! Now I don't want to get too carried away but goals equal wins and as we've discussed before, wins are important and so what if you lose a few as long as you stay away from those pesky draws.

Now Arsenal might have had six different goal scorers on Sunday, but one man was involved in five of them, that man is actually not really a man but a god disguised as a man and he goes by the name of Cesc. He can score, he can assist, he can even turn water in to wine. He brings joy to the masses and can make you happier than Hugh Heffner and Bill Gates combined, but he can also be vengeful...... He can bring pain to all those who are stupid enough to not have him in their Fantasy team...... I felt that pain on Sunday and I've seen the light, never again will my fantasy team be without it's God and to appease him I had to make a huge sacrifice Sunday night. I placed upon the alter a huge gift of flesh (Frank Lampard) and BEHOLD!!!! The divine one blessed me with his presence in my fantasy team and even gave me an extra £1.6m to spend....... Forgive me oh Cesc, for I have sinned.

Elsewhere

As predicted by yours-truly, Pompey finally got a win this season by beating Wolves away despite putting in a performance worthy of a Sunday league team. I also warned you not to back Wigan to beat Hull and look what happened, Phil Orange might have saved his job!

I was disgusted to see two of my Croatian brothers salvage a draw for Spurs against Bolton...... Those Croats are dead to me..........

Also drawing this weekend were West Ham and Fulham aswell as Everton and Stoke, I'm not going to lie to you, I have no idea what happened in these matches other than the results and since they were draws they too are dead to me.

On a personal note, the Football Dad missed out on £600 thanks to Newcastle failing to beat Bristol. He did a six team accumulator and had the other five. This is not the first time Newcastle have cost him, about 10 years ago he missed out on £10,000  due to Newcastle conceding a 95 minute equalizer........ Moral of the story..... Don't bet on Newcastle to win ever!

The Football Guy Prediction League

Thankfully the United and Sunderland match finished as a draw, had it not there would have been quite a controversy as I had by accident pick Sunderland to win 2-0 instead of United. Now I'm going to be totally honest with you, had Sunderland held on for the win I still would have marked it down as in incorrect score as I had not picked them to win (well I had but it was a mistake) I wonder would my fellow league members been as generous had United won?

The scoring system is simple -

Perfect Result = 30pts

Correct Result = 10pts

Wrong Result = -10pts

Here's a look at how everyone did this week -

                          PR       CR      WR      PTS

Football Guy      2          2         5         30

JamRock            2          2         5         30 

Lawro                2          2         5         30 

Footy Doc          1          4         4         30

SportBoys          0         2          7        -50

Heres the complete table -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

JameRock        11       33       31       350     

Football Guy     7        39       29       310

SportBoys        11       30       34       290

Footy Doc         7        32       36       170     

Lawro               6        27       32       130

Horrible week for the Sportboys who lost 80pts to everyone in the league and not only have they lost the lead but have slipped back to 3rd....... Ouch!

Again like last week we have a Monday night match left, but unlike last week where everyone went for a home win, this week win have home win, away win and draw as predictions....... Here's hoping for 2-2!!!

Players you wish you had made captain but never would.

1. Kamil Zayatte      - 12pts
2. Hassan Yebda     - 9pts
3. Stephen Fletcher - 9pts 

The Cristiano Ronaldo award for fantasy excellence.

1. Cesc Fabregas - 22pts

What can I say other than I'm sooooooo sorry for not having him in my fantasy team....... But hey, when you have won your private friends league three years on the spin you start to lose interest....... Now I know how all my buddies must have felt watching me kick their asses year after year....... That's right I'm bitter and a sore loser!

Speaking of which.....

Winners and Losers

Winners

Everyone who made Cesc their captain in fantasy football

You are great!

Chelsea

For beating Liverpool and going back top of the league

Arsenal

For having Cesc in their real team

Pompey

For finally winning a match

Hull

For getting a much needed win

Losers

Everyone who had Cesc but did not make him their fantasy Captain

You are loser's. but not as big as these next guys......

Everyone who does not own Cesc in fantasy

Admit you are a fool and move to Sudan...... I've already booked my tickect.

Anton Ferdinand

For being yourself

Kieran Richardson

For getting the most stupid red card of the season

Alan Wiley

For not meeting Sir Alex's strict fitness regime, just ask Wayne Rooney......

Wolves

For losing to Pompey

Football Dad

For backing Newcastle to win

The End

Take care

Football Guy 

Hi and hello Football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, what's going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! It's been a horrible week here at Football Guy towers, so much so I've been unable to do anything blog related until now (1.30am Saturday.....). I won't bore you with the details but lets just say I've been very unhappy with Virgin Broadband........... Anyhoo, next week I'm going to make it up to you all with a post everyday!!! But before I get ahead of myself, let's take care of the business at hand.

The Football Guy Prediction League

Due to there being a Monday night match this past week the table we saw on Monday afternoon still needs some updating. City beat West Ham, something we all predicted, but only JamRock had the correct scoreline which means he get's the big 30pts.

Heres the complete table -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

 SportsBoys      11       28       27       340    
 

Jamrock            9        31       26       320

Football Guy     5        37       24       280

Footy Doc         6        28       32       140     

Lawro              4         25       27       100

Right, now that that's out of the way, let's get on to this week's predictions -

Bolton v Tottenham

I wrote last week that I feel I know exactly what kind of team Spurs are, they beat poor teams and lose to good teams. So having said that how can I go for any other result than a away win?

Well Bolton have not been playing all that bad of late, they have actually picked up seven points from their last three league games, hardly relegation form! But when you look at the teams in that run (Birmingham, Stoke and Pompey) you soon realize that it's not really all that impressive.

I've been wondering what's happened to Jermain Defoe...... Goals seem to have dryed up of late, I've got a feeling that's going to change on Saturday.

Football Guy's verdict 1-3

Burnley v Birmingham

It's the battle of the B's, the battle of the "Sneaky Good" defence vs the "God-Awful" defence, the "Sneaky Good" attack vs the "God-Awful" attack. Will Birmingham stifle Burnley's attack? Will Burnley's defence be made to look good by Birmingham's blunt attack?

If I knew for sure I'd stick all the money I have in the world on it...... But since I don't, I'll just have to guess.

Football Guy's verdict 2-1

Hull v Wigan

From a gambling point of view this looks like a easy couple of quid. Hull look like a broken team and Wigan just beat Chelsea........ Surley they beat Hull right? Well I'm pretty confident that they will but I advise all you would-be Rockerfeller's out there to stay away from this one. Basically, if a mediorce team looks like a great bet to beat a crap team away from home I'd look the other way...... If it looks to good to be true.......

Football Guy's verdict 1-1

Wolves v Portsmouth

Now I know this might sound strange considering Pompey have lost all of their games this season but I don't think they have played all that bad of late.

They have got to get some points sooner or later and why not now? Wolves are harldy world beaters?

I think Pompey get a break this week and finally get a win.

Football Guy's verdict 1-2

Man Utd v Sunderland

Sunderland are due a good beating, trust me! I don't remember seeing a team look so poor yet pick up so many points...... I think Sunderland have Mr Jones and Mr Bent to thank for that!

United on the other hand have also been less than impressive this year yet sit atop of the Premiership, not really sure who they have to thank for that, but considering I gave him a lot of stick last year I'd like to just point out what a wonderful season Ryan Giggs is having, if only he'd played like this last season I would not have begrudged him winning the PFA Player of the Year....... But what can I say..... Footballers are simple folk. I can assure you that should Giggs continue his fine form he will not be voted PFA Player of the Year this time around, I'm thinking of putting a cheeky tenner on Paul Scholes, maybe it's his year for the "Lifetime Achivement" award.

Football Guy's verdict 0-2

Arsenal v Blackburn

Watch out Rovers fans, Rockin Robin is coming for you! RvP loves playing against Blackburn and has scored eight goals in seven appearances in all competitions against Rovers...... Which worries me as I don't have him in my fantasy team........

As much as Robin loves the Rovers, I can't imagine it comes close to Blackburn's hate of visiting Arsenal - Rovers have lost their last six Premier League away games against the Gunners, failing to score in five of them...... Three points for the Gunners, I think?

One other thing, Arsenal have been guilty in the past of trying to walk the ball in the net..... Well Arsene Wenger's charges have scored five goals from outside the box in the league this season, no other side has scored more than three from distance. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

Football Guy's verdict 4-0

Everton v Stoke

Will be interesting to see how Everton react from such a long trip in Europe this week. I'm sure their hoping it won't affect the fine form they have been in of late with five wins in their last five games in all competitions.

United dealt with Stoke quite easily last weekend which is unusual since Stoke are usually anything but easy to deal with at home since being in the Premiership.

Since Stoke have a bad away record I'm going with a home win.

