Starting with this year’s first major disappointment: there’s no more Alan Pardew Project. Alan left “the club” and has joined another “the club” in a move that benefits him more than anyone. There are many questions that will remain unanswered: Why did Crystal Palace paid £3.5 million for a manager on the brink of being fired? Why didn’t Newcastle have a replacement lined up for when he was fired? What has Alan Pardew ever done in the Premier League?
Actually, that last one I can answer:
| Matches | W | D | L | GF | GA | Pts | Win % |
| 155 | 58 | 34 | 63 | 198 | 238 | 208 | 37 |
But even a losing manager gets to drive to his new club in a nice ride. Look what fancy car being a 37% winning manager can earn you.
To be fair, as a winning percentage that’s better than his time at Charlton or West Ham. Call be a prognosticator extraordinaire but I have a feeling that his winning percentage won’t be going up at Crystal Palace… in the Premier League anyway.
| 10-Jan 2015 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Sunderland | 0-1 | Liverpool |
| Swansea City | 1-1 | West Ham |
| West Bromwich Albion | 2-1 | Hull City |
| Leicester City | 1-0 | Aston Villa |
| Everton | 0-1 | Manchester City |
| Burnley | 2-1 | QPR |
| Chelsea | 2-1 | Newcastle United |
| Crystal Palace | 1-2 | Tottenham Hotspur |
Sunderland will be looking for a draw about as hard as Liverpool are looking for striker, defence, and a goalkeeper who doesn’t have an issue with his feet. I’m not sure why Brendan Rodgers insists on bashing his players but after putting Balotelli on the bench and informing him he needed to “get used to it” it seems that the hard-nosed, no-nonsense, father-figure tactic is in play. I hope he doesn’t play hardball with Raheem’s new contract because he’s one of the few bright spots for the team. With Gerrard finally admitting to being too old for the premier league ready for a trip to the retirement franchises of the MLS things can only look up for Liverpool. It’s his senior send-off so the team should be up for the game and ready grooming younger players to take over. It’s a positive to have him start his retirement track. Some will say that he scored twice last week and is still a valuable player. To those people I say? I say that even Balotelli would have converted one penalty.
It will be 0-0 with Sunderland hanging on until a late goal from someone unexpected will turn the game – the unexpected player? Someone in a Liverpool shirt.
Swansea are a decent team sitting around the middle of the table. West Ham are a decent team sitting on the low end of the upper tier of the table. Two equally matched teams? This can only be a draw.
West Brom are better than their position and Hull are, according to the form books, not very good. The difference maker is that Tony Pulis has had a chance to teach the team the ways of survival for over a week behind closed doors. What makes Pulis refreshing is that he says what he says and he means what he means: “Saido Berahino is for sale”. Unlike most new managers, like say Pardew, that insist they are some major purchases away from being good, Pulis says their goal-scoring machine is available if the price is right. In other words, if you offer a team like WBA enough money they have to say yes. Tony Pulis 2-1 Hull – we’ll give him full credit for the points.
Leicester City are bottom, basement, one place from the Championship. This will change as they face an inept Aston Villa who can’t score.. and worse, will be without defensive player of the year Ron Vlaar with injury. That hole in the back will make all the difference as the Foxes break through the defensive unit who just haven’t had the time to gel.
Roberto Marinez needs to channel his inner David Moyes and start looking for creative ways to play boring and winning football. Manchester have been disappointing in recent wins but maybe someone other than Lampard will score and free us from having to listen to NYFC fans complain about how they bought tickets just to see Frankie. Is the MLS so dearth of talent that Lampard sells tickets? City will scrape it.
I did analysis of my picks this year so far (not good – lower percentage than Lawro by some margin, though more perfect results) and did learn that over the course of the season so far I had not picked Burnley to do anything at all! Not even 6 points. This pick is rectifying that situation. They should have a decent shot at Turf Moor against QPR. Maybe they will have two decent shots? and let’s suppose both of them results in goals? Could happen.
Chelsea are playing Newcastle in a revenge match. Newcastle seemed to turn it on whenever their manager looked like he was close to leaving, saving him from the end. The question becomes, what will they do when their manager has left? You could say the players will play to impress the new manager; however, there isn’t one yet. Maybe Newcastle will play for their caretaker coach John Carver. Then again, maybe not. It will be a flattering score-line for Newcastle as Chelsea will pepper their goal all afternoon and just fail to put anything away.
I’m riding the Harry Kane train until it gets derailed. He’s young and talented but no one can put forward the effort he does for the long term. He has been clocked traveling 8 miles during a game!
| 11-Jan 2015 | ||
|---|---|---|
| Arsenal | 2-1 | Stoke |
| Manchester United | 1-2 | Southampton |
One of the other items I learned is that I have seriously overrated Arsenal. This does nothing to improve my reputation as a closet Arsenal fan. But nothing changes here as I pick Arsenal once again to get a victory over Stoke. Pete Crouch will maintain his recent scoring record. To fuel his fire, Monreal said “Peter Crouch is slow and bad at dribbling… but Arsenal fear his ‘dangerous’ aerial prowess”. I believe that means he can reach the high branches at lunch time because I think he a player with two left feet and a poor header of the ball.
Next up, a quick mid year round up.
Southampton proved over the winter break they are, as the pundits say, “for real”. Buying Victor Valdes shows me that the turtle featured LVG doesn’t know as much as people claim (unless DeGea has said he’s leaving and nothing can change his mind).. and that the Barcelona implosion is almost complete. I suspect that soon we’ll hear Rooney is off because he’s not one to take his marching orders well.