Premiership 14-15 Aug 07 Preview
A quick look at the midweek fixtures and time for you guys to make your predictions.
Tuesday 14th August, 2007
Contrary to some critics, Tottenham have no need to panic about losing to Sunderland. A home game, against genuine 5th spot rivals, should be enough to motivate the players to produce the form that is expected of them.
Jol could keep the same back four or probably bring in Rocha for Gardner, but apart from that the changes I would expect are in midfield, where a lack of width will be punished by Everton’s midfield.
Everton for me have to be more clinical and aggressive against the Spurs than they were in away games last season. You’d think that Moyes will be disappointed if Everton don’t get 3 points, and if Spurs don’t get full points, they’ll be massacred by the press (undeservingly - there’s no need to criticise them on the back of one or two performances - if you must, you should at least look at the big picture and the season gone by).
Soccerlens Prediction: Spurs to win.
Wednesday 15th August, 2007
Birmingham City vs Sunderland
Oh, this will be a good game. Brum put two past Cech and generally looked lively; Sunderland were perhaps not as impressive but got the win and most importantly prevented Tottenham from scoring.
Sunderland’s forwards (please start with Chopra, Keano) will do better against Birmingham, even in an away game while McShane, Nosworthy and co. will definitely have a better time.
Remains to be seen if Sunderland will be as wasteful though.
Birmingham are looking better than they’ve been given credit for and this is a game Steve Bruce will kill to win.
Soccerlens Prediction: Draw.
Fulham and Bolton had contrasting games - Fulham started well and ended poorly while Bolton did the opposite. Bolton will be sure to improve but Fulham are at home and Healy will probably get a goal against Bolton’s leaky defense.
Soccerlens Prediction: Fulham to win, and Lawrie Sanchez to whinge.
Manchester City vs Derby County
Both teams performed way over expectations on the weekend, but this should be an easy game for Eriksson’s new men.
Soccerlens Prediction: Man City to win, and possibly top the table on goal difference.
Portsmouth vs Manchester United
Pompey and United both need to improve from their day one showings, drastically. United will start with Tevez and perhaps with Nani as well, because I’ll be damned if Silvestre and Evra are to combine again on the left flank and leave the club looking like a pack of jokers.
United will find it hard to break down the Portsmouth defense - a repeat of Sunday will not work, 20+ chances or not.
Soccerlens Prediction: United to win, although I have a sneaky suspicion that it will be a draw.
This is a must-watch game, even if both sides are more ‘discipline’ than ‘flair’. Reading’s showing on Sunday was very encouraging while Birmingham exposed some games in Chelsea’s defence, particularly right-back (go back and see Kapo’s goal).
I wonder if Alex will get a game, and if Johnson will be dumped or not.
Soccerlens Prediction: Chelsea to win, but could be a surprise draw.
Wigan Athletic vs Middlesbrough
Two of the 4 worst sides of the weekend (West Ham and Bolton are the other 2) go head-to-head and it’ll be a good opportunity to see how Wigan’s new signings perform at home.
Soccerlens Prediction: Wigan to win.
In addition, 3 of the midweek fixtures were postponed because of European commitments - causing Arsene Wenger to throw out his first whinge of the new season. And speaking of whingers, this season Jose Mourinho will have tough, tough competition from Fulham manager Lawrie Sanchez, who spoke before the Arsenal game about how Arsenal were behind Chelsea and Manchester United, and after one of his players dove during the game and a clear-cut penalty against them was not given (although Hleb did go to the ground easily the ‘next time), complained about Arsenal players being divers. Classic Mourinho, except that Fulham isn’t that good.
Anyways, those 3 fixtures:
Liverpool vs West Ham - sparing the Hammers more humiliation / giving the Hammers time to get their shit together (neither makes sense - they’ll get humiliated the next time and they’ve already had the whole summer to get their shit together and that didn’t work too well, did it?).
Blackburn Rovers vs Aston Villa - both are the antithesis of glamour teams but fiercely competitive and actually talented - would have been a good game to watch.
Newcastle United vs Arsenal - another good game I’m going to be looking forward to.
Predictions, readers?