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

West Ham v Fulham

I might well be the only none West Ham fan who actually think West Ham are better than their cross town rivals Fulham...... So Hammers..... Don't let me down in this one!

Fulham have been riding high in the media this week since their good performance against Arsenal last Saturday. I think they get brought down to earth.

Football Guy's verdict 2-1

Chelsea v Liverpool

I'd be worried if I were a Liverpool fan for this one. I've seen a worrying trend develop in Liverpool's matches this season and that is the fact they can't beat anyone who's any good. OK, that might be a bit of a overstatement but let's take a look at who they have beaten this season on all competitions - 

Hull, Leeds, West Ham, Debrecen, Burnley, Bolton and Stoke.

A sorry bunch to say the least, now let's look at who's beaten them -

Fiorentina, Aston Villa and Spurs.

All pretty good teams.

Until Liverpool beat a good team this season I'm not backing them do so..... Especially away from home.

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

Aston Villa v Manchester City

What's going on with these two and their Monday night games? 

I can see this one going in all directions but since I have to pick just one I'm going to pick my token draw for the week.

Football Guy's verdict 2-2

The Rest

Right, first off here are the Footy Doc's predictions -

Bolton 3 - 2 Tottenham

Burnley 1 - 2 Birmingham

Hull City 2 - 1 Wigan

Wolves 0 - 2 Pompey

Man Utd 3 - 0 Sunderland

Arsenal 3 - 1 Blackburn

Everton 2 - 0 Stoke

West Ham 1 - 1 Fulham

Chelsea 1 - 0 Liverpool

Aston Villa 2 - 1 Man City

Next up we have JamrockRover - 

Bolton 2 - 2 Tottenham

Burnley 2 - 1 Birmingham

Hull City 1 - 3 Wigan

Wolves 1 - 1 Portsmouth

Man Utd 3 - 1 Sunderland

Arsenal 3 - 0 Blackburn

Everton 2 - 0 Stoke City

West Ham 1 - 1 Fulham

Chelsea 1 - 1 Liverpool

Aston Villa 2 - 2 Man City

And finally, the kings of football predictions, the SportBoys -

Bolton 1-2 Tottenham

Burnley 1-0 Birmingham

Hull City 1-3 Wigan

Wolves 2-2 Portsmouth

Man Utd 3-1 Sunderland

Arsenal 4 Blackburn 0

Everton 3 Stoke 0

West Ham 2 Fulham 1

Chelsea 2 Liverpool 2

Aston Villa 1 Man City 2

Oh, and here are Lawro's as well - LINK

The End

Again, I'm sooooooooo Sorry for the lateness of the post but as I said..... Virgin Media are ASSHOLES!!!!!!!

Take care

Football Guy 

Hi and hello football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, what's going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! I'm ashamed to say it, but the Football Gal has roped me in to watching X-Factor......... Yes I know...... I'm a loser...... But I did notice one strange this watching the "talent show". Having watched the Fulham v Arsenal match I was surprised to see Eduardo was not in the squad, I had not heard he had picked up a knock? Well as it turns out he had not, but in fact was moonlighting under the name Danyl Johnson and performing that night on X-Factor...... Take a look if you don't believe me LINK!

So let's all hope Arsenal reach the FA Cup final so we can hear a song from Danyl "Dudu" Johnson!

Goals, Goals, Goals.

33 goals this weekend and with City v West Ham to come tonight who knows ow many more we might have! Continuing on the theme I talked about last week "No guts, No glory" was in full swing yet again this weekend with  no match ending as a draw...... I LOVE IT!!!!

Ladyboys beat the machine

That's right, the team I described as a transvestite last week put an end to Chelsea all powerful start to the season and having watched the highlights I'd have to say deservedly so. Chelsea were all over the place at the back and could have well been three down at half-time, they had to settle for just the one though scored by the might Titus Bramble who now strangely has three in his career against the Blues.

Chelsea started off the second half well, getting back on level terms almost immediately thanks to Chris Kirkland failing to hold a Drogba shot. I think anyone who was following the game on Saturday was ready to put the mortgage on Chelsea going on to win the match, but thankfully nobody I know did as a couple of minutes later Wigan were ahead again and this time for good after Cech brought down Hugo Rodallega in the box and was shown a Red Card....... no I have no problem with Cech being dismissed for this, what does piss me off though is that I'm sure next week we will see a goalkeeper do exactly the same thing and stay on the pitch. There really seems to be no rhyme nor reason to when a keeper is dismissed.

Also worryingly for Chelsea (and for my fantasy team) is that Ashley Cole had to be carried off late in the match, don't know as yet how serious it is but it would be a blow to the Blues as Ashley has been in fine form this season.

All in all Wigan deserved the win. Now was this just a blip for the machine? Or is it a sign of things to come? It will be interesting to see how they respond next weekend when Liverpool come to visit.

Speaking of which........

Torres gives Phil Orange the Blues

I've seen a lot of football in my lifetime, very rarely have I seen defending so bad! Don't want to take anything away from Torres but I'm sure if you asked him privately he would tell you he will never score an easier hat-trick in his life...... An Oleole.com back four would have given him a harder time!

It felt like Liverpool had they wanted to could have scored 10 on Saturday and might well have had they not brought off Torres and Gerrard  midway through the second half.

In his post match interview Phil Brown looked a broken man, I imagine that's how the studio executive who commissioned "Show Girls" looked like after it's first weekend at the box-office. I can't see him lasting to Christmas and for Hull sake i hope he goes sooner rather than later as this team is a mess.

United win easy

Stoke away...... Tough game right? Well United didn't seem to think so as they strolled to an easy three points.

Now I know that United didn't actually take the lead until midway through the second half but to be fair, I don't remember under-fire Ben Foster having a save to make, in fact I think the only United player who toughed the ball less than Foster was star striker Wayne Rooney who at times looked like he was not even on the pitch. But United didn't need Master Rooney and put in the kind of efficient performance we've become accustomed to seeing from them over the years.

This win also took United top of the table for the first time this season and with Sunderland, Bolton and Blackburn all on the horizon at home, I don't expect them to be knocked off anytime soon........ Oh, they do have Liverpool at Anfield somewhere in that run too.

Arsenal win ugly

Now a lot of Arsenal fans might be unhappy at the manner of Arsenal's victory Saturday evening, but after going to twice to Manchester and being the better team and losing twice, I'll take playing poorly and winning anyday!

The Gunners have a lot of thanks to give to young goalkeeper Vito Mannone who only in his 4th first team appearance put in a rubberman like performance! I loved it in the post match interview on Match of the Day when asked which of his saves was his favourite he replied -

"The one that hit me in the face, I think it made me a little bit uglier than I already am"

It might have not been said exactly like that but that's basically what he said.... Love it!!

I have to say, despite the wonderful pass for RvP's goal I thought Cesc had as bad a game as I've seen him play in an Arsenal shirt, his passing was all over the place, his corners could not beat the first defender and all in all looked quite grumpy throughout the match.... Apart from when Arsenal scored of course. But seriously, Cesc has looked quite glum this season, I'm not sure if I'm reading too much in to it but I would be nice to see him smile a bit more when on the field.

Elsewhere

Robbie Keane manages to outdo Torres and score four past Burnley who almost defended worse than Hull. Burnley might feel a little aggrieved at having a goal disallowed to make it 1-1for a phantom offside.

Pompey play well yet again, but yet again lose. Highlight of the match for me was Tim Howard's awesome shoulder save to deny Portsmouth a late equaliser, truly a save worthy of any Rubberman!

Bolton get a valuable win away to Birmingham with a stoppage time winner from some Oriental fella who scored after Matty Taylor hit the post from a free kick.

Blackburn also get a big come-from-behind win against in form Villa...... What were you saying Jamrock about me overestimating Rover's chances this season?

Finally, Darren Bent puts in a monster Fantasy Football performance to secure the 3 points for the Black Cats. they made life hard for themselves though after throwing away a two goal lead, but all in all I thought they were the better team.

The Football Guy Prediction League

With yet another high-scoring week it made Perfect scores tough to get, taht does not mean there were none though!

The scoring system is simple -

Perfect Result = 30pts

Correct Result = 10pts

Wrong Result = -10pts

Here's a look at how everyone did this week -

                          PR       CR      WR      PTS

Footy Doc          1          6         2         70

Football Guy      0          6         3         30 

Jamrock             0          6         3         30 

SportBoys          0          6         3         30

Lawro                1          3         5         10

Heres the complete table -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

SportsBoys      11       27       27       330    

Jamrock            8        31       26       290

Football Guy     5        36       24       270

Footy Doc         6        27       32       130     

Lawro              4         24       27        90

Well done to the Footy Doc for moving off the bottom, I think we'd all prefer Lawro to be down there!

There is still one match left this weekend - Man City v West Ham. All of us have gone for a home win with 2-0 beind the most popular scoreline.

