Reds Alert

Behind Steven Gerrard’s hat trick and Dirk Kuyt and Albert Riera’s first half goals, Liverpool destroyed ten-man Aston Villa at Anfield Road, 5-0. Villa were reduced to ten-men only late in the game as keeper Brad Friedel was sent off in the 63rd minute. The complete and utter rout was a clear sign that the Reds do not believe they are yet out of the title race. The three points earned bring them within one of leaders Manchester United (who still have a game in hand) and increases the pressure as United have lost their past two, including a rout at the hands of Liverpool two weeks ago. Villa are ending their season in disastrous fashion, consistently losing ground in their chase for the final Champions League qualification. Still, they are in fifth place four points ahead of Everton for a UEFA Cup qualifying spot.

Elsewhere, Ben Watson scored in the 84th minute to send Wigan to victory at the JJB Stadium and back into seventh place. The victims were Hull City who remain in thirteenth position and just four points clear of relegation. While Wigan are unlikely to catch Everton, they are making their case as the most surprising club of the year with such a high position as seventh.

Finally, Manchester City continued their winning ways at Eastlands with a 1-0 win over Sunderland. Micah Richards scored in the 56th minute for City pushing them back ahead of Tottenham for tenth place. The Black Cats stay in fourteenth place though just three points clear of relegation.

United Open the Door for Liverpool

Both Paul Scholes and Wayne Rooney were sent off for Manchester United as the Premiership leaders lost their composure in a 2-0 away defeat to Fulham at Craven Cottage. Danny Murphy scored from the spot after Scholes was sent off and Zoltan Gera scored in the 87th minute to assure the win for the Cottagers. With the three points, Fulham finally broke the forty point barrier and moved within just a single point of West Ham for seventh position. United remain on top but have allowed for Liverpool to revive their chances tomorrow.

Why isn’t Chelsea mentioned in that same breath? Because they went to White Hart Lane and were handed a clean sheet by Tottenham, 1-0. Luka Modric scored just after half time to give Spurs enough of a lead to hold throughout. By not earning three points, the Blues stay four points behind United at the top and will likely be passed by Liverpool tomorrow. Spurs actually move all the way up to ninth place and are now within reach of the likes of Fulham, Wigan and West Ham.

Peter Crouch popped Portsmouth out of relegation for the moment with his brace out at Fratton Park against Everton. The Toffees have fallen off the map of late, only earning a fourth minute strike from Leighton Baines in the 2-1 away defeat. Pompey for the moment are in fifteenth place, three points out of relegation. Everton, after all this time, are still sixth, but were not able to make any gains on Aston Villa or Arsenal.

At Ewood Park, Keith Andrews equalized on 51 minutes, drawing Blackburn even with West Ham and sharing points. Mark Noble had given the Hammers a first half lead but it was not enough to earn three precious points. West Ham remain behind Everton in seventh but were almost passed by Fulham today. The point keeps Rovers out of relegation for now as they are two points ahead of pace.

Matthew Taylor scored in the 67th minute for Bolton but a late own-goal gave lowly West Brom shared points at the Hawthorns, 1-1. The Baggies remain in dead last but at least can be consoled with the point. Bolton are in twelfth place, nearly assured of retention but not quite guaranteed at this point.

In a battle of relegation-facing clubs, Stoke City emerged with a 1-0 at the Britannia Stadium over Middlesbrough. Ryan Shawcross’ 84th minute goal gave Stoke sixteenth place and three points out of the zone. Boro stay mired in it, still needing several points to escape.

Finally, Arsenal made their case to stay in Champions League qualifying as Nicklas Bendtner, Vassiriki Abou Diaby and Samir Nasri all scored within a ten-minute span to send the Gunners to a 3-1 victory over Newcastle at St. James’ Park. Missing out on home points pushed Toon back into the relegation scrum as they now sit in eighteenth place. Arsenal edged closer to the top and more importantly, away from Aston Villa (who play at Liverpool tomorrow).

