Predictions league hails the power of Drogba

February 9, 2010

Didier Drogba’s second goal in Sunday’s 2-0 win over Arsenal was the epitome of the Chelsea striker’s immense power.

It’s hard to know how any defence can stop him, even Inter Milan’s…

Top Premier League strikers are certainly having the best of it at the moment with Manchester United talisman Wayne Rooney scoring another in the 5-0 thrashing of Portsmouth.

Constrast Drogba and Rooney with Barcelona’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who has scored once in his last 10 matches, and misfiring Juventus forward Alessandro Del Piero. His side have slid all the way to seventh in Serie A.

Talking of who is in or out of form, our Premier League predictions competition had one standout performer at the weekend — leader Paul Radford, who was spot on with Chelsea’s 2-0 win. Paul racked up four correct scores in all, bagging a maximum five points for each, while he picked up three singles for guessing the right result in three other games.

A midweek fixtures programme awaits and as many of our panel are away at the Winter Olympics, here is a perfect chance to sneak up on them while their minds are focused on luge and freestyle skiing.

If that doesn’t tempt you, any new entrants get double points for the rest of the season. Oh, and we trust you to total up your own points too.

Here’s the panel scores and the fixtures. Please play along in the comments.

Reuters Soccer blog panel: Paul Radford 221, Patrick Johnston 204, Neil Maidment 190, Mitch Phillips 189, Simon Evans 165, Kevin Fylan 162, Mark Meadows 162, Julien Pretot 143, Mike Collett 140, Asia Sports Desk 131, Martyn Herman 118, Miles Evans 108, Sonia Oxley 84

Tuesday
Fulham v Burnley
Man City v Bolton
Portsmouth v Sunderland
Wigan v Stoke

Wednesday
Arsenal v Liverpool
Aston Villa v Man Utd
Blackburn v Hull
Everton v Chelsea
West Ham v Birmingham
Wolverhampton v Tottenham

Source

Tags: A. Talking, Alessandro, Alessandro Del Piero, Asia, asia sports, aston villa, Birmingham, Chelsea West, correct scores, Del Piero, didier drogba, fulham, Ham, HULL, inter milan, Kevin Fylan, league predictions, Liverpool, man city, Manchester, mark meadows, Mike Collett, Miles Evans, mitch phillips, Neil Maidment, patrick johnston, Paul, paul radford, premier league, simon evans, Sonia Oxley, Sunderland, top premier, wayne rooney, winter olympics, zlatan ibrahimovic

Bolton stump everyone in another dire predictions week

September 29, 2009

Are Bolton Wanderers so bad that not one of our Reuters Soccer Blog predictions panel thought they would win at Birmingham City?

Ye of little faith. Manager Gary Megson may not be very popular with the Bolton fans but his side will always fight. A 2-1 win at a promoted club wasn’t all that shocking.

Obviously Chelsea losing at Wigan was a real eye-opener so let’s not beat ourselves up about not guessing that. Kudos to Mitch for at least predicting a draw but he’s not getting the extra points he claims we promised him.

Generally it was a pretty dreadful weekend all round, even for the many of you out there like Chipking who have been showing us up in recent weeks.

Scores were only swelled by Stoke v Manchester United being a double-pointer.

This meant leader Simon Evans, Kevin’s Dad (making a guest appearance and adding to Kev’s total), week winner Mitch Phillips, Mike Collett and Asia Sports Desk all got 10 for rightly predicting that Ryan Giggs would come off the bench and inspire a 2-0 victory.

We threatened minus points for those who got Man U wrong but we’ll defer any penalties given Miles only got three points overall anyway…

My crystal ball is obviously geared towards the first and last game of the weekend programme but useless otherwise.

I was the only one of the panel to score a full five for Saturday’s early game where Everton, I thought unsurprisingly, beat bottom club Portsmouth 1-0 while I was also out on my own saying money bags Manchester City would overcome West Ham 3-1 on Monday.

So here are our running scores, let us know how you did in the comments. Don’t gloat too much.

Reuters Soccer Blog: Simon Evans 59, Kevin Fylan 56, Mitch Phillips 52, Patrick Johnston 48, Paul Radford 46, Mike Collett 43, Miles Evans 38, Justin Palmer 35, Neil Maidment 34, Julien Pretot 32, Mark Meadows 30, Asia Sports Desk 28

PHOTO: Bolton boss Gary Megson REUTERS/Nacho Doce

Source

Tags: Asia, birmingham city, bolton wanderers, bottom club, CHELSEA, Don, gary megson, guest appearance, Justin Palmer, Kevin, Kevin Fylan, last game, Manager Gary Megson, Manchester, manchester city, manchester united, mark meadows, Mike Collett, Miles Evans, Mitch, mitch phillips, money bags, Neil Maidment, patrick johnston, paul radford, Portsmouth, reuters, ryan giggs, simon evans, sports desk, weeks scores, west ham, ye of little faith

Panel predictions: how low can you go?

September 14, 2009

The best and brightest here at Reuters Soccer Blog continue to show they’d struggle to tip their own hats in a stiff breeze, let alone a correct score in the Premier League.

Our leader, Paul Radford, managed an unhappy three points this week … and look, who’s that chap who has sneaked through to replace him at the top? That was not the most impressive display of the week, however … for that look at one Julien Pretot, our new signing from the Paris bureau who leapt in with a 14 in his first week!

I expect to see him racing down the entire length of the Channel Tunnel, sliding to his knees and celebrating in front of Reuters Soccer Blog in Canary Wharf.

