Premiership Placings for the season

[Royalee]

It'd be interesting to have a run down on everyone's predictions - here are mine:

1st - Man United - United won the league last season and although Chelsea were missing John Terry and Petr Cech for long spells, which no doubt had an impact, particularly over Xmas, I think the new signings and in particular Tevez will see them through.

2nd - Chelsea - Unlucky with injuries last time out, I think they'll chase United right to the wire again this year with Malouda and Pizarro coming in. However, I think the African Nations Cup will lead to their downfall this season as they will be without their main source of goals in Drogba and half their midfield will be buggering off, leaving them with the vastly overrated Sidwell to ruin their title challenge.

3rd - Arsenal - This may cause some surprise, but I think Arsenal will do well without Henry as the focus will be off of one man for a change and the players will have more license to go out and express themselves. Van Persie looks sharp pre-season and Eduardo looks like a bit of a fox in the box. Add the fact that the youngsters will be a year older and maturing and I think Arsenal will have a better season.

4th - Liverpool - Invested heavily, which they needed to do. However, I think too much chopping and changing up front, combined with them still persisting with playing the likes of Pennant, who is crap, could hold them back this season. I think once Voronin and Torres settle, it's looking good for them, but it'll take a while for them to gel. I think they'll have a slow start and steadily improve as the season goes on, but I think it may all come too late.

5th - Spurs - They've bought every half decent young player (plus Darren Bent) again for the sake of it. They've got a superb squad, which could easily break into the top four if managed correctly, but I think they're flawed in terms of Jol's tactics, as we saw last season. They'll have a steady enough season in 5th and do alright in the cups, but it remains to be seen how much longer the board will put up with stagnation given the money being pumped in.

6th - Newcastle - Controversial and they haven't brought in too many players as yet, but I think that'll change by the end of August. Allardyce has cleared out some utter shit like Titus Bramble and brought in some reasonable players, like Viduka. They'll miss given at the very start, but I expect to see them finally fulfill their potential under Big Sam and can see them getting into Europe if they can keep Martins, Viduka and Owen fit.

7th - Reading - Yes, Sidwell's gone, but then again he was overrated and not in our top 5 players anyway. Halford only played two games and two minutes for us, so you can't say he'll be missed. We were missing our best winger last season in Convey, so it'll be a huge boost to have him back instead of Hunt, who tries hard, but flatters to deceive in terms of end product. I like the look of the two signings in Cisse and Fae and they look solid in the clips I've seen of them. We've got better defensive cover this time around more options going forward, so I expect us to upset the odds again.

8th - Blackburn - Did okay last season, but didn't look anything special in the two games against us, or on Sky to be fair. Santa Cruz might be a decent signing and there's not questioning McCarthy and Roberts, but they look weak in central midfield.

9th - Everton - Their only major signing this summer is Jagielka, who is similar to Sidwell in being vastly overrated. There's no doubting Everton have some quality in Johnson and Arteta, but with Cahill's injury problems, they lack a box to box midfielder, which is so important to them. Their wingers also don't inspire me much.

10th - Aston Villa - They've got a few decent young attacking players, like Moore, Young and Agbonlahor, but questions need to be asked about their defence. O'Neill will improve it in time, but this season has come too early. Expect them to score goals, but they'll let them in too. Still, I reckon they'll be top half, just.

11th - Man City - Sven appears to have scouted all his players on Football Manager! Still, he looks to have made a few decent signings and he needed to to be fair as City were shit last season! Bianchi'll score goals and he's slowly clearing out the crap, so I expect them to finish mid-table.

12th - Portsmouth - Spent money again, but they've got an aging defence which won't be as good as last year. Nugent will get them goals, but I can't see them doing much without another decent striker to partner him. It'll take their new signings time to fit in as well.

13th - West Ham - Another team which has spent big and again they needed to. However, Ljungberg is a complete waste of money for me as he's been injured for the last two seasons pretty much. He also relies heavily on pace, which he's losing. It'll be a big boost to have Ashton back, but then again they've lost Tevez, who single-handedly kept them up. They'll be solid, but unspectacular.

14th - Bolton - This is the start of their decline I think with Allardyce having left. Scandinavian imports aren't necessarily going to improve their team and they previously relied heavily on Allardyce's brilliant record in the transfer market and his ability to get the best out of underperformers like Diouf and mavericks like Anelka. Anelka's goals will see them through, but I think there'll be fallouts before long and they'll lose a lot of players at the end of the season, resulting on them going down the year after.