NCAA’s Day Two

Yet another reason why I’m looking forward to moving to the west coast is having gone to bed before the thrilling finishes of the Ohio State-Siena and Florida State-Wisconsin games last night. Games starting after 10pm are just too tough to make it all the way through, even on a Friday night. That said, those were the first really exciting games of this tournament. Not that there haven’t been upsets, but those games were the first that really came down to the end.

It greatly saddened me to see Utah State go out to Marquette, and not just because I had the Aggies in the final 16. Utah State was in control of the game with just a few minutes left and completely choked. First, their best two players fouled out, and then the team took and missed wide open three pointers on consecutive possessions late in the game that would have retaken the lead. The scoreline has Marquette winning by one but that is only because Utah State made a three-pointer at the buzzer. Marquette never really looked like they deserved the game, especially in the second half. That’s the worst kind of game to see, especially if you have the upset picked.

I did manage to correctly identify one upset of sorts which was Dayton over West Virginia. The Flyers looked pretty good despite playing a team from the big, bad Big East. I thought this particular match-up showed the worthlessness of including middle-of-the-pack teams from power conferences over higher end teams from mid-major conferences. Dayton was technically the third qualifier from the Atlantic-10 behind Temple and Xavier, yet they looked confident and strong against West Virginia.

The ACC continued to disappoint yesterday as Boston College fell meekly to Southern Cal, a team that would never have made the tournament had they not surprisingly won the PAC-10 tournament. BC never once looked like a good team against USC. Meanwhile, Florida State’s total choke against Wisconsin, another also-ran from a big conference, set the ACC back several years, in my opinion. Mike Krzyzewski might want to rethink his statement that the ACC is by far the superior conference in the country. I’m sure he was referring to the top dogs but even that argument has hit the fan with Wake Forest getting destroyed by Cleveland State. Granted, most pundits expected Cleveland State to play Wake tough and some even called for the upset, but I’m not sure anyone expected the thrashing that the ACC’s third-best team received yesterday. Combining those games with Clemson’s loss to another Big Ten team in Michigan on Thursday, four of the ACC’s seven teams are already out.

One more game will complete my thoughts about yesterday’s action. Pittsburgh looked extremely vulnerable against East Tennessee State. The team that is supposed to be bigger and badder than anyone else out there was matched physically almost every step of the way yesterday against a supposedly inferior side. In the next round against Oklahoma State, I think Pitt will struggle with the non-stop offense of the Cowboys and up-and-down pace. They were very unimpressive, even less so than Memphis or Kansas, the other really high seeds to struggle in round one. Granted, I hate Pitt so that probably colors my judgement to a degree, but I just think they are good against other big, slow, ugly teams in the Big East but are far less suited to play against the world at large as they’re now required to do.

UEFA Cup Quarterfinal Draw

Somehow I missed this earlier today. Maybe it was the watching of basketball since noon today. Either way, here is the draw for the quarterfinals of the UEFA Cup:

Manchester City v. Hamburg
Paris Saint-Germain v. Dynamo Kiev
Shakhtar Donetsk v. Olympique Marseille
Werder Bremen v. Udinese

With Shakhtar and Dynamo making the final eight, Ukraine have their first ever quarterfinalists in the UEFA Cup. Interestingly there is just one English side as compared with four in the Champions League. Two German sides (Hamburg and Bremen), one Italian (Udinese) and two French (PSG and Marseille) make up the rest of the final eight. These matches will take place on April 9 for the first leg and April 16 for the second as the clubs vie for a spot in the final in Istanbul. The last major club final in Istanbul produced the famous Liverpool comeback against AC Milan in the Champions League in 2005.

Premiership Predictions – Week 30

After a strange week last week the Premiership is back this week with some very nice match-ups. Three of the top four clubs will be away, trying to hold onto the positions they currently hold. Chelsea will be in London to face suddenly improving Tottenham, United will be at Craven Cottage to see Fulham and Arsenal go up north with a match against Newcastle. Only Liverpool, who are home to slipping Aston Villa, will have the benefit of the home crowd this weekend.

Perhaps more intriguing though is the quagmire at the bottom with Portsmouth, Toon, Blackburn, Stoke and Middlesbrough all within a five-point range. Boro and Stoke will play each other while Rovers host West Ham, Pompey host Everton and even DFL West Brom get a chance to pick up some points in hosting Bolton.

