Thursday 11 August 2011

End of the long hot summer

The unofficial start to the new season happened last weekend, when Manchester United beat their city rivals 3 – 2 in the charity shield.
At half time it looked like the reigning Premiership champions were heading for defeat, they were two nil down, to what looked like a superior outfit. Had City won they would have erased some of the inferiority complex the club has within Manchester.
However normal service resumed after the break and United managed to draw level, they then won the game in injury time. Based on this performance, United and their aging manager still have the hunger to win and that is why they will be the team to beat this season.
The sad thing about the highly professional game is that only a select few teams can actually win the league. Personally I would be surprised if United and Chelsea do not finish first and second again, though not necessarily in that order.
The best guide to future events is past results and that means that Arsenal will choke, Liverpool will most likely not be competitive for the title and Man City will still be a mess off the pitch.
However the race for the top four could be more exciting than ever: I suspect that Arsenal will make it, but the final place will see the incumbent, Manchester City, possibly face a sustained threat from a rejuvenated Liverpool and a Spurs team, who have only the league to focus on this season.
City may suffer the same fate as Spurs did last year. Tottenham found competing on two fronts meant that league form suffered. However Manchester City have endless cash and this could be used to bolster their squad come January, if the current crop cannot handle the added workload.
Queen’s Park Rangers are the real unknown for the year: they are another with seemingly endless resources, however according to articles I have read, they have not really splashed the cash this summer. Perhaps their owners are hoping to make the club financially viable. This season will most likely centre around avoiding relegation – next season they will know what’s what and be able to spend sensibly, with the eventual aim of European football.
However despite my concerns that the season overall may prove to be drab, I will be an eager onlooker come next Saturday. The appetite was certainly whetted by the Community Shield, but the real business is only two days away.
From this week on I will try to include a small piece about gambling every week. This being the start of the season there is always the urge to bet on the league winner and on who will be relegated – avoid at all costs. You do not want to tie up cash till the end of the season.
After that statement I imagine that this blog will be followed by: “the views expressed by individual bloggers are not consistent with the opinions held by Kingbet or any of its affiliates”
But seriously, why have a bet that takes nine months to pay off - if you are in it for the long haul, buy Irish government bonds, they offer solid rates of interest and are going to give you a real sweat.
In the Newcastle – Arsenal game, which is live on ESPN (Saturday 1730), I fancy Arsenal at evens. Newcastle are supposedly in turmoil and Arsenal certainly have the nous to take advantage. On to Super Sunday, there are two live games. In the first game Chelsea are 4 to 6 away to Stoke, once again this smacks of value. In the later game Man United are 8 to 15 away to West Brom and for this weekend at least I will stick with the favourite.
Combine the three of them for a price of 4.12 to 1.
Anyone who mentions this treble in either Kingbet outlet, Drogheda or Clogherhead will receive the enhanced price of 9 to 2.
Till next week,
M.C.
To keep it simple the staking plan will be one point on each of the three games plus on the accumulator.

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