15th - Sunderland - Keane's a winner, but he has brought in a load of absolute shit this summer. I don't care what anyone says, Kieran Richardson is a pile of absolute oxf*rd and Michael Chopra's relatively unproven still. Keane's leadership qualities and their ability to spend if they get into trouble will see them out of the relegation zone though.

16th - Middlesbrough - Woodgate being injured to start will cause them problems. They've also lost their best striker in Viduka and replaced him with an absolute donkey in Aliadiere and the unproven Tuncay. I don't rate Southgate as a manager and I think they'll struggle this season, especially if they lose Woodgate for any long period of time.

17th - Birmingham - They look weak and they were poor last season when we played our reserves against them in the cup. However, they've brought in one or two and I think with Forssell coming back and their other forwards, they may get the goals this time to get them out of it.

18th - Fulham - Buying half the Northern Ireland team will not keep you in the Premiership. Sanchez is very unproven at club level, which people forget and he has made some disastrous signings. Healy will definitely be a flop if he can't score goals in the Championship and whereas they had Malbranque and Boa Morte to rescue them in previous years, they now have nobody.

19th - Wigan - Their existence in the Premiership annoys me as they only got 15,000 for a lot of games last season and they couldn't even sell out to Arsenal! Frankly, their fans don't deserve a Premiership club and this year Chris Hutchings is going to fulfill my wish and take them down. Anybody who rates Titus Bramble needs their head checked and they've just lost their best player in Baines and have yet to replace him. Add to that the fact that De Zeuw's gone and they're down.

20th - Derby - The Watford of this season. They play dreadful football and although Davies is a great motivator (much like Boothroyd), but you can't polish shit. Earnshaw'll score a few goals, but the whole spine of their team is very weak.

[Alan Partridge]

Basically Royalee's view on each team and i suspect you'll be wrong with a lot of those predictions, good stuff.

[Dickie Davies]

Optimistic but a fine read none the less. 16th.

[SpaceCruiser]

Whilst finishing 7th would be nice, I suspect that we won't be finishing that high up. Mid-table sounds about right.

As for the rest of your predictions, whilst I think Man Utd look likely to win it, I don't think Arsenal will finish above Liverpool and I'm fairly sure that Tottenham will challenge for the 4th spot.

Wigan look likely for relegation though.

[papereyes]

Although there's loads of little bits here and there that I disagree with or are just plain wrong (6th best defence in the league has 'questions about it' for example), don't disagree too much with the ordering.

Think that we'll do worse and Villa, West Ham and Blackburn might do a touch better. Maybe even City and Portsmouth.

Injuries, luck, form will be key for everyone between 6th and 15th. The wrong injury could do you - Sheffield united looked safe last year until Hulse went with his broken leg.

Top 5 is a given

Bottom 5 is much the same, except Birmingham might be poor where Fulham are mediocre.

[savage 4 england]

I agree with most of that.

I only doubt our final position.

[Only one Trevor Morley]

For what its worth

Man Utd
Chelsea
Arsenal
Liverpool
Tottenham
Aston Villa
Sunderland
Portsmouth
Blackburn
Everton
West ham
Newcastle
Bolton
Reading
Man City
Middlesboro
Birmingham
Fulham
Derby
Wigan

[Alan Partridge]

Man Utd
Chelsea
Liverpool
Arsenal
Spurs
Everton

The rest

Reading about 15th

Sunderland
Wigan
Derby

[Yorkshire Royal]

Man Utd
Chelsea
Liverpool
Spurs
Arsenal
Everton
TBC

And going down Derby, Wigan and Fulham.

Reading somewhere between the 2, hopefully in 7th....

[Royalee]

Interesting to gauge people's opinions - cheers for the feedback.

[Coppelled Streets]

I don't care as long as were above 18th.

[Farnborough Royal]

19th - Wigan - Their existence in the Premiership annoys me as they only got 15,000 for a lot of games last season and they couldn't even sell out to Arsenal! Frankly, their fans don't deserve a Premiership club

We haven't sold 3,000 tickets for Man United away, and Can't sell out at home to Chelsea.

I guess we don't deserve a Premiership club either...

[strap]

For what its worth

Man Utd
Chelsea
Arsenal
Liverpool
Tottenham
Aston Villa
Sunderland
Portsmouth
Blackburn
Everton
West ham
Newcastle
Bolton
Reading
Man City
Middlesboro
Birmingham
Fulham
Derby
Wigan

I'll go along with this. Sadly the Sham might finish a place or too higher, and Bolton and us might swap places, but all in all fairly sound prediction. Be interestingto compare this at the end of seaosn.

