Bet Premier League

Fernando Torres skips past Standard Liege’s Mohamed Sarr but there were few signs last night that Rafa Benitez’s re-arranged side would be knocking at the door of the Premier League title or the later stages of the Champions League. There are good odds on Sunderland grabbing some points off them in the late fixture on Saturday too which suddenly look attractive. The £20 million Robbie Keane was substituted. Steven Gerrard was not fit enough for the 90 minutes although he added some fizz when he came on. Pepe Rainer saved a penalty and the Belgians made most of the running. Benitez’s seemingly thwarted desire to bring in Gareth Barry from Aston Villa suddenly seemed an inspired thought because this was a team without inspiration lobbing long balls up to Torres. As the TV commentary said: where was Peter Crouch? Maybe Benitez is on borrowed time, saved over the years by his luck and the sublime spirt of Gerrard. On last night’s display Tottenham could well fancy their chances of finishing above them in the league. Unlike Sir Alex Ferguson Benitez’s spending seems increasingly to be a churn without yielding real quality. A baffling selection of unknowns, promising kids who might develop better at another club where they could get first team football and only Torres as his real star buy. Torres is favourite to be top goalscorer thisyear, but who is going to provide the service?

Bet Manchester United

The goalless draw played out by way of a friendly by the teams of those wily old soccer assassins Alex Ferguson and Claudio Ranieri last night may give some pointers to events about to unfold. United have a problem scoring goals without Cristiano Ronaldo and Wayne Rooney. These two players above all represent Manchester United’s class, the more so on the pitch than off it where they seem to want to rival each other as spoilt brats of the Premier League. On Sunday, United go to Wembley to play the showpiece Community Shield against Portsmouth who have their own new strike force in Jermaine Defoe and Peter Crouch. They also meet Portsmouth as their second game of the season. Their first is Newcastle in what looks like a leisurely start to the campaign to retain the Premier League and another showpiece game in the European Super Cup against Uefa winners Zenit St Petersburg, probably now without a striking Arshavin. In September they have just three fixtures - Liverpool, Chelsea and Bolton. Ferguson will have needed to have greased the engine by then.

Liverpool are noteworthy slow out of the blocks. They travel to Sunderland for the first day of the season, entertain Middlesbrough who punch above their weight against the better teams, get distracted by the European Cup against Standard Liege and then visit Aston Villa who were scoring for fun at the end of last season. Rafa Benitez will need to find a rythmn quickly. The bad news is that in September they also face Everton.

Arsenal are looking the part again with just the question mark about who will actually tap the ball into the net. They are young, fast and play attractive football on the harder surfaces in the sunshine of early seasons. West Bromwich Albion, Fulham and Newcastle are first up and don’t look likely to be given any change. They also have what should be an easy September before meeting Tottenham and Everton in October. The tough stuff starts in November with both Chelsea and Manchester United.

Luis Felipe Scolari seems to have the charisma to further bond and fuse the Chelsea fighting spirit with impressive wins on their travels. 5-0 against an unfit AC Milan is still 5-0. But they have some testing games against teams that would hope to break into the top four starting with Portsmouth, then Spurs, then Manchester City, then  United, then Villa. These are games that are going to matter and if the Blues can get the points in the bag, they are probably worth more than ther equivalent games for their rivals. It will also be a test of their mettle. If they are top of the league by the end of September, everyone else will fear the worst.

Crystal ball time. The first Saturday of the football season is the hardest weekend to call. Last season was last season, everyone is pumped up, some fitter than others, the sun is shining and it is all very unfootballing, unseasonal and so are the odds. There are historically two things to watch out for if we are going make money betting on football matches this season. This weekend because there is no form at all to go on, it is probably the least predictable of any weekend to come. For the last couple of years you could have kept yourself in beer and sandals by doing a double on Chelsea and Manchester United each week A double at £10 would return £17.20, make it a triple with Liverpool would return £29.74 and pop in Arsenal for a quad and your money might harvest £36.28. That may be a bold bet for a first Staturday.

