The best thing about watching the first Match of the Day of the new season is seeing all the teams with players you had absolutely no idea they had signed. Aside from our own dealings and some of the really big money moves made by others, generally I have absolutely no clue who clubs have bought so the first couple of weeks of the season are always interesting.
I didn’t need to be seeing Lineker in his bills though, but fair play to him for going through with it as most wouldn’t. He’s obviously been in the gym all summer in readiness for it, but that’s understandable.
Anyway, the Champions kicked the new season off at crisis hit new boys Hull and it didn’t go quite as planned. “Hello Leicester, it’s normal service here, just to let you know we’re resuming”. It must be hard for them knowing that there’s absolutely zero chance of them repeating what happened last season and as a result of that we might see them not being as up for certain games this year as they were when chasing the title.
They went all last season without losing any of these types of games, so maybe they looked at Hull and thought it would be easy. Who can blame them really? Hull have only 13 senior players this season and even worse, they’ve got Mike Phelan managing them. They mightn’t win another game all season so this was pretty embarrassing for Leicester.
Abel Hernandez put Hull ahead with an overhead kick but Mahrez levelled from the spot after Tom Hundredstone clumsily brought down Gray. Everyone expected Leicester to go on and win it at that point but Snodgrass blasted in a surprise winner for the home side.
Even before this I was expecting Leicester to have an up and down year this time because they won’t be able to handle juggling Europe with the Premier League, and the players will be more up for the Champions League games than they will about playing Watford and West Brom. Throw in the fact they’ve got a massive fucking bullseye on their backs now as the defending Champs and they might not even finish top half. But if they don’t, so fucking what? They won the league, the warm glow of that will stay with them for a long time.
I’m glad they’ve managed to keep almost all of their team together as it would have been a real shame if they’d all jumped ship like that little gobshite Kante, who left the Champions to sign for the team in 10th. Mahrez and Vardy to their credit spurned the advances of Arsenal to sign new deals with Leicester, and good on them, especially Mahrez because… well because this….
and this…..
Arsenal supporters really are the gift that keeps on giving. It’ll be funny as fuck if Leicester go further than Arsenal at their very first attempt, especially if Mahrez is the reason for it.
The best part of this game was undoubtedly Vardy punching himself in the face after missing a chance. Can’t blame him, he’s only doing what half the country have dreamed about doing. Maybe he thought he was hitting that gobshite lookalike of his who he can’t stand. Like when a dog attacks a mirror when it sees itself. Let’s face it Vardy doesn’t seem like the sharpest knife in the draw.
That Musa looks handy, but I can’t help thinking they might be making a mistake abandoning the whole “Okazaki running teams ragged for an hour before Ulloa finishes them off” thing.
Moving on to the rest of Saturday’s games, starting at the Pit. Everton replacing John Stones with Ashley Williams and coming away with £35m or so profit was one hell of a bit of business. Blowing it all on Bolasie not so much, although that could go either way as sometimes he looks absolutely unplayable. Usually against us, it has to be said, so if keeps that up that’s easily worth £30m to them even if he stays at home for all their other games. Surprised they didn’t buy Dwight Gayle too.
They dominated their opening game for an hour before running out of gas and letting Spurs back into it. I expect Everton to do quite well as they’ve still got a lot of good players, they’ll be a better defensive unit without Stones and Koeman knows what he’s doing. As long as they’re below us I don’t care where they finish, although I would like to see a season ending injury for Funes Mori some time soon.
As for Spurs, they’ve got basically the same squad as last year plus Wanyama and some Dutch forward who won’t play because he’s not Harry Kane. I’d started to believe in them last season but then they went and “did a Spurs” and made me feel foolish. They’re a fraud team, always have been always will be. If we finish below them again this year I want everybody responsible thrown off the roof of the new stand, as this shit has to stop.
Dele Alli says this year he will have "Dele" on the back of his shirt for 'personal reasons'. Presumably that reason would be him being a massive tool? No doubt it will be some bollocks about his family, but really it’s just about trying to look cool isn't it? I mean if he's got such a problem with the name Alli, then fucking change it to something else, don't start calling yourself by your christian name like an absolute cock. As long as Alli is still his surname it should be on his shirt. Simple as that.