All the latest football headlines.
reading are cowards, how can you put 10 men in a box, and leave 1 man forward, have any of you seen the wrigglys gum advert, where they have formations, somebody copied there formation.
Its not agaisnt the rules to put 10 men in the box i dont aprove of it but you cant change that. Pompey isnt a good team to face after drawing a game with cambell and David James not good
Yeah they are cowards and there is nothing in the rule book about it. But if they were smart, after Rooney got injured they should of attacked more instead of soaking up our shots. We had O’Shea playing up front.
ok guys I am mad at at Reading too, but may be our players should have played better.
Well what reading did on sunday was definitely not football but fergie should have had tevez at least on the bench.Furthermore United were pretty one dimensional in attack and it was clearly evident how much a target man is needed. Thats why saha needs to get his backside out of the stands and onto the pitch to earn those weekly wages. Moreover the silvestre, evra partnership dont do that against pompey or for the rest of the season. Give Nani his chance on the wing and evra back at left back. Silvestre is absolute rubbish.
It was just like many of the games Arsenal played last season, with teams playing for a tie by playing 10 players in box!!! now you how it feels when teams come to play for a point.
Rossi could have played a big role if he didnt move to la liga.
Man Utd is pretty short on strikers.. but Man Utd can still win it.
They always do.
1. Keane to pull the strings for Tottenham.
2. Wigan to win over Middlesborough with Koumas to do all the running.
3. Bolton to regroup to post a surprise win, thanks to Anelka.
4. Sunderland to snatch a draw.
5. Ericksons honeymoon to continue with some old city boys shining.
6. ManU to score another 0-0 victory
7. Reading to defeat Chelsea.
Arsenal vs. Newcastle. looks like a great game, Im not surew who will win…Ahh yes I do Arsenal 3-1!
saf new that reading and all other teams(chelsea,liverpool and arsenal included) come to old trafford for a draw. so i think he mader a mistake not having a striker in the subz bench,what the **** was silvester doing in the startin line up..tevez will get a goal tomorrow, i fancy manutd winning,.liverpool will have to try reaaly had to beat westham..arsenal newcastle will def be interesting to win,thought it will be a 2-2 draw
is it just me, or is that the least ugly picture of tevez that has brrn posted in awhile??
Tough tie for Arsenal Newcastle are looking good but i think Arsenal will win if they improve the way they played last weak
And Manutd jaluo Chelsea and Liverpool are defensive teams stop being so parinoid (i cant spell
) and Arsenal beat you guys at Old Trafford if i recall correctly 
United will definitely win tomorrow, and then the “crisis” will be over.
I admire the way Reading played. Its part of football to play 10 men behind the ball. If other teams can’t break through, its their own fault. Considering the millions these guys get paid nowadays, I’d expect them to dribble through 20 men and then score spectacular goals anyway.
Question:
If your opposing team plays 10 men behind the ball with a lone striker, why then do you have a need to play 4 defenders + defensive midfielders? Why not play 1-2 defenders and push everybody into the box. (Someone’s bound to make a mistake). The cowardice therefore lies not with the defensive team as such, but with the attacking team.
karl, we did that though, rio and vidic stayed back(and rio came forward eventully) we were all there, and we had shots, but their keeper was top quality and most of our missed chances were slightly off, look at nani, him and carrick had the best chances of the match, if the wind was blowing the other way, both chances would have gone in!
dan, I know we tried that (perhaps that’s where the 25 shots came from). I’m trying to make a point - ‘Why whine when a team play defensively). Even the way Reading played (defensively), if our finishing was on-target, we could have won at least 3-0.
Our loss can also be attributed to not having any attack-minded replacements on the bench. A mis-calculation on SAF’s part. All-in-all we missed our chances.
agreed karl.