Saturday:
Everton @ Portsmouth – Everton
Chelsea @ Tottenham – Chelsea
West Ham @ Blackburn – Draw
Manchester United @ Fulham – United
Bolton @ West Brom – Bolton
Middlesbrough @ Stoke City – Stoke
Arsenal @ Newcastle – Arsenal

Sunday:
Hull City @ Wigan – Hull City
Sunderland @ Manchester City – City
Aston Villa @ Liverpool – Liverpool

Results Thus Far:

Week 1 – 19 points
Week 2 – 16 points
Week 3 – 12 points
Week 4 – 13 points
Week 5 – 13 points
Week 6 – 27 points
Week 7 – 14 points
Week 8 – 22 points
Week 9 – 18 points
Week 10 – 19 points
Week 11 – 11 points
Week 12 – 10 points
Week 13 – 16 points
Week 14 – 13 points
Week 15 – 9 points
Week 16 – 18 points
Week 17 – 11 points
Week 18 – 14 points
Week 19 – 15 points
Week 20 – 23 points
Week 21 – 21 points
Week 22 – 20 points
Week 23 – 21 points
Week 24 – 14 points
Week 25 – 23 points
Week 26 – 11 points
Week 27 – 16 points
Week 28 – 19 points
Week 29 – 22 points

Premiership Predictions – Week 30 – Philip’s Picks

Written by Philip Oliver, a professional sports writer who blogs about the Premier League and soccer gambling.

Blackburn v West Ham – Blackburn
Rovers beat West Ham 7-1 in 2001/02 but have since suffered a poor run against the Hammers, losing eight of the ten league meetings between the two. Both teams have been short of goals and a single goal might settle this one.

Fulham v Man Utd – Manchester United
Fulham, who have started to lose at home but win away, provide the Champions with the chance to prove their heavy defeat by Liverpool was an aberration. Anything other than an away win will open up the Premier League title race.

Newcastle v Arsenal – Arsenal
Newcastle have won once in 11 matches since Christmas and face a Premier League relegation battle that looks like going to the wire. Arsenal have not lost since late November and have beaten the Magpies 3-0 in the last three meetings in all competitions between the two.

Portsmouth v Everton – Portsmouth
Everton have lost once in their last 13 league matches but have started to miss the creativity of Mikel Arteta on the road – they have not scored in their last three away assignments. Pompey are playing well under Paul Hart but might need to win this to stay out of the relegation zone.

Stoke v Middlesbrough – Draw
Stoke’s top flight survival depends on the maintenance of their good home form – one defeat in their last eleven at the Britannia Stadium – whilst ‘Boro desperately need points from anywhere. A tense draw might ensue.

Tottenham v Chelsea – Draw
Spurs stole a dramatic point in a 4-4 thriller in the corresponding fixture last season that helped to derail Chelsea’s title bid and another draw would have a similar effect.

West Brom v Bolton – West Brom
Basement club West Brom are nearing must-win territory and they certainly need three points from the visit of a club who have gained one point from their last six away from home.

Liverpool v Aston Villa – Liverpool
Villa’s hopes of Champions League football are quickly receding and another defeat here, one which would keep Liverpool’s title hopes alive, will leave them looking over their shoulders at sixth-placed Everton.

Man City v Sunderland – Manchester City
City have won eight and lost one of the nine Premier League meetings between the two and should maintain that run thanks to their excellent home form – they have won their last five at Eastlands.

Wigan v Hull – Draw
Hull ended their barren run with a surprise win at Fulham in their last away match and their appetite for the battle could secure another decent result on the road.

Champions League Quarterfinal Draw

In case you haven’t seen it yet, here’s how the draw for the quarterfinals of the Champions League turned out:

Villarreal v. Arsenal
Manchester United v. Porto
Liverpool v. Chelsea
Barcelona v. Bayern Munich

All interesting match-ups that I’ll detail further before the first legs but needless to say, Man United lucked out by drawing Porto. Perhaps the stars really are lining up for United to accomplish the record five trophies this year. Or perhaps not, but at least they have a slightly easier draw than they could’ve been given.