 The other unknown is what kind of season is it going to be in terms of goals scored. Towards the end of last season Aston Villa were popping goals in for fun. Is that the way to go? Portsmouth have invested in a very sharp looking new attack with Jermaine Defoe and Peter Crouch and reportedly Shaun Wright Phillips on his way and he could make a differernce. United reputedly have a £20million bid in for Spurs Dimitri Berbatov possibly, surely, only if Cristiano Ronaldo is off to the Madristas. Otherwise a forward line of Berbatov, Ronaldo, Wayne Rooney and Carlos Tevez could be falling over each other like drunken ballerinas to actually put the ball in the net? Too much artistry, perhaps or maybe the master Scottish plan is to withdraw Rooney into mdifield, though probably not as far as full back. Nor has Felipe Scolari as yet shown his hand although for sure he must conclude that the only area of genuine improvement he might bring to Stamford Bridge would be on the wings…that is if he has not got so many fullbacks flying up and down the touchline he does not need anymore wingers?

It is interesting that Chelsea play Portsmouth on the first day of the season. A Pompey victory is beautiful odds of 8/1 and maybe it could be that Chelsea are well up themselves coping with some fancy Brazilian system while Harry Redknapp’s boys do the basics and steal it. The end of Jose Mourinho’s unbeaten home run might be just the kind of cathartic, purging experience to launch a new era and genuine attack minded football on all fronts. Look what happened to them at Barnsley in the FA Cup last winter. Hardly looked back.

Another curious tie is the mystery of Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal hosting an optimistic West Bromwhich Albion. Is there maybe a draw in this for the Baggies? 9/2 are tempting numbers. 11/1 for a win sounds a little far fetched but any more departures from north London and it could all go boing boing boing.

Aston Villa host Manchester City which says goals if Mark Hughes new striker Jo is as good as reports and City sprung up the league apace in the sunshine last year.

Bolton could destroy Stoke, Hull might surprise Fulham but there is nothing in the astrology that says the Kevin Keegan’s Newcastle can get anything at Manchester United.

Tottenham have a nasty game at Middlesbrough and don’t appear to currently have a forward line or certainly in terms of the rumour mill they have all been sold. Juande Ramos is too shrewd for that to happen, so probably too earkly to bet. Liverpool won’t like a trip to Roy Keane’s Sunderland either and in a reverse sense the West Ham Academy of Footballing Arts won’t get any bursaries out of Steve Bruce’s Wigan who finished very strong last term.  

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Robbie Fowler joins up with Paul Ince at Blackburn which is an interesting one, although Blackburn might be 15/1 against relegation which could be a good bet, even if a bit depressing for a bright young English manager…Peter Crouch’s much heralded move from Liverpool to Portsmouth where he teams up with Jermaine Defoe looks another shrewd Harry Redknapp move and probably securing their contention in the top half of the table and maybe even a Uefa possibility. Portsmouth are a romantic 500/1 against winning the Premiership but stranger things have happened. Who won the FA Cup last year anyway? And goals is what you need and those two could score 20 apiece next season. Meanwhile Anfield welcomes the Swiss defender Philipp Degen on a free. The much injured full back arrives after three years in the Bundesliga Borussa Dortmund. Also arriving is Andrea Dossena , a stopper with 63 appearances for Udinese who finished sixth in Serie A last year and his perfromances against the top flight clubs impressed.  Plus also there is Steven Gerrard’s new pal Gareth Barry from Aston Villa, which looks like Rafa Benitez accepting that for Premiership football an English style midfield may be more effective tha silky Spanish skills. None of these three set the pulse racing the way a move for David Villa to partner Fernando Torres up front might. But Benitez this week ruled out such a move. It looks like more tinkering round the edges and another season of missed opportunity perhaps for the Reds. They are 1000/1 against relegation and 8/1 to grab that elusive title.  Gareth Southgate has signed the former sprinter and Dutch Under 17 international winger Marvin Emnes who scored eight goals for Sparta Rotterdam.  Southgate has also bagged Paris defender Didier Digard who will have endeared himself by turning down Newcastle and saying that club looked in a mess.  Middlesbrough are 8/1 to be relegated which is the same odds as Liverpool for the title,  neither of which look likely. West Bromwich Albion have bought the promising 21-year-old defender Gianni Zuiverloon turning down other clubs he said because he liked the Baggy style. West Brom are another team in the relegation odds mix but at 2/1, that looks a bad bet.  Another interesting move will be Steve Sidwell to Aston Villa. Can Martin O’Neill regenerate the career of the former Reading midfielder who was eclipsed in the Chelsea galaxy?  Similar questions will be asked at the Emirates where the long saga of Samir Nasri’s departure from Marseilles was completed for an undisclosed fee while Alexander Hleb looks set for the Deco role in the Barca midfield for £15million. There is also speculation that Marseilles fans are planning to have a £22 million whip round to get Didier Drogba back from Chelsea.