[SpaceCruiser]

19th - Wigan - Their existence in the Premiership annoys me as they only got 15,000 for a lot of games last season and they couldn't even sell out to Arsenal! Frankly, their fans don't deserve a Premiership club

We haven't sold 3,000 tickets for Man United away, and Can't sell out at home to Chelsea.

I guess we don't deserve a Premiership club either...

As Royalee is talking about home games, I guess the Chelsea game will have significantly more than a Wigan home game.

[Royalee]

19th - Wigan - Their existence in the Premiership annoys me as they only got 15,000 for a lot of games last season and they couldn't even sell out to Arsenal! Frankly, their fans don't deserve a Premiership club

We haven't sold 3,000 tickets for Man United away, and Can't sell out at home to Chelsea.

I guess we don't deserve a Premiership club either...

Given that it's August and people are still on holiday, you would expect there to be some spare seats at Old Trafford, especially when they're asking for stupid money for a ticket. I still expect us to take far more than Wigan will take to nearby Everton though. I expect the Chelsea game will eventually sell out as well.

[Tilehurst Mike]

It'd be interesting to have a run down on everyone's predictions - here are mine:

1st - Man United - United won the league last season and although Chelsea were missing John Terry and Petr Cech for long spells, which no doubt had an impact, particularly over Xmas, I think the new signings and in particular Tevez will see them through.

2nd - Chelsea - Unlucky with injuries last time out, I think they'll chase United right to the wire again this year with Malouda and Pizarro coming in. However, I think the African Nations Cup will lead to their downfall this season as they will be without their main source of goals in Drogba and half their midfield will be buggering off, leaving them with the vastly overrated Sidwell to ruin their title challenge.

We'll win the Premiership by default!! Most of the foreign owners will have been found to be corrupt or unfit to own their clubs along with further dubious transfer dealings a la Tevez ( Man City comes to mind) which will see numeorous clubs being docked points for irregularities.
One or two others will go bust. Just a dream i had last night!!

Seriously, looking forward to another thrilling season where at the end I can see us finishing about 10-14th in my view. Bring it on!

3rd - Arsenal - This may cause some surprise, but I think Arsenal will do well without Henry as the focus will be off of one man for a change and the players will have more license to go out and express themselves. Van Persie looks sharp pre-season and Eduardo looks like a bit of a fox in the box. Add the fact that the youngsters will be a year older and maturing and I think Arsenal will have a better season.

4th - Liverpool - Invested heavily, which they needed to do. However, I think too much chopping and changing up front, combined with them still persisting with playing the likes of Pennant, who is crap, could hold them back this season. I think once Voronin and Torres settle, it's looking good for them, but it'll take a while for them to gel. I think they'll have a slow start and steadily improve as the season goes on, but I think it may all come too late.

5th - Spurs - They've bought every half decent young player (plus Darren Bent) again for the sake of it. They've got a superb squad, which could easily break into the top four if managed correctly, but I think they're flawed in terms of Jol's tactics, as we saw last season. They'll have a steady enough season in 5th and do alright in the cups, but it remains to be seen how much longer the board will put up with stagnation given the money being pumped in.

6th - Newcastle - Controversial and they haven't brought in too many players as yet, but I think that'll change by the end of August. Allardyce has cleared out some utter shit like Titus Bramble and brought in some reasonable players, like Viduka. They'll miss given at the very start, but I expect to see them finally fulfill their potential under Big Sam and can see them getting into Europe if they can keep Martins, Viduka and Owen fit.

7th - Reading - Yes, Sidwell's gone, but then again he was overrated and not in our top 5 players anyway. Halford only played two games and two minutes for us, so you can't say he'll be missed. We were missing our best winger last season in Convey, so it'll be a huge boost to have him back instead of Hunt, who tries hard, but flatters to deceive in terms of end product. I like the look of the two signings in Cisse and Fae and they look solid in the clips I've seen of them. We've got better defensive cover this time around more options going forward, so I expect us to upset the odds again.

8th - Blackburn - Did okay last season, but didn't look anything special in the two games against us, or on Sky to be fair. Santa Cruz might be a decent signing and there's not questioning McCarthy and Roberts, but they look weak in central midfield.

9th - Everton - Their only major signing this summer is Jagielka, who is similar to Sidwell in being vastly overrated. There's no doubting Everton have some quality in Johnson and Arteta, but with Cahill's injury problems, they lack a box to box midfielder, which is so important to them. Their wingers also don't inspire me much.