Remember, you get one point for predicting the right result, and make that five if you hit the nail exactly on the head. This week, I’m giving an extra point to Mike Collett for cheekily predicting Adebayor to score against Arsenal, even if he was a way off on the score. No other points for style as yet, but I expect there’ll be some pleas coming in.

Here are the latest standings:

Reuters Soccer Blog: Kevin Fylan 35, Paul Radford 34, Patrick Johnston 34, Simon Evans 32, Miles Evans 30, Mitch Phillips 24, Mike Collett 18, Neil Maidment 14, Julien Pretot 14, Asia Sports Desk 10, Mark Meadows 8

The Rest of the World: Insert your score in the comments, please. We’ll believe you. Thousands wouldn’t.

Back on Friday with the tips for the weekend and remember, you’ve got to be in it to be able to, er, gloat about how much better you are at tipping scores than we are.

PHOTO: Fulham’s Paul Konchesky (R) celebrates after scoring against Everton at Craven Cottage in London, September 13, 2009. REUTERS/Kieran Doherty

Source

Tags: adebayor, Asia, asia sports, channel tunnel, correct score, craven cottage, extra point, fulham, impressive display, Kevin Fylan, kieran doherty, london, mark meadows, Mike Collett, Miles Evans, mitch phillips, Neil Maidment, PARIS, patrick johnston, paul konchesky, paul radford, premier league, s paul, simon evans, source panel, sports desk, stiff breeze

Everton win saves panel from being banished to the stands

August 31, 2009

Very few of our panel should be enjoying their English Bank Holiday Monday. Most must hang their heads in shame.

Manchester United 2-1 Arsenal was an eventful game to say the least, with a penalty, bizarre own goal, a late strike disallowed for offside and Arsene Wenger harshly being sent to the stands where he didn’t have a seat.

Nevertheless, 2-1 to the champions was a pretty predictable score but only our Kevin had his wits about him to forecast it.

Three of our panel (the flying Justin Palmer, Simon Evans and Neil Maidment) correctly guessed Everton would end an early slump and beat Wigan 2-1 but in truth it was only thanks to a penalty deep into injury time from former Wigan man Leighton Baines.

Justin got another bumper five points for predicting Chelsea’s 3-0 victory over Burnley to gain the top score of the weekend with 15. Simon was close behind after bagging a second maximum for Manchester City’s attacking riches grinding out a 1-0 win at Portsmouth, who have finally starting buying rather than selling players.

So here’s the run down overall (with a few sunbathing absentees last week): Paul Radford 31, Justin Palmer 28, Patrick Johnston 25, Simon Evans 25, Miles Evans 24, Kevin Fylan 23, Mitch Phillips 16, Mike Collett 14, Neil Maidment 11, Asia Sports Desk 5, Mark Meadows 5 (last three on debut)

Let us know how you did and what your general total is (remember 1 point for correct result, 5 for correct score). I see maid did very well indeed…

PHOTO: Fans react as Arsenal’s manager Arsene Wenger climbs onto the stand after being sent off during their English Premier League soccer match against Manchester United in Manchester, northern England, August 29, 2009, REUTERS/Phil Noble

Source

Tags: Asia, asia sports, bank holiday monday, CHELSEA, correct result, correct score, English Premier League, english premier league soccer, injury time, Justin, Justin Palmer, Kevin, Kevin Fylan, leighton baines, maidment, manager arsene wenger, Manchester, manchester city, mark meadows, Mike Collett, Miles Evans, mitch phillips, Neil Maidment, northern england, patrick johnston, paul radford, Phil Noble, Portsmouth, premier league soccer, Simon, simon evans, sports desk

Swansea show up Premier League tedium

February 17, 2009

The (almost complete) lack of Premier League action at the weekend saw thumbs being sucked all over the place, and the Reuters Soccer Blog is no exception. While some were predicting the end of the Big Four, and others picked over Rafa Benitez’s latest contract comments, we found ourselves enthralled by the silky football displayed by Championship side Swansea City in their FA Cup game against Fulham.

Here, Padraic Halpin waxes ornithological about The Swans, while in the post below Neil Maidment bemoans the lack of on-field drama this season. Are they right? Is it just an overreaction? I’ll turn the comments off on Neil’s piece, just to keep things tidy, but they’re on here as usual. For now, over to Padraic:

Watching Swansea City play Fulham off the park on Saturday — even if their reward was only a fifth round replay trip to London — you almost hope they don’t gain promotion to the English top flight.

Swansea, sitting three points outside the championship playoff places with a game in hand, were magnificent in the 1-1 draw, demonstrating the passing game of a second-tier equivalent to the great Liverpool team of the 80’s.

Yet should the team coached by Spaniard Roberto Martinez join the survive-at-all-costs world of Premier League riches, would the one-touch philosophy instilled so finely into players like Jordi Gomez – on loan from Espanyol – and Welshman Joe Allen be preserved?

The widespread praise for Swansea’s “culture club” is actually more galling than encouraging. Would we have been so amazed at an English team endeavouring to win through attractive, attacking football 30 years ago?

“Martínez has done a wonderful job and he has a wonderful team. They play football the right way,” Fulham’s manager Roy Hodgson, whose team haven’t exactly been the worst culprits of a lack of premier adventure, said on Saturday.

Wouldn’t the great Brian Clough have insisted that was the only way to play football? Yet with TV revenue continuing to rise, relegation from the top flight remains too expensive a reality for any club to attempt to cut loose. Points far outweigh performance and one kicking too many at Everton or Bolton might force a change in promoted Swansea’s style.

What is certain is that a tie-of-the-sixth-round awaits Swansea against the European Champions if they can play Fulham off the scoreboard as well as the pitch next week.

Go to

Source