Not gonna lie, this has disappointed me as I was a fan. It’s great news though for all of you, my loyal readers, as it means instead of me bitching about our transfer committee every time he does something good, I'll now just look at that name on his back and think "dodged a bullet there" and say nothing.
Sunderland lost Fat Sam and replaced him with the Moyesiah. I’d say they’ve downgraded there, but not by much. They opened up with a last minute loss at City and if it were any other team I’d say they were unlucky, but the first goal they conceded was a pen and the second was an own goal. Just about as Sunderland as it gets that is, there’s nothing unlucky about it.
Their new centre back Paddy McNair put through his own net in the last minute to deny them what would have been a great point. Between that and Diego Costa acting the twat on Monday night (I’ll get to that in a bit), it's like footy has never been away. Credit to Moyes though, he needed to replace the ageing John O'Shea and he's clearly done a stellar job with this fucking mug.
It looks like he’s just gone and signed all the shit youngsters that got Van Gaal the sack at United. McNair and some jabroni called Donald Love (sounds more like a golfer than footy player), that Januzaj prick (wonder if his stalker has followed him up there?)… it’s only a matter of time before he signs that left back with the name that’s even longer than his stupid giraffe like neck.
Tell you what’s great about this season already; no Newcastle or Villa. Very happy about that, hope neither come back up any time soon.
You know what I hate already though? The predictable wankfest over “Pep”. First of all I hate when people call him “Pep” like they know the cunt personally, and I hate how he’s portrayed as some fucking tactical visionary. That shit he’s pulling with his full backs playing centre mid when they have possession, I’ll give that three weeks before some team absolutely takes them to the cleaners.
It’s easy looking like the dog’s bollocks when you’ve got Messi, Xavi and Iniesta in your team, or when you’re in charge at Bayern Munich, a club who every year just go out and sign the best players from any club who happens to look like being a threat to them. This shit won’t fly in the Premier League though and I reckon “Flat track Pep” will be getting his comeuppance this season.
He dropped Joe Hart too, which would have been fair enough except apparently the reason is that Caballero is better with his feet. Not quite Brendan benching Mignolet for Brad Jones, but the logic is the same. If he’d dropped Hart for being an error prone liability who stunk at the Euros, fine, but no-one likes a smart arse, or at least they never used to. I don’t understand all this Guardiola love at all. Fuck him.
Anyway, moving on… Llorente is playing for Swansea? Fucking hell, that’s a bit of an odd one. He had a decent enough debut as they won at Burnley, his header setting up Leroy Fer to score the only goal of the game from close range. Swansea will be bottom half again this year but have too much to go down I reckon.
As for Burnley, Andre Gray is the only real change from the side that was relegated two years ago so it’s tough to see things being any different for them this time. He’s replaced Ings and looks like a bit of a handful, but I just can’t see them staying up, even if they do have Flanno. I notice that Sean Dyche still has that sore throat. You’d think with all that money floating around the Premier League now he could afford some cough sweets. I imagine this is what Villas Boas will be like when he finally hits puberty.
Next up, Palace losing at home to West Brom. I saw that coming a mile off and one of the best bets to do this season is 1-0 West Brom any time they’re playing anyone outside of the top eight. They only ever win 1-0 so you'll win more than you lose with that bet.
Saloman Rondon got the only goal of the game and he was linked with Real Madrid this week. Between that and the constant Moussa Sissoko rumours you have to wonder just what the hell they’re smoking over at the Bernabeu. They do this from time to time though, it’s like some sort of social experiment like in Trading Places. Don’t believe me? Two words. Thomas. Gravesen.
I’m tipping Palace to be surprise relegation candidates simply because of Pardew’s history of slumping horrendously following any limited success. Newcastle were top four at Christmas one year but then could hardly win a game for 12 months until he was sacked, and the same is happening at Palace. If they buy Benteke they’ll probably be fine, but if they don’t it’s gonna be a long old season with Connor Wickham up front and Bolasie gone.
Perhaps the biggest shock of the summer is that Tony Pulis is still at West Brom though. Not only that, Berahino is still there as well. Not happy about that at all, simply because it means we’ve got to listen to Pulis patronisingly talking about “Saido” every other week. I don’t know what it is, but every time I hear him say the word I want to put my foot through the telly. “I thought Saido was terrific”… ah FUCK OFF YOU SCRUFF!!