The Cristiano Ronaldo award for fantasy excellence

1. Robbie Keane - 21pts

Considering he scored four goals, 21pts seems kind of low to me, but hey ho, I wish I had had him..... Funny story, my boss at work does not really follow football that much but we are on good terms and talk about our fantasy teams, on Saturday morning he was bemoaning his team thinking they would not do that well....... He had Darren Bent and Robbie Keane (not sure if either was captain) Not to bad huh?

Winners and Losers

Winners

Vito Mannone

For winning this weeks "Rubberman of the week" award for super goalkeeping.

Tim Howard

For pulling off "Rubberman save of the week" for his shoulder effort against Pompey.

Fernanado Torres

For scoring a hat-trick.

Robbie Keane

For scoring a Hat-trick plus one.

Man Utd

For going top of the table.

Wigan

For beating the machine.

Losers

Chelsea

For losing a lot of people money who had them Liverpool and Spurs in a treble.

Bobby Zamora

For winning the Adi Akinbayi award for "How am I a Premiership Striker".

Fulham

For employing Bobby Zamora.

Burnley 

For a horrible defesive performance.

Hull

For making Burnley's defence look good.

The End

Take care

Football Guy

Hi and hello football fans. it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, what's going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! I'm in a good mood this morning....... I know hard to believe right!?!?! I was up here in the broom closet at Football Guy towers till the wee hours of the morning last playing online poker and the reason for my good mood is that I managed to win not one, but two "Sit an Go's" which has me rolling in the money just in time for the weekend! WooHoo, Go me!!

Before we get in to this weeks predictions, I need to update our prediction league table due to me not being able to find Lawro's results from last week.

Lawro it turns out had a really good week getting 3 Perfect results, 5 Correct results and 2 Wrong results which leaves the up to date table looking a little like this -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

SportsBoys      11       21       24       300    

Jamrock            8        25       23       260

Football Guy     5        30       21       240

Lawro               6        26        24      200 

Footy Doc         5        21        30       60

Lets see what this week has in store.

Portsmouth v Everton

Until Pompey can prove otherwise I'm going to have to back against them each and every week, kind of like riding a hot dealer and the Blackjack table!

Everton are scoring goals and there is no reason to suspect that will change against Pompey's two bob defence and having said that Louis Saha looks like a good Fantasy option right now.

Ride the hot hand and go with Everton.

Football Guy's verdict 0-2

Birmingham v Bolton

Bolton have found he net seven times in their last three games in all competitions....... For some reason that shocks me as their attackers see about as useless as an inflatable dartboard..... Will be interesting to see how they fare against my favourite sneaky good defence of the season.

If Birmingham could find just one very good striker I'd be sure they would stay up, but having said that if I could find a winning lottery ticket I'd be a rich man.

Football Guy's verdict 1-1

Blackburn v Aston Villa

Like with the Portsmouth v Everton match, I'm going to ride the hot hand here and baring Chelsea there is no other hand hotter than Aston Villa at the moment as they have reeled off six straight victories in all competitions.

Our old pal Jamrock seems to think I have overestimated Blackburn's chances in this months Power Rankings and to be honest, I think maybe I did....... But that's what the comments section is there for, to point out my BS (I guess it should be pretty full each post then.....)

Football Guy's verdict 0-1

Liverpool v Hull

Unfortunately, due to a scheduling conflict, there will be no "Amer Knows" section this week. But despite that, I'm pretty certain he will be going with Glenn Johnson as captain of his Fantasy team for this one, so the rest of us will just have to pick Stevie G instead and hope Mr Mayonnaise Dirk Kuyt does not steal any of his goals!

Apparently Hull rested most of their first teamers midweek for their Carling Cup match against Everton...... I have to be honest, I didn't notice any difference.

Expect a big one from Steven "I better hurry up and have a monster Fantasy week sometime soon" Gerrard

Football Guy's verdict 4-0

Stoke v Manchester United

Stoke very nearly held the machine that is Chelsea to a 1-1 draw a couple of weeks back at the Britannia Stadium, Could they do the same here?

I'm not all that confident in United defence right now which leaves me with a rather nasty headache fantasy-wise - Do I play Ben Foster or Joe Hart in goal? I think it's going to have to be Foster but I'm not happy about it.

One thing I am happy about though is the form of my most expensive Fantasy striker, one Mr Wayne Rooney, here's hoping he can continue his fine goalscoring form!

Just so you know - Man Utd have won eight of the last 10 league meetings with Stoke without the Potters scoring. In the two games where Stoke scored, they won the match. I think that run ends tomorrow.

Football Guy's verdict 1-2

Tottenham v Burnley

Hold on, Spurs at home to a none top eight team? Home win. That's what Tottenham have become this season, a bankers dream, you know who they will and won't beat and this is a match I guarantee they win, go put you house on it as it's buying money!!!

Those of you who own Jermain "Stop teasing" Defoe might want to consider picking him as fantasy captain as I'm quite scared as to what he might do (hopefully get sent off ;-))

Football Guy's verdict 3-1

Wigan v Chelsea

The Machine vs the team I described as a Ladyboy in yesterday's Power Rankings.......... Maybe that could be the plot for the next Terminator movie, oh wait, didn't they already do that for Terminator 3?

Other than the Spurs game this is the other match this weekend that I'm 100% confident about the outcome, away win.

I don't think Wigan have ever taken a point in the league against the "Big Four" and I don't expect them to break that trend this week.

Chelsea are the only Premier League team to have won their opening seven games of a season (2005-06), a record they'll match if they win at the DW Stadium.

Football Guy's verdict 0-3

Fulham v Arsenal

Normally I'd have gone for a draw here, but considering draws have been about as rare as a Cure fan at a Brittany Spears concert I'm going for an Arsenal win.

Yeah, maybe I'm biased due to being an Arsenal fan and yeah, maybe I want some form of revenge for last seasons defeat at Craven Cottage and yeah, maybe I just feel Arsenal are good......

I've brought Thomas Vermaelen in to my fantasy team this week so I expect either a goal or a clean sheet, I don't mind which, but both would be nice!

Football Guy's verdict 1-2

Sunderland v Wolves

Last time Sunderland played a crap team at home who play in Orange (Hull) they pumped four goals past them. Now Wolves are not really any better than Hull so can I expect a repeat performance? I know Football generally doesn't work that way but I'm banking that it will this time round.

From a Fantasy point of view I know everyone will be talking about Darren Bent, but do take a look at Andy "Fatty" Reid, scored some good points in his last two performances and got an assist midweek in the Carling Cup.

I wrote yesterday I'm starting to believe that maybe Big Mick might be able to keep Wolves up, if he wins this one on Sunday I might become a convert to that idea.

Football Guy's verdict 3-1

Manchester City v West Ham

City's saving grace last year was their home form and so far this season that form has continued and considering the calibre of their opponents Monday night I see no reason for that trend to go the way of Pokemon, Tamagotchis and Nicholas Cage's movie career.

All of West Ham's points this year have been on the road this season, but I think we can all agree that Blackburn and Wolverhampton are easier places to go than Manchester.

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

The Rest

Right, first off here are the "cellar-dweller" Footy Doc's predictions -

Portsmouth 0v2 Everton

Birmingham 1v1 Bolton

Blackburn 2v1 Aston Villa

Liverpool 4v0 Hull City

Stoke City 1v2 Man Utd

Tottenham 3v1 Burnley

Wigan 1v3 Chelsea

Fulham 1v2 Arsenal

Sunderland 3v1 Wolves

Man City 2v1 West Ham

Next up we have JamrockRover - 

Portsmouth 0 - 2 Everton

Birmingham 1 - 0 Bolton

Blackburn 1 - 2 Aston Villa

Liverpool 4 - 0 Hull City

Stoke City 1 - 3 Man Utd

Tottenham 4 - 1 Burnley

Wigan 0 - 3 Chelsea

Fulham 1 - 2 Arsenal

Sunderland 2 - 0 Wolves

Man City 3 - 1 West Ham

And finally, the kings of football predictions, the SportBoys -

Portsmouth 0 v 2 Everton

Birmingham 1 v 0 Bolton

Blackburn 1 v 2 Aston Villa

Liverpool 4 v 0 Hull

Stoke 1 v 2 Man Utd

Tottenham 4 Burnley 1

Wigan 0 Chelsea 2

Fulham 0 Arsenal 2

Sunderland 3 Wolves 1

Man City 2 West Ham 0

Oh, and here are Lawro's as well - LINK

The End

Have a great weekend

Football Guy

 

 

Hi and hello football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, what's going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! Football Guy Towers has been a dark place this week to say the least what with the fall out of posse-gate (see Monday/Tuesday Hangover) it's been like my own personal Eduardo-gate only no one was accused of diving, yet there were some misinterpretations of rules and I think someone might been getting a ban which won't be overturned.......... Anyway, this is the last you shall read me write about it as I'm quite bored of the whole affair....... Kind of silly of me to bring it up then I guess.......