10th - Aston Villa - They've got a few decent young attacking players, like Moore, Young and Agbonlahor, but questions need to be asked about their defence. O'Neill will improve it in time, but this season has come too early. Expect them to score goals, but they'll let them in too. Still, I reckon they'll be top half, just.

11th - Man City - Sven appears to have scouted all his players on Football Manager! Still, he looks to have made a few decent signings and he needed to to be fair as City were shit last season! Bianchi'll score goals and he's slowly clearing out the crap, so I expect them to finish mid-table.

12th - Portsmouth - Spent money again, but they've got an aging defence which won't be as good as last year. Nugent will get them goals, but I can't see them doing much without another decent striker to partner him. It'll take their new signings time to fit in as well.

13th - West Ham - Another team which has spent big and again they needed to. However, Ljungberg is a complete waste of money for me as he's been injured for the last two seasons pretty much. He also relies heavily on pace, which he's losing. It'll be a big boost to have Ashton back, but then again they've lost Tevez, who single-handedly kept them up. They'll be solid, but unspectacular.

14th - Bolton - This is the start of their decline I think with Allardyce having left. Scandinavian imports aren't necessarily going to improve their team and they previously relied heavily on Allardyce's brilliant record in the transfer market and his ability to get the best out of underperformers like Diouf and mavericks like Anelka. Anelka's goals will see them through, but I think there'll be fallouts before long and they'll lose a lot of players at the end of the season, resulting on them going down the year after.

15th - Sunderland - Keane's a winner, but he has brought in a load of absolute shit this summer. I don't care what anyone says, Kieran Richardson is a pile of absolute oxf*rd and Michael Chopra's relatively unproven still. Keane's leadership qualities and their ability to spend if they get into trouble will see them out of the relegation zone though.

16th - Middlesbrough - Woodgate being injured to start will cause them problems. They've also lost their best striker in Viduka and replaced him with an absolute donkey in Aliadiere and the unproven Tuncay. I don't rate Southgate as a manager and I think they'll struggle this season, especially if they lose Woodgate for any long period of time.

17th - Birmingham - They look weak and they were poor last season when we played our reserves against them in the cup. However, they've brought in one or two and I think with Forssell coming back and their other forwards, they may get the goals this time to get them out of it.

18th - Fulham - Buying half the Northern Ireland team will not keep you in the Premiership. Sanchez is very unproven at club level, which people forget and he has made some disastrous signings. Healy will definitely be a flop if he can't score goals in the Championship and whereas they had Malbranque and Boa Morte to rescue them in previous years, they now have nobody.

19th - Wigan - Their existence in the Premiership annoys me as they only got 15,000 for a lot of games last season and they couldn't even sell out to Arsenal! Frankly, their fans don't deserve a Premiership club and this year Chris Hutchings is going to fulfill my wish and take them down. Anybody who rates Titus Bramble needs their head checked and they've just lost their best player in Baines and have yet to replace him. Add to that the fact that De Zeuw's gone and they're down.

20th - Derby - The Watford of this season. They play dreadful football and although Davies is a great motivator (much like Boothroyd), but you can't polish shit. Earnshaw'll score a few goals, but the whole spine of their team is very weak.

[Gordons Cumming]

Personally I see us pushing for top spot early in the season after a surprising amount of points in the first 3 games.

[Einstein agogo]

yeah sidwell , the only reading player anyone who's not a fan of reading has heard of. because he was best player outside prem for one season.. hardly set the prem alight , like lita& doyle , little tore barry apart in one of a few games he played and hunt stopped chelsea winning the title (accidentally )

[ScottishRoyal]

For what its worth

Man Utd
Chelsea....

... 7th Sunderland

You've got to be kiddding right?!

Anyway here are my predictions to pick holes in.

Man Utd
Chelsea
Liverpool
Top three very close then off the pace...
Arsenal
Tottenham
Everton
Another four or five points further back to the rest. Eight sides of simular quality will battle it out for the mid - table places and the extra revenue, with injuries, bans and January signings playing a large part in who finishes where.

Sunderland, Brum and Man City just avoiding relagation ahead of...
Fulham
Wigan
Derby

[bottom left hand corner]

1.Man Utd
2.Chelsea
3.Liverpool
4.Spurs
5.Arsenal
6.Everton
7.Newcastle
8.West Ham
9.Blackburn
10.Pompy
11.Man City
12.Aston Villa
13.Sunderland
14.Fulham
15.Reading
16.Bolton
17.Middlesbrough
18.Wigan
19.Birmingham
20.Derby