Alvaro Negredo is at Boro now? No way. Victor Valdes too? Get the fuck outta here! Hell, even Antonio Barragan (remember him?) is there, playing at centre back for some reason. They started well against Stoke and Negredo gave them an early lead but Shaqiri’s brilliant free-kick ensured both sides came away with a point, which was about right on the balance of play.
Boro will have enough to stay up and Stoke will be where they always are, somewhere between 8th and 12th.
Poor old Charlie Adam is back on the bench again and with Wee Joe there now that’s not going to change any time soon. Brendan fucked him off when he signed Allen and it looks like Useless is going to do the same. Adam must hate Joe even more than he hates healthy food.
Southampton and Watford met at St Mary’s and I genuinely had no idea who was managing either of them. I’ve never even heard of the fella Southampton appointed and although I knew who Mazzari was it doesn’t really matter as he won’t be there long unless he gets them top four, as their owners are fucking mental.
Watford took the lead through Capoue but Nathan Redmond struck to spare Southampton’s blushes. He’s playing up front because Pelle has left to go to China. What the fuck? Why? Why would he do that? He’s Italy’s centre forward, in the prime of his career and he’s fucked off to China for the money. What a complete turd. More to the point, how come we can’t send Balotelli over there?
Ben Watson was sent off for hauling down Shane Long after the Irishman had turned on the after burners to leave him for dead. I don’t think there’s anyone better in the league at getting people booked and sent off than Long, and this time he didn’t even have to cheat to do it.
Southampton can’t keep losing their best players every summer and continue to cope with it though, it’s got to catch up with them eventually and this might be the year. They won’t go down, but they might be in the conversation for a while. Hopefully Watford will go, I don’t even know why I’m saying that as I can’t rationalise why I feel that way. It might be Troy Deeney and his allergic reaction to a bee sting face, or it could be them sacking Quique Flores. I don’t know or care why, I just want them down this year.
Onto Sunday now. United won. I’ll say no more on that because I’ve decided that the easiest way to avoid keeling over due to high blood pressure this year is to avoid Mourinho and United as much as possible. No doubt I’ll catch bits and pieces and obviously I’ll be aware of their results, but I can’t focus too much on that cunt because it’s just not good for me. I hate the fucker far more than it's healthy to, so for now, where possible I’m going to try to pretend he doesn’t exist.
Jordon Ibe was shite apparently (no surprise, sadly), and was taunted by United fans during his time on the pitch for being a “murderer” and a “scouse bastard”, of which he’s clearly neither. Sad obsessed gobshites. Brad Smith didn’t play and I can’t see him getting a game at all as they’ve got Charlie Daniels, who is pretty good, and I seem to remember them buying another left back last summer for big bucks who then got injured. I have no idea why they bought Smith. Maybe Eddie Howe just likes buying left backs. Shame we couldn’t get him to take Albert the Moron as well.
Finally, Chelsea just about beat West Ham on Monday night. The Hammers were woeful but somehow found themselves heading for an undeserved a point after a great finish by Collins had cancelled out Hazard’s penalty. They have every right to feel aggrieved at the manner of defeat though as Costa shouldn’t have even still been on the field after a terrible lunge on Adrian. It should have been a straight red, but he didn’t even a get a yellow, no doubt because he’d been booked earlier. Ref Anthony Taylor also bottled out of giving Kante a second yellow too. The refs generally did well on opening weekend but Taylor was the glaring exception and although I’m happy to see West Ham lose, if it means Chelsea winning then that’s not a price worth paying.
Obviously after one weekend it’s too soon to be making any judgements, but waiting a few weeks feels like cheating so here’s a few predictions based on how I’m feeling right now:
Aguero to finish top scorer but City to miss out on the top four.
Rooney to fall out with Mourinho and be banished to train with the kids.
Zlatan to be a big success, Pogba to be bang average.
Hull, Burnley and Watford to go down.
Leicester to finish bottom half but reach the Champions League quarters.
Wenger to continually come under pressure all season but always just do enough to keep the wolves from the door and sneak them into a CL spot yet again.
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