S14M5: 149, 259, 379

Let's start at the beginning and the bottom. Southampton and Everton. Wow, they are bad. Both teams conspiring to throw away promise - a first half-penalty at 0-0 for the Saints and a second consecutive 2-0 lead for Everton to lose. Why not just relegate them already and save their fans? I admittedly know very little about Southampton's last few years but Everton have been asking to be relegated for several season now - will this be their lucky year?

The 2 other promoted teams did better - creditable draws away to Brighton and Palace respectively. Fulham have started the season well but yet another late goal conceded lost them 2 points to West Ham - will this trend persist? Liverpool suffered a shock home defeat to Forest - lots of sterile possession defeated by a great finish on the counter - the classic underdog sucker punch. Bournemouth's loss to Chelsea was almost the inverse. No possession, loads of chances, still lost to a late goal - only Chelsea's 2nd chance with an xG of >0.1 all game. Brentford also played really well and left empty handed from the Etihad. 4 games played for City - 11 goals, 9 from Haaland. The wrong Norwegian had his foot amputated last week....

North London Derby day saw Tottenham High Road painted red, again. For all the talk about Arsenal's midfield woes, there was basically nothing from Spurs all game and Set Piece FC scored again, led from the front by the highest scoring set piece defender in modern times. Cockahoop. Finally, Wolves looked on course for a solid win at home to Newcastle, but decided not to bother playing for 5 minutes, conceded 2 from distance and Newcastle went home with the dub.

S14M4: 5peat it is then

Oh a post-international blog. My favourite.

1) The international break 3 weeks into the season is a crime.

2) It's got all cold

3) People have lost their mind. I had someone tell me this week that their favourite footballer was....Mohammed Elneny. That too, friends, is a crime.

Usually I hate these blogs because I have to reach back through time, remember what happened 2 weeks ago and then write something when everyone's forgotten/moved on.

WELL NOT THIS TIME. Now I get to say my piece on Ricegate.

What a load of nonsense. I mean fine, do the letter of the law. But then letter of the law everything. Throw ins from the correct blade of grass. Penalties at every corner. 4 red cards a side for all the yellows being handed out. Maybe book Joao Pedro for a *more* egregious incident in the first half, or send off Veltman for kicking Rice - ball was moving, so couldn't have been trying to take the free kick....it's just a swipe off the ball. Mr Beckham will tell you how that one goes....

Anyway, as I say about 4 times a year, the PGMOL are the absolute worst. Worse than Michael Owen. Worse than people who eat beige. Worse even, than people who pronounce "specifically" as "pacifically".

I detest Howard Webb and all who sail within him. In the bin.

In football terms, some stuff happened, it was weeks ago, let's move on

S13 Rewind: Reviewing those Pre-Season Predos

I've also LOVED international football. Discard all previous comments. Got some time now to get out the pre-season predos blog so Hannah stops texting me every single day. At 5am. I hope....

Let's get started:

Firstly, thanks to the 20 people who submitted predos. I'll use your initials as per the results graphs/leaderboard to make my life easier.

Champions
Unsurprisingly, most people went for Man City to win the league. 13 for City (DH, ND, DSIL, RD, SD, DG, DWIG, JMAC, JG, AK, NK, Rk, MH), 6 for Arsenal. One weirdo, NJSPTC went for Chelsea. That went well.

Runners Up
7 votes for City, 6 for Arsenal (ND, DSIL, RD, DWIG, AK, NK), 4 for Man Utd. 2 for Chelsea (JMAC ofc, delusional leek-botherer and MH) and 1 for Newcastle (DG)

CL Places
Third: Arsenal 7, Liverpool 5 (ND, ZD, JD, DSIL, RD), Man Utd 4 Chelsea 3 & Newcastle 1
Fourth: Man Utd 6, Liverpool 5, Chelsea 4, Newcastle 3, Spurs 1 (RK) & Luton 1 (NJSPTC) - not sure which was more delusional....

Nobody saw Villa sliding into 4th. Not even Unai Emery the giant fraud.

EL Places
Fifth: Chelsea 4, Liverpool 4, Newcastle 4, Spurs 4 (ZD, DSIL, NK, MH), Villa 2, West Ham 1, (HS....hmmmm) Man Utd 1
Sixth: Newcastle 5, Brighton 3, Chelsea 3 (RD, DG, NK), Liverpool 3, Villa 2, Spurs 2, Arsenal 1, Man Utd 1 

DSIL & I were the best at working out who'd be good.....

Relegation
Luton - 18. Only NJSPTC (more on him) and RK felt they'd stay up
Burnley - 2. AK & RK. That family HATE Turf Moor.
Sheff Utd - 8 (DH, ND, HS, RD, SD, DWIG, JG, NK)

Who else did we go for?