UEFA Cup Quarterfinals Now Set

With everything happening with the NCAA tournament over the past few days I’ve neglected my duties to cover the UEFA Cup. Here are recaps of the games from the Round of 16 from Wednesday and Thursday:

Wednesday:

Despite two late goals at Le Geoffroy-Guichard, St. Etienne crashed out of the tournament where they showed so much promise, 3-2 on aggregate to Werder Bremen. Sebastien Prodl and Claudio Pizarro scored in the first half giving Bremen a 2-0 lead, just enough to hold on and advance. Though they’ve had a disastrous domestic season, Bremen are looking good in the UEFA Cup.

A 2-2 draw at the Amsterdam ArenA pushed Olympique Marseille through to the quarterfinals 4-3 on aggregate over Ajax. With Ajax leading 2-1 at full-time, the match went to overtime to determine who advanced on aggregate. Tyrone Mears scored in the 110th minute for Marseille, giving the French power a dramatic and rather unexpected away victory and the means to advance. Adding insult to injury, Ajax received a red card in the 120th minute, completely eliminating whatever chances they might have of a late equalizer.

Thursday:

An own-goal in the 79th minute proved fatal for Metalist Kharkiv as it gave Dynamo Kiev a second away goal. Though Metalist won 3-2 on home soil at the Metalist Stadium, Dynamo’s two-goal advantage on away goals sent them through to the quarterfinals. Without the own-goal, Metalist would have booked their place.

At the Ali Sami Yen Stadium in Turkey, Hamburg scored three goals in the final half-hour to complete a thrilling come-from-behind victory and aggregate win to advance past Galatasaray. Though Harry Kewell and Milan Baros gave the Turks a 2-0 lead, José Paolo Guerrero’s brace and Ivica Olic’s last second goal pushed the German side through, to the shock of the home crowd.

Luis Fernandinho and da Silva Luiz Adriano allowed Shakhtar Donetsk to defend their home stadium in a 2-0 win and 2-1 aggregate victory over CSKA Moscow. It must be a sweet win for the Ukrainian side after so many years of the Russian Army running wild in their country.

Another Russian side were felled yesterday as Zenit St. Petersburg, holders of the UEFA Cup, were dethroned despite a 1-0 victory over Udinese. Anatoliy Tymoschuk’s goal was not enough to overcome Udinese’s two-goal lead on aggregate, so the Italian side advance 2-1. Of course Zenit are without two of last year’s stars, Roman Pavlyuchenko and Andrei Arshavin, now both of North London sides in the Premiership.

In the 81st minute at the Estadio Municipal de Braga, Guillaume Hoarau broke the nil-nil score and aggregate to push Paris Saint-Germain past Braga and into the quarterfinals. PSG have been down for a few years so it’s nice to see them back in the European discussion.

Finally, in Denmark, Luton Shelton’s 85th minute goal and Michael Jakobsen’s 90th minute penalty drew Aalborg even with Manchester City on aggregate at the Aalborg Stadion. After the requisite overtime expired, the two clubs went to penalties to settle the matter. Richard Dunne’s penalty was the fourth for City and proved to be enough as Shelton could not equal his regular-time heroics and missed on his attempt from the spot. As such, City advance to the quarterfinals.

NCAA’s Day One

So we made it through the first day of the NCAA tournament. As far as I know I’m still human and able to interact with the outside world. Though by the end of the weekend that may have changed. CBS’s March Madness on Demand is the greatest invention I’ve encountered, now that it’s free. Being able to watch whichever game you want and not being locked in geographically like on tv is fantastic. It was a little disappointing that there weren’t really any upsets, though Cal State Northridge and American sure looked like they were going to pull it off. I’m sure today there will be upsets to counteract yesterday’s general chalkiness. Here are a few thoughts about a few of yesterday’s games:

I was really happy with the result of the Washington-Mississippi State game out West. I thought UW really looked like a strong team, though that doesn’t really mean that much for a middle-of-the-pack SEC team as an opponent. Still, there were other teams who looked a lot worse than did UW. Brockman is a total beast and Overton and Pondexter really took over the game a few times for the Huskies. Plus, the ‘home court’ advantage of being in Portland really showed up, the crowd was decidedly behind UW.