Each time that Rafa Benitez gets his ducks nicely in a row then that Scotsman, that Portugese, that Frenchman comes along and spoils it. And this year there is another Spaniard in town with Juande Ramos at Spurs. Each time Benetiz says he needs more money but the squabbling Americans umm and err over the cash. His great success was Fernando Torres, but he probably needs more class and the cash for David Villa would be a tantalising proposition. The trouble is the money men seem more interested in building the new Stanley Park stadium about which they now talk as if it is a leading edge football team. It could well be the world’s first 4-3-3 architectural build.

But Benitez has often bought strangely and there are conundrums to his management style. Peter Crouch is surely the foremost shock tactic attacker in the league and should be brought on with a winger to feed him on 75 minutes in every game and yet the rumours say he will be sold which could make Portsmouth with Jermain Defoe a force to be reckoned with. And then there is Steven Gerrard, to some England and Liverpool’s footballer of a generation, albeit his trophy cabinet is more naked than www.sapphicerotica.com. Is he the disrupting force that stops the others from playing? The solution of playing him up front as Torres strike partner also changes the complexion of the team.

Dirk Kuyt played tirelessly for Holland at Euro 2008 on the right and obviously would rise to the kind of fast end to end movement that Van Basten believed in rather than the slow slow Spanish style push and shove. And where in this mix does the luring of Gareth Barry from Aston Villa quite fit, unless it be to free Gerrard even more?

The Anfield faithful believes it is entitled to the Premiership title again. They are 7/1 The Anfield faithful believes that they can be champions of Euope again. The odds are 14/1. On Saturday August 16 they open the campaign at Sunderland, for once perhaps they can get off to the kind of start they need and not be looking up the table from mid September onwards. Roy Keane may have other ideas.

Bet Liverpool to win the Premiership

Bet Liverpool to win Champions League

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There will be no gang of four this year, despite the pundits saying the title is a done deal. All the omens and labrador bones point in other directions. If United lose Ronaldo that is 42 goals off their goal difference which would put them mid table. Even if they get someone in to replace the Portugese, they are unlikely to score so prolifically and if Ronaldo stays nor will he.

Chelsea may take a year off under Felipe Scolari and just focus on the Champions League - but it is a good team and a couple of exceptional wingers could get them off to a flyer but probably Scolari will take his time.  Only Arsene Wenger really knows what his team can do and possibly his visit to the Spain v Italy match last night was a scouting trip to look at David Villa. A straight swap for the African Player of the Year Adebayor going to Milan must be tempting. Meanwhile one wonders how many times Rafa Benitez can mix up his jigsaw puzzle before he gets it right. Or maybe the answer to the conundrum abhout England’s finest player Steven Gerrard is that no one can play with him? Villa would be an obvious Anfield target too. Surely at least one of these teams and maybe more will start dropping points to the teams underneath them.

But behind the familiar miscreants are shaping new forces. Juande Ramos’s Tottenham look interesting as does new signing Mondric who must make an impact. Harry Redknapp is not out of the mix either. Goals win titles and he picked up Jermaine Defoe last year and paired possibly with Peter Crouch and one other they will notch up the points. Aston Villa under Martin O’Neill are tight and organised and only one or two players short of calibre, even if they lose Gareth Barry to Liverpool. Mark Hughes has an interesting proposition at Manchester City, especially if he gets both Jo and Ronaldinho up front- and can get both to play. Everton too are capable and only a couple of signings short of worrying the bigger teams. Anyone of those five might challenge. All seem to have the money and maybe this year the top four will take more points off each other, or even the top eight will scrap it out.

There might also be a case that West Brom make a flying start to the season, again nibbling points off the upper echelons. West Ham will have a better team than last year if their injured team stays fit.  The magician Roy Keane could also start to make his mark if he can pick up a couple of good players. Newcastle look wobbly, as do Middlesbrough but with Hull and Stoke looking like return-to-senders, that leaves just one relegation slot for the teams that escaped last year to avoid.

None of which points to another season of big four domination.

Check the odds out here for the first Saturday, August 16