Anyway, it's time for the first real Power Rankings of the season and it's your chance to see where I think teams will end up come May based on what's happened so far. To see the Pre Season Power Rankings click HERE.

I have to say that I've so far enjoyed the season were having....... Even if my fantasy team is not doing all that well! What I've loved most about it is that it seems for the first time since I can remember teams are really having a go at each other and trying to win games, that adds excitement as no one really likes to see a draw........ Well unless it's a high scoring draw but they rarely happen, especially at Old Trafford...... So far we've had 56 Premiership games, care to guess how many have ended as a stalemate? TWO......... That's right TWO! The other 54 games have all had a winner and let me be the first to say "LONG MAY IT CONTINUE!"

Now I'm not saying you can't get a good game of football that ends in a draw, but the lack of draws is really pointing towards a change in attitude of teams who generally will finish outside the top Eight. In years gone by lesser teams have been to cautious when playing each other, not wanting to give an inch and settling for a point a piece, but now it seems we have a new attitude of "No Guts, No Glory" and in actual fact trying to win games will see you finish with more points in the long run and might well be the difference between going down or staying up. This does not only apply to teams who don't have Championship aspirations, I've often said it's not losing games that cost you the title, it's the draws that kill you. Just look at Liverpool last season, they only suffered two defeats yet that still was not enough to end their long arduous title drought. Put it this way, a title chaser could in theory lose Eight games and still be there or there about winning all the rest as that would give them 90pts, a total that will win you the league most years.

I'm sure now that I've wrote about it we'll see Six draws this weekend, but the longer we see teams going out there and trying to win football matches the better it will be for all of us who love the beautiful game.

The Power Rankings

Right, for those of you who don't know, this is basically where I think teams will finish the season and I will be doing one every month of so during the course of the season up until about March/April.

As always we shall start at the bottom.

The worse than Mick McCarthy division 20th - 19th

I didn't think it was possible but two managers have proved otherwise.

* Last months place in brackets

PR 20th (19th) PL 20th - Portsmouth

Pompey have flirted quite a few times with the drop since entering the Premier League, although unlike their previous flirts this one is going to see them get a restraining order and sent to prison..... I.E. The Championship.

The only thing that can save them is for some dumb rich guy to invest a whole lot of cash in them and buy their way out of trouble in January, kind of like a celebrity does when accused of some crime, but unfortunately for them I think they are destined to end up like Phil Spector and not like Michael Jackson, although considering the latter is dead maybe being Phil Spector isn't all that bad.

SkyBet are giving 6/4 odds on Paul Hart being the first manager sacked this season and for me that seems like buying money!

PR 19th (16th) PL 19th - Hull

If you don't fancy Paul Hart for the chop but still want a bet then you could do a lot worse than pick Phil Brown for the sack. I've never seen a manager have so many ex-players come out and say what a prick he is or for that matter have so many players refuse to join his team in a summer for the same reason....... I mean Jesus, even David Pleat and "Big" Ron Atkinson have more lovers than Phil Orange!

I think for the sake of karma they should fire the guy as doing a good deed can see a good deed done to you, or so they say.......

All in all Hull are just a poor side with a poor manager and that spells trouble.

The Basement division 18th - 13th

For those teams looking to escape the drop.

PR 18th (20th) PL 12th - Wolves

There are very few things in life, let alone sports that will shock me any more, but if Big Mick keeps Wolves up then I will have seen everything........ Well apart from a limo that turns in to a plane or a man eating his own head..... Derka derka......

Even though I'm writing it I still don't believe it but might there be a chance that Mick keeps Wolves up? Bryan Robson managed to break the "Bottom at Christmas" curse a few years ago with West Brom, so why not Mick? I've got a gut feeling we might see a miracle this year....... Although my guts have been know to make mistakes...... From time to time.....

PR 17th (14th) PL 17th - Bolton

I've not seen all that much of Bolton so far this season, but what I have seen is BAD and I'm not talking about Michael Jackson song BAD, I mean you are poo BAD!

Better start praying Matty Taylor can win you a few games on his own with his 25 yard + thunderbolts which seem to have vanished since he left Portsmouth.

Side Note - Gary Megson might be the ugliest manager in the Premier League.

PR 16th (15th) PL 15th - Wigan

Wigan are a team that really do confuse me, kind of like the way you see a transvestite and wonder....... Now before you jump to conclusions let me explain - Sometimes Wigan have looked good this season, but then you watch them play like shit and realize they are bad, just like when you realize that that ladyboy has a penis....... OK this is not making much sense but but I know what I'm talking about!

Basically Wigan can look alright but really they should be happy if they survive the drop this season.

PR 15th (18th) PL 11th - Birmingham

I very much like Birmingham's defence........ I very much dislike Birmingham's attack.

Other things I like and dislike -

I like the first Matrix Film - I dislike the 2nd and 3rd Matrix film

I like Cutters Choice rolling tobacco - I dislike Drum rolling tabacco

I like Lady Gaga's ass - I dislike Lady Gaga's face

I like Fifa - I dislike Pro Evo (This has only been the case since they started releasing them on the next gen consoles, before that Pro Evo was king)

I like Black Sambuca - I dislike White Sambuca - Wait, that's a lie...... I love ALL SAMBUCA!!!

PR 14th (17th) PL 9th - Burnley

Burnley strike me as the embodiment of the "No Guts, No Glory" attitude this season. This team it seems likes to go out there and try to win, especially at home where they have a perfect record with Eveton and United no less as scalps.

I recommend watching any Burnley match you get a chance to watch as there will be goals and goals are good as I've already covered!

PR 13th (12th) PL 18th - Blackburn

I think Blackburn have been a tad unlucky so far this season. With the exception of last Sunday's beating against Everton they could easily have won all of their other matches. I expect Fat Sam to turn it around and steer them to a lower mid-table finish....... Although their start to the season has not been all that tough and considering they have not picked up that many points maybe I'm over estimating their chances.

PR 12th (10th) PL 8th - Sunderland

Football can be a funny and cruel game at times. We've just discussed a team (Blackburn) who should have a lot more points then they have and now we get to discuss a team who I'm not sure how they have any points whatsoever! 

Really, Sunderland probably should have lost all their games so far this season (well apart from the Hull match) yet they sit in 8th spot in the league win 9pts to their name. Steve Bruce obviously sucked of Satan for this kind of luck and to be fair, if they can play this bad and still be 8th, then what happens if they start to improve?

The Looking over my Shoulder division 11th - 10th

Those teams who should be safe but should keep an eye out on what's going on behind them.

PR 11th (11th) PL 14th - Fulham

In last months Power Rankings I said I had some questions about Fulham, let's see if we have any answers -

Will Europe effect them?

To early to tell I guess.

Will their defence be as good as last season?

It's not been that bad, but how do you feel this season having Hageland in your fantasy team?

Will Murphy be as good as he was last season?

Does he still play for them?

Fulham will be fine, but that's about all I can say.

PR 10th (13th) PL 10th - Stoke

I love Stoke! There I said it....... Never thought I'd hear those words come out of my mouth!

I'm not really sure why I love Stoke, but then again, you can't question love, you just have to go with it and I'm riding the Potters train all the way to....... Errr.... Wherever it goes I guess?

Side Note - Get Shawcross in to your fantasy team, for whatever reason if Stoke keep a clean sheet (which they will) this guy is getting bonus points!

The your Season ended in August division 10th - 9th

No highs or lows

PR 9th (9th) PL 16th - West Ham

West Ham have thrown away some points this season, Carlton Cole's infamous assist for Jermain "Stop Teasing" Defoe springs to mind.

But overall they are what I expected them to be and I'm sure they will finish somewhere between 9th and 12th.

The Europa League division 8th - 6th

I think you can guess what this means.

PR 8th (8th) PL 5th - Aston Villa

Aston Villa have flown very much under the radar this season. You'd almost feel like they were having a bad season until you realize that they have reeled off four wins on the spin and sit 5th in the league.

They have managed to address some squad depth concerns at the back, but all in all I think the same problems that arose last year will haunt them this time around - What happens when Ashley Young and Agbonlahor start to tire?

PR 7th (6th) PL 13th - Everton

Hello? Everton seem to have found the scoring touch! 11 goals in their last three games is pretty impressive....... OK I know that one of the matches was against Hull in the League Cup and an other was against AEK Athens in the Europa League but still, scoring goals is always a good sign good sign!

Not only have they started scoring, but their leaky defence which hadn't managed a clean sheet all season has no gone 270 minutes without shipping a goal in all competitions and with Pompey, Stoke, Wolves and Bolton on the horizon expect to see the toffees riseup the table pretty quickly.