The most unwatchable game of the day had to have been Purdue-Northern Iowa, also out west. The main reason being that Purdue has a hounding defense and at the same time, no spectacular offensive players. Northern Iowa, an upset pick by more than a few people, turned out to be mostly slow white guys without much game. The whole thing was atrocious. I really can’t see Purdue keeping up with a legitimately good team like UW, one that will pound right back.

I felt bad to see this morning that Illinois lost. I was really rooting for them, not just because I picked them, but because of Mike Davis, a kid I covered when he was in high school. He scored the first basket of the game but I just couldn’t stay up late enough to watch to the end. Turns out Western Kentucky barely won. That’s the 5-12 upset for everyone out there who loves that kind of thing. I thought the Illini could at least pull this one out, guess I was wrong.

That said, Gonzaga should wipe the floor with Western. Though it took them some time to get going, Gonzaga looked fantastic in the second half against Akron. The crowd in Portland was as into the Zags as they were into UW earlier in the day.

My heart stopped on about seventeen occasions in the Villanova-American game. I obviously needed Nova to win and their 10-point halftime deficit and 14-point lead early in the second half made me want to jump out the window. But all became right with the world when Villanova realized they were just the better team and started playing like it in mid-late second half. If they’d just gone inside to Cunningham the whole game maybe it wouldn’t have been so close. Either way, I thought for a good while that Garrison Carr was going to become this year’s Stephen Curry.

Finally, I’m very happy to have woken up to see that UCLA knocked off VCU late last night. Usually I would be pulling for the underdog but in this case, so many people thought they’d be really smart and pick VCU, that I had to go with the Bruins. Though I only watched bits of the first half before going to bed, it seemed that UCLA was the better team. I don’t know why people thought they sucked so badly.

AD nauseum – NCAA Tournament Edition

With the NCAA tournament starting officially tomorrow around noon, I wanted to get my thoughts out there in the ether for everyone to criticize. Just remember, when you’re laughing at all my picks, I’m the only person you know personally who is airing out every single pick for all to see (or I guess hear). With that said, I hope you’ll listen to my thoughts on the sixty-three NCAA games coming over the next few weeks. I mentioned at the end of the podcast that I’ll be running another one of these on each of the next two Mondays after the full weekends of games, so tune in for those. Otherwise, enjoy.

 

What is MLS Thinking?

MLS is already a niche league. As much as I’d love to see a viable American soccer league, MLS has it’s fans and really doesn’t have much more room to grow in terms of a fan base. And they certainly aren’t going to do themselves any favors with their idiotic season opener tomorrow night.

Major League Soccer will be kicking off its fourteenth season tomorrow night at 9 in a match between New York Red Bull and the Seattle Sounders at Qwest Field. That doesn’t sound too bad, right? New club opening their inaugural season with a prime time game against the club from the league’s biggest market. Sure, that makes perfect sense. The problem is that the game will run against the NCAA TOURNAMENT. The game will be on ESPN2 (not even regular ESPN, which will probably be an all-day Sports Center covering the NCAA’s) and will literally be directly competing with the late games of the first day of the NCAA tournament.

I know ESPN has to run something against the NCAA’s since they’ll be on CBS but this sounds like a disaster. Why aren’t they starting the season tonight in the void just before the tournament starts? Sports fans will be looking for anything to watch on tv as baseball hasn’t reached regular season yet, there’s not that much interest in the World Baseball Classic and the tournament will be just a day away. That seems like the perfect opportunity to get a nice rating for the opening game of a league that could really use the increased viewership. But no, MLS is going to compete with the NCAA tournament. The only thing they could do that would be dumber than that would be to open on Super Bowl Sunday.

Granted, MLS is getting incrementally better each season. There are still major points of improvement that could be made (see Trey’s column last year, and one of mine that drew quite a few angry responses) but on the whole, the league is establishing itself as a relatively viable product. But decisions like the opening game date/time are what will confine it to secondary or tertiary status in the minds of American sports fans. Wake up MLS, present your product in a way that makes sense. It’s not like MLS is NHL, mired on a network that no one knows where it is or if they even have it. The matches are on ESPN2. Use that to your advantage, not the opposite.

