Archive for September 2008
Hull shock Gunners as Chelsea go top
This was only the second loss for the Gunners at the Emirates Stadium. Their other loss at that stadium was against West Ham United.
Here are some other interesting stats from round 6:
- There were no draws
- No team scored more than two goals
- The majority of matches(six) were won by away teams
- The scoreline was either 2-0 or 2-1 with exception of Boro/West Brom match which finished 1-0
delicious
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Phoenix snatch first win
That win meant the Phoenix moved off the bottom of the ladder and their position was taken by Perth Glory who lost away to the Mariners.
Round 6 also saw Melbourne Victory and Sydney FC suffer their first losses of the season after the Victory lost 2 nil at home to the Queensland Roar.
It was the third consecutive match in which Victory finished the match with ten men and the first one they failed to score this season with ten players on the pitch.
The Roar were the only away team to win in this round but interestingly they are still to win at home themselves.
So round 6 had no draws and this is the second round this season to have no draws.
There have been 19 rounds
without any draw since the start of the A-League.
This gives just over a quarter of the rounds at about 26%.
Possible second team for Melbourne
If the negotiation goes well then there is going to be a second A-League team in Melbourne to join Melbourne Victory.
Next season the A-League will be composed of ten teams after the two Queensland teams join the league and so the second Melbourne team will be the eleventh.
This means that there is likely to be a twelfth team possibly from Sydney or Canberra.
That will make the A-League more interesting tipping wise and the season will be longer too.
Europa League to replace Uefa Cup
48 teams will form twelve groups of four with the top two from each group plus the third placed Champions League teams going into the knockout phase.
In this format this is a competition that could be featured on TipsChallenge but it will depend on whether a lot of people are interested in the competition.
Increasing to 48 teams is good because it means it will cover more teams and countries but it also means that some of
the teams may not be known by many people outside the country they play in.
City in goalfest against Pompey
City scored more goals in one match than what teams like Manchester United, Liverpool, Sunderland, Tottenham, Newcastle, West Brom, Fulham and Portsmouth have scored so far this season.
Arsenal shot to the top of the ladder with an away win over Bolton in a round where there were only two away wins with the other one coming from Aston Villa's win over the Baggies.
Spurs remain winless after a goalless draw against Wigan at home but with four teams on four points and two on five, a few wins will see them leave the bottom of the ladder if other results go their way.
In round 6 one of the matches to look forward to is the Merseyside derby between Everton and Liverpool.
Last season Liverpool won both derbies and Everton who are ninth on the ladder at the moment will try and use home
advantage to reverse that trend this season.
Jets maintain Suncorp grip
The Roar has also failed to score against the Jets in those five matches at the Suncorp. It is interesting to see that four of the five matches have been won 1-0 but in round 16 last season the Jets beat the Roar 3 nil.
In fairness to the Roar they have only lost once to the Jets away and one of their victories was a 5 nil demolition of the Jets in the 2005/6 season.
With the Jets and Perth Glory winning, only the Wellington Phoenix are without a win after 5 matches. The Glory now no longer the anchor the ladder and that role goes to the Phoenix.
For the second round in a row Melbourne Victory finished with ten players but they managed a draw to maintain top spot.
Sydney beat Adelaide are in second place because of goal-difference.
No goals in Group E
While four away teams won on Wednesday morning, on Thursday only Bayern Munich won away against Steaua Bucharest with draws dominating the day.
Apart from the draws in Group E there were also draws for Dynamo Kiev against Arsenal and also between Lyon and Fiorentina.
In Group H both Juventus and Real Madrid started with wins plus clean sheets as they brushed aside Zenit St Petersburg and BATE Borisov respectively.
CFR Cluj in shock win as away sides win
Chelsea and Barcelona were the only home teams to win with Werder Bremen being involved in a goalless draw against Anorthosis Famagusta.
But the biggest result will be CFR Cluj who beat Roma 2-1 in their first match in the Champions League. They have given notice to the rest of the group and next they will play Chelsea who had an easy 4-0 win over Bordeaux.
Chelsea's win was the biggest on the night and the next was Atletico Madrid's 3-0 away win against PSV Eindhoven.
Spurs still winless after four rounds
Spurs have managed to draw one match and interestingly they have scored a single goal in all their matches so far.
They have lost all three matches by the same scoreline of 2-1 and worryingly two of them at home where one would expect them to do better.
Talking about the 2-1 scoreline, in the 39 matches played so far, 12 matches have finished 2-1 or 1-2 and of these four were home defeats and two of them were for Spurs.
It is by far the most popular scoreline so far with the next popular being 1-0 or 0-1 and so far six matches have finished with this scoreline.
On the other end of the table only Chelsea and Liverpool remain unbeaten after the other unbeaten side Manchester United lost to Liverpool 2-1 at Anfield.
Chelsea next meet Manchester United at home in the fifth round and this is easily the match of the round.
A win for
Chelsea would mean that United will remain on four points but United has got a game in hand.
Roar notch first win
After a record equaling high scoring round 3, round 4 was the opposite with a record equaling low scoring of just four goals in the round. Also the four goals were scored in two matches and by two teams The other six teams did not see the back of the net.
The Roar's win means that only Perth Glory, Wellington Phoenix and Newcastle Jets are the three teams still to get a win under their belt this season.
The Jets continue to get their points through draws and the weekend's draw was the the third for the team in four matches.
League leader Melbourne Victory and Sydney FC remain undefeated after four rounds with Victory handing Adelaide United its first defeat of the season.
A draw against the Jets away was good enough to make sure that Sydney remained unbeaten.
South Africa misses Angola 2010
South Africa needed to finish second in this group to qualify for the Nations Cup but Sierra Leone beat Equatorial Guinea to get the second spot.
I think South Africa as hosts of the 2010 World Cup would have benefited a lot from the Africa Nations Cup because they don't have to go through the qualifying rounds of the World Cup and this missed opportunity could prove costly if not embarrassing for the World Cup hosts.
Its also interesting to see that the Nations Cup will showcase the top 16 teams from the continent and South Africa will not be one of them.
South Africa will have a chance to host the FIFA Confederations Cup next year and this will hopefully help them to prepare for the tournament.
Spurs and Baggies off the mark
There was nothing spectacular from last weekend's round but probably the significant results of the weekend were Chelsea and Liverpool drawing for the first time this season and the Hull and Stoke City both losing.
It was Hull's first loss after an impressive start to the premiership and that loss means that only Manchester United, Chelsea and Liverpool remain unbeaten at this early stage of the season.
Manchester United's match against Fulham was postponed because of the Super Cup but if they were to team that match then they would be tied on the same points with Chelsea and Liverpool.
Also if Fulham were to win the match then it would be their second win against one the 'big four' teams.
There is an international break this weekend and when the premiership returns on the 13th of September the teams Liverpool and Manchester United will kick off that round.
