Football – Woe For The Wearsiders?

Everton manager David Moyes believes this season’s battle to avoid relegation from the Barclays Premier League will be the fiercest yet and I’m inclined to agree with him.

Normally, one wouldn’t hesitate in nominating the three promoted teams to fall straight back through the trap door but Hull and Stoke have made excellent starts to life in the top flight and both look capable of amassing enough points in the final two thirds of the season to survive. In Hull’s case, that probably means wrapping Brazilian bargain buy Geovanni in cotton wool on occasions but Tigers’ manager Phil Brown will know that and won’t be overtaxing his prize asset. Stoke’s strength is at the Britannia Stadium, where the likes of Arsenal have already come to grief. Teams will eventually work out how to combat the Potters’ aerial bombardment but it might not be until next season and I’d certainly rather be a layer than a bettor at Skybet’s 4-11 for Stoke to go down, while extrabet’s 4-1 for Hull to crash and burn makes little appeal either, even though the two teams are likely to find winter a lot tougher than autumn.

Last year’s Championship title winners West Brom are a different matter, however. With strikers that, speaking comparatively, lack real quality and a back line that’s leaking goals, it’s no surprise to see the Baggies already propping up the rest of the Premier League. Their defending against Liverpool at Anfield last Saturday was woeful and I’d have no problem backing them at 4-6 with extrabet to still be in the bottom three come May.

West Ham, too, appear to have major problems. Time spent as the Italian U21 coach can hardly have prepared Gianfranco Zola for what he’s come up against at Upton Park. The financial storm clouds were already gathering in the summer when players were being shipped out left, right and centre to put enough funds in the club’s coffers to sort out the Carlos Tevez affair and since then West Ham’s major sponsors have gone bust. The much-reported Icelandic banking crisis has left owner and chief financier Bjogolfur Gudmundsson counting the pennies too and, while the Hammers aren’t yet at crisis point, it was noticeable how quickly the players’ heads dropped when they conceded against Everton at the weekend. The inexperienced Zola undoubtedly has a job on his hands to keep them up and you can still back the Londoners at 17-5 on Betfair to drop a division.

But the surprise name in the bottom three at the end of the season could be Sunderland. Canbet have priced up the Wearsiders at 6-1 which is ridiculous when one considers the likes of Fulham, who have proved a match for anybody at home and have a top-class striker in Andy Johnson in their ranks, are no bigger than 17-5 on Betfair and Bolton, who are proven battlers, no bigger than 2-1. Roy Keane’s men have recorded morale-boosting derby wins against Middlesbrough and Newcastle at the Stadium Of Light this term but they’ve been pretty woeful on the road and even the excellent Craig Gordon has started to look shaky behind an easily-breeched defence of late. Mackem fans may have to get used to supporting a team that’s going to yo-yo between Championship and Premier League for a few seasons yet!

Betfred have joined forces with Talksport magazine, the radio station’s free online magazine, to provide video streaming of odds on a wide variety of events. The deal, though to be worth in the region of  £1/2million, will also see the Lancashire-based betting firm’s name feature prominently on the daily Hawksbee and Jacobs Show.