PR 6th (7th) PL 6th - Tottenham Hotspur

I'm starting to believe that 90% of Spurs fans are Bi-Polar, they either think their team stinks (see last to seasons) or think their team is destined for greatness, there is never any middle ground which makes them quite insufferable to say the least......

As up and down as their fans (and team at times) can be I think they have found a nice balance which is beating teams they should beat and losing to the rest which should see them finish 6th and all in all they should be happy with that as that is their ceiling.

The can we break in to the top four division 5th 

For the one team that might just do it.

PR 5th (5th) PL 4th - Manchester City

I genuinely believe City have a chance at breaking the top four this season, but right now I don't think they will.

They defiantly have goals in them and already have almost as many wins away from home as they had all of last season, but I don't trust that defence as far as I could throw them, thank God for them that they have the best keeper the the land in-between the sticks.

I'm also worried by the fact they have some very combustible players in their team that could derail their season. Robinho I don't think is happy and fancies a chance of scenery, Bellamy is sure to get injured for a extended period of time sooner or later and Adebayor will either a) Get lazy and stop scoring b) Punch a team-mate and cause dressing room disharmony c) Get his legs broken by a football blogger we all know.

The Big Four division 4th - 1st

Same as it ever was.

PR 4th (2nd) PL 3rd - Liverpool

Liverpool arguably have not had the toughest start to the season, yet they have already been beaten twice, which if last season is anything to go by might already be twice too many.

To me they are the same team they were last year just minus Alonso and a few players that one year older (but not in an Arsenal good way). Jamie Carragher has looked terrible so far this season which is a bad sign for the Reds as he seems to be the only Centre-back they have who does not get injured.

On the bright side Yossi and Dirk have started the season in fine form and could ease the burden for Gerrard and Torres, but I just feel that they wilol end up drawing too many games like they usually do.

PR 3rd (4th) PL 7th - Arsenal

I'm sold on Arsenal, I've seen enough for me not to worry about if they will make the top four and here's why -

Both defeats they have had this season for me have been a little unlucky, against both United and City they created more chances just the rub of the green didn't go their way, plus the ref's didn't help their cause either. Also having played City and United away in their first four matches means they have already gotten out of the way two of their four hardest away league games (also don't have to go to Goodison any time soon).

I feel the defence will improve and with Rosicky back and Nasri on the way they have depth, but what I love most of all is the GOALS!!!!! The Gunners are on pace to score 129 goals this season! Now I know that what be the amount they end up on, but they do seem to find it easier to score this season than they have against lesser teams in years gone by, which might well mean some of those frustrating draws that have held the Gunners back will turn in to wins and propel Arsenal in to title challangers.

It's not all sunshine and rainbows though I'm afraid, I'm putting a lot of faith in to that defence improving and with the form Clichy and Almunia are in right now they could both easily lose their place. But for now I'm quite confident the Gunners will be good this season.

PR 2nd (3rd) PL 2nd - Manchester United

Wow, this team just keeps getting it done, even when you don't think they have the personal to do it!

No C-Ron, no Tevez, no worries...... I think Giggs has played better and been more influential so far this season than he was the whole of last year and last year he won the PFA Player of the Year award!

Also I think the world Anti-Doping body should test Darren Fletcher's urine as that guy has been playing about 5X better than I thought possible, he's like some 100m sprinter who's PB was 10.03 and now all of a sudden he's busting 10's every race...... I WANT FLETCHER'S URINE TESTED NOW!!!!!!

If Rooney can keep on scoring and they tighten up a little at the back which I'm sure they will as now Rio is back and Van Der Sar will be soon then they will be there or there about come May. Only problem is that without C-Ron they don't have a league winning team and that means they won't beat.......

PR 1st (1st) PL 1st - Chelsea

Men win leagues and Chelsea have quite a few "Men" in their team. They are strong, they don't concede and they score, hell even Drogba and Anelka have managed to work out how to play together.

This is the football equivalent on Arnie in the Terminator, you can pound them but you won't break them and in the end they will terminate you in cold blood. Don't be surprised if Adebayor does what he did to Van Persie to John Terry and this happens.

I'm not ready to give them the title as we have only played six games, but boy do they look like the team to beat.

One thing I do think they need to change though is the music they play before a home game, scarp "Chelsea, Chelsea" and play this instead, then it really would be all over! 

Hasta la vista, Baby! 

Hi and hello Football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, whats going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! I firstly must apologies for the Tuesday Hangover, I was not at Football Guy Towers Sunday night but rather at the Football Gal's rather modest apartment in South London which has a computer Fred Flintstone would be proud of and made writing anything Monday morning impossible.......... But don't worry, I won't make that mistake again and all future Tuesday Hangovers will be down to real Monday Hangovers!

Saturday night was quite a laugh and almost involved a fight between some of my friends I mention in this blog from time to time........ I can't go in to too much detail, but let's just say a rather Drunk Fantasy Football king Amer rocked up to a house warming party thrown by one of the SportBoys with a 15 man posse......... Not a cool move........ I tried to play peace-maker and I had a few harsh words for some of the guilty parties which they didn't like (can't handle the truth I guess) Then I hear them badmouthing me behind my back...... Poor form guys...... Still waiting for an apology which I doubt I'll get but hey, that's what friends are for right?

Twas quite an action packed weekend, so let's get right in to it!

Owen winner in Fergie-Time

There are only a few sure fire things in life, Death, Taxes and Unlimited injury-time at Old Trafford when United need it!

Michael Owen capped off a thrilling Manchester Derby on Sunday scoring the winner almost six minutes in to injury-time when only four were added........ Sounds about right......... Here's my take on the whole thing -

Now the rules of injury-time are that whatever the fourth official put up on his board is what must be added on as a "minimum." Now when Bellamy scored to make it 3-3 in the 90th minute he celebrated for about a minute which should be added on, plus United made a sub in injury-time (I think they brought on Carrick) so time should be added on for that as well so already there should be an extra 1.30 added to the 4 that we had to start with, I guess the ref rounded that up as Owen scored towards the end of the 95th minute. So Owen scored in time that should have been allowed in my opinion......... Here's where I have a problem though, I guarantee that in 19 out of 20 matches where something like this happens the ref blows for full-time just after 94 minutes regardless of celebration time or subs...... I think the ref added on the right amount of time, I'm just sure that he would not have done so had it been anywhere else other than Old Trafford, but hey! Why moan about something that's been happening for 20 years and probably won't change until Sir Alex meet's Sir Bobby in limbo!

I've got to say that for me United deserved the win as City barely left their half in the last 51 minutes of the match and had it not been for "Rubberman" Shay Given City might have lost by a much bigger scoreline......... Speaking of keepers, Ben Foster is not the man I thought he was. I was very excited at the start of the season to see him get a run in the first team at United as I thought it would spell the end for VDS, but as the Footy Doc said - I don't think Edwin can come back quick enough for Sir Alex. Foster has been at fault for quite a few goals so far this season and I'm not surprised I'm having my worst start to a fantasy football season ever when I have that bum in my team!

City obviously have goals in them, but their center-back paring of Toure and Lescott leave little to be desired, £50m down the drain if you ask me!

Super Torres bags 3pts for The Redmen

I had the pleasure of watching this match in the company of the Football Dad and boy did he have a few disparaging remarks to make about the Hammers penalty scorer Diamanti, ranging from "This guy is as good as a one-legged rodent", to, "he is shit"........ I thought both were rather harsh, but Jon Champion did call him an "Italian Ragamuffin" so who am I to judge?

Speaking of Jon Champion comments, rather early in the match Jon pointed out to the viewers that Fernando had had as many "Shiners" or "Blackeyes" this season as he has scored goals (3)........ Should Torres be worried now that he bagged two in this match that his two front teeth will be knocked out in training?

Both of Fernando's goals were class, the first probably being the better as he proceeded to mug off West Ham's young Center halve James Tomkins, then not only did he manage to lift the ball high enough to beat Rob Green at his near post, but induced a tackle from Upson which resulted in the Hammers Captain having to come off due to injury......... That's like banging some guy's missus infront of him then cumming in "his" face....... Well done Fernando!!!....... The winner was just a great header and worthy of winning any match. although we can't forget Ryan "when will Rafa give me a run in the team" Babel cross to set it up..... With his Right foot no less!!!

All in all I found this to be quite a strange game as despite the fact it had five goals in it I found it to be quite boring....... Some people are never happy.......

I was also rather unhappy to see Mr Mayonnaise - Dirk Kuyt - poaching what looked like a Stevie G goal....... MAYONNAISE EATING BASTARD!!!!!      

Chelsea - Unstoppable force!

The last time we saw something crush all before them was just over 2000 years ago when a little town called Rome when on to rule the world....... How fitting that Chelsea would be owned by a man named Roman?!?!

