I would regard this season to be one of the most exciting, or rather the scariest seasons yet. Just look at how every team ride roller coasters every week can make a little heart attack now and then.
The start of the season saw the likes of
Wigan and
West Ham performing exceedingly well. Zaki and Heskey had shone brightly in the first few matches and have given Zaki himself right on top of Golden Boot challenge. He still stays as leader after 10 matches with 7 goals. Ashton performed well too, but crashed out in a training session. His fortune fell together with the club when Curbishley resigned and its owner was sucked into the financial crisis. I enjoyed watching Zola while he was playing, but his managerial skills have yet to be seen.
The 3 promoted teams have been having mixed successes.
Hull stole most of the thunder by suddenly rising to the top in the month of October, with 4 consecutive wins, including one at the Emirates. Phil Brown is one phenomenon himself. But I would regard Hull’s success at its shock factor and its random attacks which would throw many teams’ defenses into mayhem.
Stoke’s performance was like halfway between heaven and hell. Noticeable matches include a draw with Liverpool and victory over Arsenal last night.
West Brom is more consistent, winning and losing the right amount of matches to keep itself save from relegation.
The big four had been erratic, except
Chelsea which only lost to Liverpool at home, and winning most of the other matches to keep itself on top of the table.
Liverpool’s had a good start, winning most games too but a shock loss to Tottenham last night would dampen their title hopes. Riera is a good buy, but Keane looks doubtful.
Manchester United and more recently
Arsenal have been dropping too many crucial points and this would be dangerous, if they still want to qualify for Champions League next season. Berbatov is one good player, thought he would be a point man, but had been a running striker the last few matches. Gallas had not been influential as a captain, but there was no one else. Wenger need to settle this fast or the team would just pecah.
Newcastle and
Tottenham had been on the headlines for their terrible start to this season. Newcastle had been bad, but is slowly picking up, and it is really slow. It needs more than just Kinnear to pick the team up. There is a need to fill in a few gaps at defense. Tottenham had been a terrible error at the technical department. There is no reason to buy 3 playmakers and selling all your strikers, unless you play defensibly like A.S. Roma. But I still like Modric, but that’s all about it. It makes things look better when Redknapp led it to victory over Liverpool last night, but there is a huge urgent need to keep this continuing.
Aston Villa is really set to break into the top 4, with key players performing well consistently as they should. O’Neill seems to be a very good strategist by utilizing average players to the maximum. I like him a lot.
Manchester City was a little disappointing, by not performing as I thought it would. The Brazilian players were good, together with Dunn and Ireland, but the overall team is just not winning more games I thought they would.
Teams like
Blackburn,
Middlesbrough,
Everton,
Portsmouth,
Sunderland,
Bolton and
Fulham are a little boring, so I shan’t say much. But Portsmouth looks like it is slowly going down. After 10 matches, with teams from 7 to 17 having a difference of only 4 points, it is a big scramble for these 10 teams to either escape up or drop dead. Chelsea and Liverpool have a nice cushion of 5 points and the next four teams are neck in neck for the Champions League spots. Keep your fingers crossed not to see Newcastle and Tottenham relegated.
－异客拍客 a.k.a. Soccersiao－