Arsenal Earn Controversial Spot in FA Cup Semis

An non-call on offsides, a post-game spitting incident and a genuinely tense match characterized Arsenal‘s come-from-behind 2-1 victory over Hull City in the last quarterfinal of the FA Cup. Nicky Barmby gave Hull an early lead on a deflected shot, a lead that would last until the final fifteen minutes of the game. Robin van Persie drew the Gunners even in the 74th minute and William Gallas headed in from a very clearly offside position for the go-ahead goal in the 84th. Adding insult to injury, there are allegations that Cesc Fábregas, not playing due to injury, spit at a Hull assistant manager in the tunnel after the game.

While the wild match certainly carries headlines, it is relatively fair revenge for an Arsenal side who lost to Hull earlier this season at the Emirates. Arsenal were also able to rest at least some of their regulars, though the likes of Arshavin and van Persie did grace the pitch. Now the Gunners move on to the semi-finals of the FA Cup and will face Chelsea at Wembley. The winner of that match will face the winner of the Manchester United-Everton tie.

The Last FA Cup Quarterfinal

Arsenal and Hull City will play today to finally round out the semifinals of the FA Cup tournament. The big question though will be whether or not Arsenal play their regular players against a clearly inferior Hull side. After their dramatic 120-minute match with Roma in the Champions League last week and a rout against Blackburn on the weekend, the Gunners will be facing their third game in a week’s time. So will Arsene Wenger care enough about the FA Cup to jeopardize the club’s chances in the Champions League or in trying to keep in the final Champions League qualifying spot domestically?

The other interesting side note about this match is the fact that Hull defeated Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium, where today’s match will be held, back in September. While Hull are no longer sailing among the Premiership’s elite clubs as they did for several months last fall, that match will surely be in the minds of both clubs. For Arsenal it will surely be a motivation, regardless of which players are sent out onto the pitch, but for Hull it will no doubt be a reminder that when all is going well they can play with anyone in England.

One Reason to Watch the Play-In Game

I’ll admit, I won’t be watching it. But there is a really good reason to if you don’t have anything else going on tonight. The game features Alabama State (Montgomery, AL) and Morehead State (Morehead, KY) but more importantly features Alabama State’s 7’1″ center Chief Kickingstallionsims. Yeah, that’s really his name. Well really it’s Grlenntys Chief Kickingstallionsims, Jr. but you don’t have to remember all that.

The NCAA play-in game is one of the weirdest games of the year because it’s technically the first tournament game but outside of the alumni of the schools involved, no one really cares. There’s not much of a chance that either Alabama St. or Morehead St. could knock off Louisville when they play on Friday, though at least Morehead has the in-state rivalry going. I guess it’s not quite Louisville-Kentucky, but hey, Louisville-Morehead State could work.

While I won’t be writing about every game in the NCAA’s this month, you can check back here for posts about all of the major games and upsets.

Not Much Good to Say at Upton Park

Ooof

West Ham United produced a horrible result for a club that are situated in the top ten of the English Premier League yesterday. Their nil-nil draw with DFL West Bromich Albion was a disastrous result and all but eliminate whatever chances the Hammers had of catching Everton for sixth place. Apart from two yellow cards there really isn’t much to say about the match at all, so we’ll just leave it at that.

So, Round 29 is now complete. Obviously the biggest news was at the top though the quagmire at the bottom remains an interesting story. Here’s how Philip and I fared over the weekend.

Correct:
mao – Arsenal, Everton, Draw (Pompey-Boro), Wigan, Draw (Hull-Newcastle), Chelsea, Spurs
Philip – Arsenal, Everton, Draw (Hull-Newcastle), Chelsea

Incorrect:
mao – Man United, Bolton, West Ham
Philip – Bolton, Draw (Man United-Liverpool), Pompey, Sunderland, Draw (Villa-Spurs), West Ham

The way I score myself is that I take three points for a correct pick, one point if a match ended in a draw and zero for a completely incorrect pick. In that scale the score this week was:

mao – 22
Philip – 14

In a straight up and down scoring:

mao – 21
Philip – 12