They delt with Spurs like Ike Turner delt with Tina..... Brutally...... Yeah Spurs put up a bit of a fight, I'm sure Tina did at times too, but in the end there was only ever going to be one winner.

I guess it's still to early to say for sure, but right now I don't see anyone stopping them........ Maybe that will change after they actually play someone good. They face Liverpool on October 4th..... Pencil that in to your diary!

Elsewhere

Arsenal crush Wigan and manage to keep a clean sheet! Shock Horror!!!!

Pompey prove that they are poo yet again, not sure Villa will have an easier match this season. Also, is it just me or does Paul Hart look just like your stereotypical "Sunday League" manager? That might explain why they play like a Sunday league team and why there are always loads of Orange peels cut in to triangles in their dressing room at Half-time....... BRING BACK TONY ADAMS!!!

Hull lose to Birmingham at home and it's inspired me to set up a sweepstakes on when Phil Orange will get the sack, I've picked December, the week before Christmas to be exact..... What about you?

Big Mick's Wolves have more points than games played!!!!!! Wait..... Why am I shocked? I picked them to win this weekend!....... Their still going down though.

The Football Guy Prediction League

Awesome weekend for me, I got 9 out of the 10 results!!!! Wish I had put some money on at the bookies!!! Unfortunately I lost two perfect scores in the last couple of minutes due to Cesc and Dave Nugent........ Thanks for nothing you pricks!!!!

The scoring system is simple -

Perfect Result = 30pts

Correct Result = 10pts

Wrong Result = -10pts

Here's a look at how everyone did this week -

                          PR       CR      WR      PTS

SportBoys          3          5         2        120

Football Guy      2          7         1        120

Jamrock             2          6         2        100 

Footy Doc          1          4         5         20

Lawro      --       Don't know where his result are, on his link it's last weeks results, if anyone finds them please contact.

Heres the complete table -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

SportsBoys      11       21       24       300    

Jamrock            8        25       23       260

Football Guy     5        30       21       240

Lawro               3        21        22       80 

Footy Doc         5        21        30       60

So despite still waiting on Lawro's results for this week (at worst will have them on Friday) The Footy Doc is still at the foot of the table...... Good thing there's still a long way to go!

The Cristiano Ronaldo award for fantasy excellence

1. Thomas Vermaelen - 19pts

Second time this season that an Arsenal player has won this award...... Although last time out it was Abou Diaby and look what he went on to do the following match.

Winners and Losers

Winners

Sir Alex Ferguson

For having control of peoples perception of time.

Michael Owen

For scoring a goal he can live off for the next 12 months.

Thomas Vermaelen

For being the first good white defender Arsene Wenger has ever bought.

Fernanado Torres

For not getting his fourth black eye of the season.

Birmingham

For once again proving how underrated their defense is.

Losers

Mark Hughes

For spending £50m on Toure and Lescott.

Amer Fatayer

For slipping to 81st in the world in Fantasy Football.

Craig Bellamy

For celebrating for too long.

Amer Fatayer

For bringing a 15 man posse to a house warming party.

Craig Bellamy

For punching a fan whilst he was being held by stewards.

Portsmouth

For keeping a Sunday league manager in charge on a Premiership team.

Paul Hart

For being a Sunday league manager in charge of a Premiership team....... Wait...... That might actually make him a winner?

The End

Take care

Football Guy

Hi and hello football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, whats going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! I was going to write a Champions League recap yesterday but I felt I could do a better job today, so here goes -

Three of the "Big Four" do professional job whilst Arsenal in true Harlem Globetrotter style deliberately fall behind 2-0 only to snatch a late win thanks to Alex Song's hand and Eduardo's knee. Elsewhere Real Madrid fall asleep after leading 3-0 in Switzerland, then wake up late to score two more in their 5-2 win. Inter and Barca on the other hand actually make viewers fall asleep with 0-0 snooze-fest.

See, it was not really worth me posting that yesterday now was it?

Now along with the usual predictions that come on Friday's we now have a new feature called "Amer Knows" in honor of our buddy Amer's amazing achievement of being in the top FIVE in the world in Fantasy Football, so look out for that at the end of the post. But before that we have a lot of fixtures to get through.

Burnley v Sunderland

Last weekend I was a tad annoyed that there was no early kick off in the Premiership.......... This week I'm a tad annoyed that this is the early kick off........ I guess there is no pleasing some people.

Sunderland have really not impressed me at all this year yet they have nine points and sit in 7th place and with a win here could well be 5th after the weekend.

Burnley should be happy that they have got their super though start to the season out of the way and now have a run of games that must look like Fillet Steak compared with the dog food they have been munching on so far.

Football Guy's verdict 2-1

Arsenal v Wigan

I have a lot of questions about Arsenal so far this season, are they going to keep a clean sheet ever again? Is Gael Clichy worse than Tony Hibbert? Could someone in training injury Abou Diaby? I need answers people!!!

This is only Arsenal's second home game of the season and after the disappointments of the last couple of games they really need to get  back on track with a run of wins starting here.

Football Guy's verdict 3-0

Aston Villa v Portsmouth

If you are a fantasy owner you really have to love it when one or more of your players are facing Pompey at home as they stink!

Villa were being written off buy quite a few people after their loss at home to Wigan on opening day but they have quietly bounced back with three straight league wins......... Three wins out of four is quite a good start last time I checked.....

Pompey on the other hand are the only team in the league yet to pick up a point yet to be fair, in all but the Arsenal game they were unlucky not to pick up at least a point...... I guess that's why they stink..... Or maybe the team on the whole does not stick, just the forwards?

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

Bolton v Stoke 

I'm warning you now, this one will not be pretty, expect lots of long balls and Rory Delap throws....... Speaking of which -

Stoke have attempted 86 long-throws - the most in the league, while Bolton are third in this ranking with 57.

But why can't these two teams try and pass it about? Because they are both shit at it -

Bolton have posted the second-lowest passing accuracy (63%) in the top flight with Stoke being the only side to complete a lower percentage of their distribution (60%).

You'll have more fun going to your local park on a Sunday and watching 22 hungover men kick it around than you will watching this horror show.

Football Guy's verdict 1-1

Hull v Birmingham

So, I was reading in the broad sheets this week how neither Hull nor the four company's affiliated with them have announced their Tax returns for the last financial year........ Oh dear, how do they explain Phil Orange using all five as secret sunbed emporiums? BUSTED!

Birmingam, whilst having quite a tight defense have also got quite a tight attack...... Just two goals so far this season, good thing they are playing Hull this week who seem to be shipping goals like it's going out of fashion.

Football Guy's verdict 1-1

West Ham v Liverpool

Did you know that Liverpool are yet to concede a goal from open play this season? All have come from either set plays or penalties...... So much for zonal marking (only joking Stew).

I'm not really sure what to make of West Ham so far, are the bad or half decent? I'm going to say they are alright and are looking good for the mid table finish I had them having at the start of the season.

For what it worth, I love Dirk Kuyt, not enough is said about him (other than the fact he's as ugly as sin) and I want some love for the man me and my buddies call mayonnaise!

Football Guy's verdict 0-2

Man Utd v Man City

Remember a couple of seasons ago when United and City played each other in retro kits? How cool was that?!?!?! What can't they do that every year? I've talked about this before and I wish the Premier League would "force" all local Derby's to be played in 1970's style kits!

BTW, that day when they played in retro kit's City beat United 2-0 at Old Trafford thanks to two Benjani goals and boy could they do with him on Sunday as City will be without Adebayor (evil) Tevez (looks evil) and Robinho (probably evil) which works out to £75m+ worth of strike force missing or 9/10ths of Cristiano Ronaldo........

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

Wolves v Fulham

Want further proof of how poo Wolves have been when they have visited the Premiership - Wolves have taken four points against Fulham in the Premier League - their joint-most against any opponent........ That make Fulham your friend who slept with a really ugly bird you all know and would never go near, but he did it twice........ I'm looking at you Pavel A.k.A one of the SportBoys.........

Wolves in fact have never lost to Fulham at the Molineux and that alone would be enough to predict a Wolves win normally, but I know that Big Mick was not incharge for those previous glories......

Screw it, I've got to pick Mick to win sooner or later!

Football Guy's verdict 1-0

Everton v Blackburn

Everton....... Just three points so far this season........ Not good. Although I did watch them beat AEK Athens last night 4-0 which could be a sign for better things to come, but considering the way the Greek's defended it's probably a false dawn..... BTW - Has anyone actually seen a real "False Dawn"? Where the Hell does that saying come from?

I was right last week in saying Blackburn had to win sooner or later, not as positive about their chances this time out.

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

Chelsea v Tottenham

Are you ready to watch to likes of Jermain "Stop Teasing" Defoe and "Little" Lennon flounder against top class opposition again? Since I have neither in my fantasy team and Fantasy King Amer has both I really hope they do jack shit.