DAMN IT make me official,
So what happens if Carlos Tevez gets injured in the near future? Have United fans begun to ask that question. Honestly, the stupidity of selling a young talent like Rossi who proved he could cut it in Serie A, and keeping the sulking often injured Saha and the terminally injured but loved Ole is beyond my comprehension. Does United enter the transfer market yet again to see if any team is willing to unsettle it’s squad at the last second by letting go a top striker? The team has depth at the back four and too much depth in midfield, how then could they expect to win the Prem on Tevez and Rooney alone? Saha should have been sold when the past season ended. Fergie’s loyalty to him boggles my mind considering how he dumped loyal servants like Ruud and Becks without blinking. And please stop coddling players like Nani and Anderson. They are more than ready and more than competent to handle the Prem. Playing in Portugal isn’t exactly the third division. Porto and Benfica have won the Champions League and teams from that country are always competitive. If those players can play regularly there, they can play anywhere, especially Nani. In his short time on the pitch he performed far better than Giggsy or Scholes. I say start him half of the time and sit either Scholes, Giggs or Carrick down in a rotation. Pompey will be a tough test because they will attack at home. I just hope Tevez can get in sync with his teammates quickly. After the Copa, I have no fears about his conditioning.
sandbagger, we have dong, campbell and anderson, andeson can hold his own, dong and campbell alternate, giggs and ronaldo can play upfront with anderson martin gibson and nani can all go on the wing, and if you want
——-edvs——
brown-rio-vidic-evra
ronaldo-carrick-hargreaves-nani
———-scholes———-
-anderson/giggs/campbell,dong-
The best thing for united will be to play hargreaves, carick and scholes. In previous games against portsmouth we haven’t controlled the game from midfield and playing all three of them will allow us to break down portsmouth’s attacks and start our own. This is precisely what hargreaves was bought for. Don’t be surprised to see SAF employ this system with Nani and Ronaldo on the wings and Tevez up front. (Evra at left back, the left wing thing won’t last for long)
Spurs lost 1-3, at home.
Can we start throwing stuff at them now?
hehehe.spurs fans.where are you? 4th place over the gunners huh? breaking into the top 4 huh? im glad this happened. now you spuds pricks can shut your pie holes for a while now.
Ahmed
I think a rotten tomato or two will do for now. If they lose one or two more matches against beatable teams i’m gonna join the bandwagon of ‘Spurs always suck, suckie, suckie, suck!’
Oh yeah, btw, GO ARSENAL!!!
As much as I hate the way that Reading played last sunday, I was more angry at the way M U failed to break through. The quality between the two teams are too disparate and the only strategy that Reading has is defend. They did nothing wrong there although there were some over zealous defending. Now I hope the team can do well against Pompey and shut the critics up. Put Evra back at LB, he is better staying there. Get a proper winger to play
My predictions for tonight: Brum 1-2 Sunderland
Fulham 1-1 Bolton
Citeh 3-1 Derby
Pompey 0-2 United
Reading 0-1 Chelsea
Wigan 1-2 M’brough
Why weren’t Villa and Blackburn playing?
who are brum
Birmingham, it’s even in the first line of Ahmed’s preveiw if you need clarification
dan - brum = birmingham city
liam - blackburn play MyPa in a Uefa Cup game on Thursday, that’s why the Villa game is postponed.
I love you Manc fans. Anytime a team actually beats you or gets a point it’s “not fair”. Oh, Reading, they came to defend, that’s not football… blah blah. You are laughable.
Is it “fair” or a level playing field that a single one of your players is worth the same as probably the whole of the Reading team. Perhaps all the opposition teams should turn up and just stand aside and let mighty Man Utd score?
Now, I will agree when Chelsea do a similar thing it is a bit pathetic because they have a similar amount of money meaning they do it out of CHOICE. The vast majority of other teams in the Prem do it out of necessity.
You people are absolutely pathetic excuses for football “supporters” (see Ahmed’s ‘true fan/supporter thread).
PS - Ahmed, West Ham probably will get “humiliated” against Liverpool - we always lose to the Scousers - but at least we can look forward to another 6 points from those push-overs from Old Trafford again this year eh.
PS - Good luck Tevez. Hope he scores a hat-trick, and Pompey win 4v3.
FC - I’m hoping that West Ham do better than that, I’d rather see them fight, but I don’t see the manager getting that out of them.
Personally I think Reading played fantastically well, and FC this sort of reaction is always going to happen, and if you have to blame someone for making it popular you should look at the Gunners
Hmm…
Well played by Portsmouth, United looked woefully off-key. Fair result.
FUCK!
5 out of 7 for predictions, with the Spurs and United predictions going bust.
Midweek review, plus a match report for United, coming up.