Predictions 10/27 – 10/28

Daylight Saving Time kicks in for the UK early Sunday morning, which is the reason for the odd times for that day's matches. Liverpool v Arsenal kicks off at 12pm.

Saturday
Chelsea v Manchester City, 10am, FSC: Now we get to see how far City's really come. This will probably be a better measuring stick than the Manchester derby earlier in the season, which was at City’s ground and was when United had key players out. Now, Chelsea’s won their last four, hasn’t given up a goal in three games, and is starting to look like the Chelsea of old. Chelsea 2-1
Manchester Utd v Middlesbrough, 10am, Setanta: Ugh. United's rounding into form (but isn't even there yet), has scored 8 goals in the last two games, and is slowly but surely looking like the crushing machine they were last season. Yep, “ugh” suffices. Oh, and it's Boro on the road. United 3-0
Birmingham v Wigan, 10am: Two of the five teams currently on 8 points, and the game should be as close as the points total would have you believe. If Heskey were fit it might be a different story, but Sibierski’s not back to the form shown before his injury, and neither Bent nor Aghahowa have been getting goals in the meantime. 0-0
Reading v Newcastle, 10am: I’m following the template of Newcastle's previous away results with this prediction. Reading’s still losing games they at least drew last season, but they’re scoring goals, and I do not trust Newcastle away from St James', no matter how much better Michael Owen has looked, Barton and Emre’s return to fitness, or Newcastle’s good performance against Tottenham on Monday. 1-1
Sunderland v Fulham, 10am: Another match, like the Brum/Wigan game, which could go either way. Antti Niemi kept 10-man Fulham in their game last week, and the Cottagers could end up with a similar result Saturday. However, if Roy Keane’s Sunderland is to stay up, these are the games they must win, while they also need £5m striker Michael Chopra to pay back some of that transfer fee with goals. Sunderland 1-0
Portsmouth v West Ham, 12:15pm, FSC: No matter the fact that Curbs is finally getting West Ham to look like a team despite the exceedingly long injury list, Pompey’s playing like a team that deserves to be in 5th place, and I imagine that will continue. Portsmouth 2-1

Sunday
Bolton v Aston Villa, 9:30am, Setanta: Normally when a new manager comes in, there's a distinct upgrade in the team's performance. I don't know if that will be the case with Gary Megson, and it doesn’t help that Bolton has a tough UEFA Cup game today against Braga. Villa 1-0
Derby v Everton, 10am: As much as I like to pick against Everton, and despite the fact that Derby was unlucky not to come away with a win at Fulham last week, this should be an easy win for the away side. Everton 2-0
Tottenham v Blackburn, 11am, Setanta Xtra: Blackburn’s been excellent this season, and I’ve had bad luck when I’ve picked Tottenham to get a result recently, but I think this is going to be similar to Spurs’ games against Liverpool and Villa, where they fall behind, but do enough to equalize and keep Martin Jol from being sacked for another week. 2-2 This is the first time I’ve done this (and chances are, it’ll come back to haunt), but I’m taking a mulligan here before the games start, as Martin Jol resigned before Spurs’ home loss to Getafe. If rumors hold, Tottenham will have a caretaker manager for the foreseeable future, until Juande Ramos finally comes over from Sevilla. Duly noted. Blackburn 3-1

Last week: 6-3
Season: 43-45