I hate to use cliches but Chelsea this season have been very "Workmanlike" in their performances..... Arrgh..... I feel sick for saying that...... Cliche police.... Come arrest me!

Spurs got a draw here last season, but I don't think they will again this year.

Football Guy's verdict 2-1

The Rest

Right first off here are the Footy Doc's predictions -

Burnley 1v3 Sunderland 
Arsenal 3v0 Wigan 
Aston Villa 2v0 Portsmouth
Bolton 3v1 Stoke City
Hull City 2v1 Birmingham
West Ham1 v3 Liverpool
Man Utd 2v0 Man City
Wolves 0v1 Fulham
Everton 2v1 Blackburn
Chelsea 1v1 Tottenham

Next up we have JamrockRover - 

Burnley 2-1 Sunderland

Arsenal 3-1 Wigan

Aston Villa 2-0 Portsmouth

Bolton 1-1 Stoke City

Hull City 1-1 Birmingham

West Ham 1-2 Liverpool

Man Utd 2-1 Man City

Wolves 0-0 Fulham

Everton 2-0 Blackburn

Chelsea 3-1 Tottenham

And finally, the kings of football predictions, the SportBoys -

Burnley 1 v 1 Sunderland

Arsenal 3 v 1 Wigan

Aston Villa 2 v 0 Portsmouth

Bolton 1 v 1 Stoke

Hull 0 v 1 Birmingham

West Ham 1 v 2 Liverpool

Man Utd 2 v 0 Man City

Wolves 0 v 1 Fulham

Everton 2 v 0 Blackburn

Chelsea 2 v 1 Tottenham


Oh, and here are Lawro's as well - LINK

Amer Knows

As promised, here are some fantasy tips from everyone's favorite Jordanian fantasy player - Amer.

Hey Guys it's me Amer, your God to all things fantasy!

This week I'm thinking about playing my Wild-card in fantasy as I feel the team I have has done about as well as it can, being 5th in the world and all.

So here is a list of some peeps you should consider if you want to be as good as me at fantasy........ Hold on, not as good as me (that's impossible) but more like a lesser version of me.

Robin Van Persie - Arsenal

I love RvP, always have and always will, in fact the only sportsman I love more is a certain Rafa Nadal but since I can't pick him in my fantasy team I say go with RvP who has quite a good run of games coming up and should score well.

Darren Bent/Kenwyn Jones - Sunderland

We've all seen what Darren Bent can do now he's left Spurs, but don't forget about Kenwyn, someones got to give the ball to Bent and who better than his dreadlocked strike partner.

Damien Duff - Fulham

Don't laugh, Double D is going to light it up. Trust me!

Michel Salgado - Blackburn

That fool the Football Gay didn't even know Salgado played for Blackburn (and he wonders why I'm kicking his ass at fantasy). Basically Salgado is going to become the poor-mans Glen Johnson so if you can't afford G-John I say go with M-Sal as he will be know after a couple of weeks of lighting up the fantasy world!

Alessandro Diamanti - West Ham

West Ham have no strikers (other than Carlton Cole and he's poo) so they need someone to score right? Well Zola is Italian and who better to know about strikers from the land of pasta than a former Italian striker....... See my logic is what puts me above you mere mortals.

Captain Choice

I'm still not sure who I'm going with but I can assure you it won't be my main man G-John, I think that if you bring in RvP you should make him CpT, but other than that go with your best player, that's why you pay a lot for them! 

Peace Out

Amer

The End

Have a good weekend

Football Guy

Hi and hello football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, whats going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! It's been an up and down weekend here at Football Guy towers, I finally managed to get some sleep after being awake for over 40 straight hours from Thursday morning to Friday night, I also for the first time in my life considered planning a crime (not saying I've never broken the law before but it's never been a planned thing) more on that later. I also made the world a better place last night by getting potential Football Gal and her housemate to watch Goodfellas for the first time! I have to say it was quite a strange experience watching Goodfellas with with two girls who had never seen it before, their reaction to certain points of the movie really made me laugh, like the way they "Ah'ed" when Joe Pesci gets whacked........ Only a women could feel sympathy for a guy who's a crazy coldblooded killer getting his comeuppance. It was also funny see how shocked they were to find out that despite being married, all the wiseguys had girls on the side yet asking if Henry Hill's wife cheated on him when he spent five years in jail, I said she probably did and they said "too right, five years without sex is too long".......... I don't think there was any need for me to point out the double standard as I think they would not have noticed, but it did make me take a mental note that if "Potential Football Gal"  becomes "Full Time Football Gal" not to spend a long stretch in the clink!

Anyway, enough about my private life, we've got a lot of football to cover.

Man City 4-2 Arsenal

I missed the first half of this one due to the boozer I wanted to watch it in was too rammed, from what I've seen of the highlight City were the better team and took the lead from an Almunia own goal. I thought the Clown Prince was a bit unlucky to have conceded the way he did but I can hardly say I'm surprised that someone I call a "Clown" let let in such a comical goal.

Anyway, I returned to the said boozer with one of the SportBoys and managed to find a spot from which to watch the second half. I've read a lot of match reports about the second half and for me anyone who does not think Arsenal were laying siege to City's goal must have been drunk! It was all Arsenal with City looking dangerous on the break. Arsenal deservedly got level through a sweet goal from RvP and at this point I could only see one winner....... Unfortunately for me I saw the wrong one.........

I had not counted on the fact no one in Arsenal's defense can mark a player to save their life and that Clichy is starting to look less like a top Full Back and more like Tony Hibbert........ Arsenal were getting raped so bad down that left hand side that I was ready to call the police to report the crime! The fact that Diaby who is also a waste of space was on that left flank didn't help matters defensively. But anytime SWP is made to look like a world beater you know you've got problems!

Arsenal do have cause for complain though, at 1-1 a certain Mr Adebayor decided it would be alright to basically stamp on Van Persie's face........ Now for me this is a criminal act, it goes beyond football, a bad tackle I can understand but what Ade did was pure assault, GBH! Now had Ade been sent off Arsenal my well have gone on to win the match and we would not have had to witness the sickening scene of him running the full length of the pitch after his goal to incite the Arsenal fans........ Now, I swear on the Football Mum's life that had I been in the away end I would have run on to the field and attempted to break his leg, call me a thug if you want, but this goes beyond being pissed off with a player (there have been many who have angered me) but none to the point that I've considered running on to the pitch. I'm still so anger at him for what he did to RvP, for what he almost did to Cesc in the first half and for what he did to the traveling Arsenal fans that I've made it my goal to buy tickets to Arsenal v City at the Emirates and attack him with a couple of Pool balls in a sock "Scum" style. Should that not work, find out where he lives and smash his house up.

Call me what you will but Adebayor is quite clearly a thug himself, should we even be surprised with what he did to RvP since after all he broke Bendter's nose at WHL.......... This man is dangerous and needs to be dealt with and since our players are too pussy to do anything about him then maybe I will! Imagine if he had done this when the likes of Keown, Lauren and Viera were playing, they would have hounded him so much that Hughes would have had to bring him off or at least scared him in to thinking twice before abusing our players!

That's what angers me the most about this current crop of Arsenal players, the fact that they have no heart to fight for respect, yes they can play good football but they are pussies who let people walk all over them. It's quite ironic that the two players who actually tried to have a scarp at the end of that Carling Cup final defeat to Chelsea a couple of years ago are now both playing for City.

All in all it seems that we've not improved our weakness form that past couple of season (conceding goals) and it frustrating to see us play well yet lose again. I think Alan Hansen summed it up best on Match of the Day - "When United, Chelsea or Liverpool play well they win, but with Arsenal you can never be sure"

United put Spurs in their place

I'll give Spurs one thing, their crowd was awesome for the first 10 minutes on Saturday evening, they never stopped singing and even I as an Arsenal fan could appreciate that.

They took the lead from a well taken goal by Jermain "Stop Teasing" Defoe who was giving too much space by Rio who was playing his first game of the season after being out with back spasms, after that though it was pretty much all United and for me they deservedly led at the break thanks to goals from Giggs and Anderson.

I felt a better keeper or maybe a taller keeper would have saved Giggs free kick but I think it's harsh to blame Tottenham's marking for the second as there was a bit of pinball football in the build up and Anderson was in the right place at the right time to score his first goal for the club.

United lost Scholes midway through the second half for a 2nd yellow card which I thought was harsh. It was a 50/50 ball which him and Huddlestone both went for and Scholsy tries to pull out of the challenge and maybe in doing so made it look worse than it actually was....... Big Tom's reaction didn't help his cause though.

Strangely enough United seemed to play even better when they went down to 10 men and deservedly got a 3rd when Rooney messed up Alan Hutton and slotted the ball through       Cudicini's legs to wrap up the win.