Let's get the comedian out the way first. NJSPTC said Spurs, 3 times. Like a chef presenting a single ingredient plate. Now I'm all for Spurs getting relegated. That would be funny, but you still need 2 other clubs 'cos rules. So, please...Spurs, Chelsea, Man Utd in future.

Notts Forest - 9
Wolves - 7
Everton - 5 
Bournemouth - 5
Fulham - 2
West Ham - 1

League Cup Winner
Man City - 7
Man Utd - 5
Arsenal - 4
Chelsea - 1
Spurs - 1
Newcastle -1
Aston Villa -1

Awkward - nobody saw Jurgen signing off with silverware

FA Cup Winner
Man Utd - 3 (DH, NJSPTC, DG)
Arsenal - 8
Man City - 4
Liverpool - 3
Spurs - 1
Chelsea - 1

Champions League Winner
Real Madrid - 9 (DH, DB, ND, ZD, JA, DG, DWIG, NK, ED)
Bayern - 5
Man City - 4
Arsenal - 1 (optimistic JD)
Barca - 1 (NJSPTC)

Europa League Winner
Liverpool - 11
Roma - 2
Arsenal - 1
Man Utd - 1
Aston Villa - 1 - especially impressive from JG as they weren't in the competition
West Ham - 1
Ajax - 1
Sevilla - 1
Villareal - 1

Nobody went for Atalanta

Europa Conference League Winner
Aston Villa - 9
Fiorentina - 5
Liverpool - 1
Maccabi Tel Aviv - 2
Fenerbahce - 1
Hapoel Beer Sheva - 1
Eintracht Frankfurt - 1 

Close but not cigar for the Viola fans - Olympiakos won in ET

First PL Manager to be sacked
There was very little love for Lopetegui lasting the season - and he left a week before.
This screwed the 4 people who went for him, who can have a moral victory point.
JD foresaw this and stated Silva would be his pick in that scenario along with JMac. Wrong, but nice try.
The only person to correctly predict Paul Heckingbottom to be the first to go was ND. Well done.
Others were:
Big Ange - 2
Kompany - 2
Hodgson - 1
Emery - 1
Frank - 1
O Neil - 1
Dyche - 1
Pocchetino - 1
Cooper - 3
Moyes - 1

Top Scorer
Nice and quick this one
1 vote for Bukayo Saka (HS), 1 for Harry Kane (not quite sure DG gets the credit for his shiny new cannon trophy) and 18 for the RoboViking

Golden Gloves
Another field made a mockery of by the folks at Transfer Window Inc. 6 people went for Ramsdale, recognising the Arsenal defensive strength. This was before Raya signed on loan, who went on to win the award. So moral victories again to DB, ZD, HS, DG, AK & ED.
5 votes for Ederson and Pope each, 1 for Alisson and a super-optimistic 3 for Onana, who I believe ended the season with something like a 2 goals conceded/game stat. Maybe in all comps, but still.

Best New Signing
As per usual, WhoScored.com ratings used
Let's start with the bad.
Mason Mount (6.32 - HS) managed to have a worse season than Jurrien Timber who blew out his ACL within 45 minutes (6.43 - DB, ND, ZD, SD), Matt Turner who lost his job shortly after (6.47 - RD) or Sandro Tonali (6.53, MH) who was a naughty boy and got banned.
Mid-level seasons for Szoboszlai (6.81, JD ), Onana (6.84, DH) Caicedo (6.85, ED), Gvardiol (7.03, NJSPTC - strong finish), Jackson (7.07, JMAC, JG ) and Mac Allister (7.09 - DWIG, sort of).
Strong seasons from James Maddison (7.17 - JA, DG, AK, NK, RK & DWIG - sort of) - Spurs fans really liked that signing - who in fairnes looked good until injury hit and the winner, Declan Rice (7.38 - DSIL).

Worst New Signing
Bizarrely, many of the same names. Maddison the best of these (DSIL, JG and DG hedging his bets. ED also thought he'd just get injured. Which was right, but only after playing well). MH thought it'd be £60m down the drain, but Kai Havertz (7.16) proved him wrong. NK hated Mac Allister, Harry Maguire came from DWIG who - well....he's a united fan who presumably knows he isn't a new signing....
JD & DH (hedging bets) went for Onana, HS for Szoboszlai and JA for Højlund (6.7). SD went for Axel Disasi (6.58), RK & NK went for Nkunku (6.49 -to wind up their family?) whilst I went for Ashley Young who had a good season in some ways in that he didn't have a bird poo in his mouth again. Unfortunately for him, he was rubbish on the pitch, scoring 6.4, which was still better than poor Mason Mount (DB, ND and a very, very angry JMAC - probably better to aim your anger California way there fella....)

And that, folks, is the very belated pre-season predos from last year.