Marlon King for Hull City (v Newcastle United), 13 September 2008

[Scroll down for predictions - they are in this post!]

At the risk of upsetting the few lovely and loyal Newcastle supporters that frequent this site, I did find myself nodding at this article written by Matthew Syed in this weeks Times.

"The only way that Newcastle fans are ever going to be truly happy is when they have formed a collective to buy the club and have made a pig's ear, as they inevitably would, of a kind that would make Freddy Shepherd's last remaining strands stand on end. When they have rehired Keegan to manage the team, Shearer to be his assistant and the ghost of Jackie Milburn to do the scouting. When they have got control of the club and discovered that their own volatility makes it practically ungovernable."

Also, whilst I strongly believe that the outcome of foul play in football should not in itself influence the punishment (Martin Taylor and Danny Guthrie should not simply be banned for longer just becuase the recipients of their red card tackle were seriously injured), I do think the FA needs to look at some sort of sliding scale for penalties. A straight red for a clumsy professional foul having the same ban as for Guthrie's terrible tackle (borne of frustration, not malice, I suspect) seems unbalanced. By all means ban players for cheating, but on-field thuggery and violence is different, and should be treated differently.

Anyway. Predictions time (I hate the UEFA Cup. It means there are hardly any games on Saturday's Match Of The Day....)

Blackburn 1-1 Fulham
Bolton 0-2 Arsenal
Liverpool 3-0 Stoke
Sunderland 2-1 Middlesbrough
West Ham 2-0 Newcastle
Chelsea 2-1 Man Utd
Hull 0-2 Everton
Man City 2-1 Portsmouth
Tottenham 2-0 Wigan
West Brom 1-1 Aston Villa

and let's make our first trip of the season to the Eredivisie, shall we?

AZ 1-3 PSV
Feyenoord 1-1 Ajax
Heerenveen 2-1 NEC