All in all, Spurs prove yet again that players like Lennon and Defoe (I know he scored) whilst good against lesser opposition, find themselves lacking against the big boys. Other than the first minute I can't remember seeing Jermain "Stop Teasing" Defoe or "Little" Lennon and if they are your best two players then where do you expect to finish in the league? 6th is the best they can hope for.

Liverpool crush Burnley

Yossi might have racked up the most points in a single fantasy week you will see this season. Three goals and an assist is pretty good going for the Fredo Corleone lookalike and I'm sure a lot of people will be bringing him in to their fantasy teams. Yossi really would be great value in fantasy if you could guarantee Rafa would start him each week.

Not really much to say about this one, Liverpool looked good and did what they needed to do and did it with ease. They only shock for me was how Stevie G failed to score? He should have had at least two, but ended up with just an assist.

Injury time Chelsea make it 5 of 5

Chelsea struck in injury time in both the first and second half to overturn a one goal deficit and maintain their 100% start to the season. It's also the 2nd time this season already Chelsea have needed a late winner against a lesser team to seal all three points.

Are you surprised? No? You really shouldn't be!

To be fair Chelsea deserved the win and were far better than Stoke who really didn't create much.

It's games like this that reinforce my belief that Chelsea are the team to beat this season and right now I don't see anyone stopping them....... Good thing there are another 33 games left to play to change my mind........

The Football Guy Prediction League

Anytime you have a lot of goals in a game week it makes perfect results quite hard to come by, having said that there were still a few to be had this week!

The scoring system is simple -

Perfect Result = 30pts

Correct Result = 10pts

Wrong Result = -10pts

Here's a look at how everyone did this midweek -

                          PR       CR      WR      PTS

Footy Doc          1          6         3         60

Jamrock             1          4         5         20

Football Guy      0          6         4         20

SportBoys          1          3         6          0

Lawro                0          5         5          0

So the Footy Doc makes good on his promise that the international break would do him good and comes back with a week leading score. Will it be enough to move him off bottom though? Lets take a look.

Heres the complete table -

                        PR       CR      WR      PTS

SportsBoys       8        16       22       180    

Jamrock            6        19       21       160

Football Guy     3        23       20       120

Lawro               3        21        22       80 

Footy Doc         4        17        25       40

So it was not enough to move him out of the basement, but at least the Footy Doc now is out of minus and within striking distance of Lawro.

Just looking at the table, if it was all about predicting the outcome of matches and not the score I would be winning, but then again if it was just about playing good football so would Arsenal........

Losers

Arsenal

For having a team of pussies and a left hand side limper than a stroke victim.

Amer Fatayer

For being only 4th in the world in fantasy...... Aim Higher!!!!

Pompey

For being worse than Wolves.

The End

Take care

Football Guy

Hi and hello football fans, it's your old pal Roko The Football Guy, whats going down? I hope all is well wherever you are! It's been a crazy past 72 hours for me I must say with more highs and lows than a Robert Downy Jnr drugs binge. I've met Ex-Croatian footballers, I've woken up with a fork in my pants, I've gambled and acted like Robert Downy Jnr and I even had a hot masseuse lady (you know, the ones who go about in bars giving people massages) give ME her number (shame I can't use it as otherwise the potential Football Girl who I'm half seeing right now might hit me in the face with a chair). Speaking of that, I found out last night that this potential Football Girl has never seen Goodfellas or Casino........... HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE???

I'd love to go in to detail about all whats happened this week but since I feel I might die from the come down I'm on I'll save it for next week as right now I won't do the story any justice...

Blackburn v Wolves

Blackburn have got to win a game sooner or later and with them playing Wolves at home this Saturday I have a feeling it's going to be sooner rather than later!

There might well be a good chance that I go the whole season without picking Wolves to win once due to my complete lack of confidence in all things Big Mick.......

Anyway, Blackburn will take care of business this weekend and I think 5/6 is good value if you fancy a bet!

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

Liverpool v Burnley

Old Stevie G got two goals midweek for England, so he better get at least one this weekend as he is going to be my Captain choice in fantasy football.

Expect Brain Jensen, Burnley's fat goalkeeper to have a busy afternoon just like he did last time out against Chelsea.

Liverpool could do with a good performance as they had not looked very good in their last to matches before the international break.

Football Guy's verdict 3-0

Manchester City v Arsenal

I guess you could say this is City's first real test of the season and should there be a repeat of the scoreline from last term (3-0 city win) then maybe it will be a sign that City are for real?!?!

I personally think that if Arsenal can play like they did against United last time out (minus the two mistakes for the goals) they will win.

I'm also 100% confident that Adebayor will score in this match and he might well be my transfer in this week in fantasy.

Football Guy's verdict 2-2

Portsmouth v Bolton

So Pompey got rid of Dave Nugent on transfer deadline day, who does that leave them up front? Pompey are so going down this year!

I really have nothing to say about this match other than that I won't be watching it.....

Football Guy's verdict 1-1

Stoke v Chelsea

A lot of people have been dissing Spurs and City's starts to the season because they have yet to play anyone really good, so if that's the case then Chelsea should also be included in that conversation as they have had one of the most easy opening five fixtures I can recall seeing.

Anyway, they have done a good job at beating all what's been set in front of them and I'd expect that to continue against Stoke, regardless of how good the Potters are at home.

Like Stevie G, Fat Frank also scored twice midweek and since he too is a member of my fantasy team I'd appreciate it if he could keep that run going!

Football Guy's verdict 0-2

Sunderland v Hull

Michael Turner - Do you think he will score against his old club? You'd think he would have a good shout as he knows how they prepare for corners!

Hull have started better than I thought they would and am quite tempted to go for a draw here as I really have not been impressed with Suderland, but since Hull are pretty poo away I'm going to have to go for a home win.

Football Guy's verdict 2-1

 

Wigan v West Ham

Due to me being so tired I actually forgot to include this fixture when this post first went online and had to be notified of the fact through a message from our good friends the Sportboys!

I'm slightly more impressed with the Hammers as a team than Wigan...... Actually impressed is not the word I'm looking for........

Football Guy's verdict 1-1

Tottenham v Manchester United

When did Aaron Lennon turn in to Stanly Matthews circa 1953? To be fair I think had you or I been playing against Croatia's left back on Wednesday we might have look pretty good too!

Spurs have a lot of players right now in form and for their sakes I hope the international break has not disrupted that (Lennon look out as Evra is actually a Full back)

I almost went with a Spurs win, but I can't back them to make it 5 out of 5 in the league as the world might end if that happens!

Football Guy's verdict 0-0

Birmingham v Aston Villa

I don't have the results in front of me but I seem to remember there being quite a few goals flying in when these two meet in the league, but as I have Steve Carr in my fantasy team I hope that the goals won't be flying in at the Birmingham end!

I think this is the first time Martin O'Neill and Alex McLeish have gone head to head since their days managing Celtic and Rangers where O'Neill was up 11 wins to seven.

I'd quite like a 1-0 Birmingham win with Steve Carr scoring the winner, but then again I'd also quite like some sleep right now and I don't see that coming any time soon.....

Football Guy's verdict 1-2

Fulham v Everton

In 16 Premier League meetings between the two, there has never been a draw (Everton nine wins, Fulham seven).

Also the home side has won on 15 of those 16 occasions, what do you think I'm going to go for?

Football Guy's verdict 2-0

The Rest

Right first off here are the Footy Doc's predictions -

Blackburn 2v0 Wolves

Liverpool 4v0 Burnley

Man City 1v2 Arsenal

Portsmouth 1v1 Bolton

Stoke City 0v1 Chelsea

Sunderland 2v1 Hull City

Wigan 1v2 West Ham

Tottenham 1v2 Man Utd

Birmingham 0v2 Aston Villa

Fulham 1v0 Everton

Next up we have JamrockRover - 

Blackburn 1 - 1 Wolves

Liverpool 3 - 0 Burnley

Man City 1 - 3 Arsenal

Portsmouth 1 - 1 Bolton

Stoke City 1 - 2 Chelsea

Sunderland 1 - 0 Hull City

Wigan 1 - 2 West Ham

Tottenham 2 - 2 Man Utd

Birmingham 1 - 2 Aston Villa

Fulham 1 - 0 Everton

And finally, the kings of football predictions, the SportBoys  -

Blackburn 1 Wolves 1

Liverpool 3 Burnley 0

Man City 1 Arsenal 2

Portsmouth 1 Bolton 1

Stoke City 0 Chelsea 2

Sunderland 2 Hull 0

Wigan 2 West Ham 3

Tottenham 1 Man Utd 3

Birmingham 1 Aston Villa 1

Fulham 0 Everton 0

Oh, and here are Lawro's as well - LINK

Have a good weekend and take care

Football Guy