Gameweek 2.1

2006-08-23T14:49:00.000-07:00

Elation and ecstacy as Manchester United sit pretty on top of the Premiership table. I can only hope that they can produce this form throughout the entire Premiership season and sit beautifully in number one position after 38 games.

At The Valley (Home of Charlton Athletic) the Mancunians put 3 goals past the Addicks putting paid to any doubt over the failure to replace Ruud Van Nistelrooy. Goals from Fletcher, Saha, and United's "greatest supersub" Ole Gunnar Solskjaer ended the match 3-0 to United after an illustrious 1st half where United managed to hit the woodwork 3 times and had a few nice attempts saved by Liverpool loan goalkeeper Scott Carson.

But the main highlight of the day is the fall of reigning champions of England, Chelsea. They were beaten 2-1 by Middlesborough who came back from 1 Shevchenko goal early in the 1st half. It took Boro 80 minutes to score their first through Emmanuel Pogatetz, and Aussie Viduka sending Chelsea to sing the Blues at the very death of the game.

Other matches saw new signing Jimmy Bullard scoring a late penalty to rescue Fulham at home to Bolton(1-1). Martin O'Neill's Aston Villa beat Reading 2-1, Blackburn 1-1 Everton, and a boring but bruising 0-0 draw for Manchester City vs Portsmouth.

My gamble on making Shevy my captain kind of paid off as he scored his 1st goals for the blues. Would have gotten more points had I made Marlon King or Dimitar Berbatov my captain. Wayne Bridge also got me 7 points. I'm sure my team 'Juventus Lives On' would have picked quite alot of points this week (Gameweek 2) and I would not be surprised if they were to be top 3 in the Serie T after Gameweek 2.

Told you people I would catch up. Staying up is a whole different matter.
See you in Gameweek 3.

Gameweek 2

2006-08-22T16:15:00.000-07:00

As I had predicted, Dimitar Berbatov and Marlon King both scored for their respective teams... Got 9 points from each player in the Serie T, shall see if my gamble of 3 Chelsea players work out or not.

Both Rooney and Scholesey start their 3 match bans, and will be missed by The Red Devils. All i can hope is Frenchman Saha can keep scoring to keep United at the top of the Premiership.

Unfortunately I was at work missed the Tottenham vs Sheffield United match which I was hoping to catch.

EPL 2006/07

2006-08-19T23:49:00.000-07:00

Finally the new season of the English Premiership is underway. With it, the start of the inaugural Serie T (Telebiz Fantasy League) with sees colleagues competing for one common goal. To be the ultimate pundit of the English Premiership, and also not to forget the mystery prize.

Over the course of the Premiership season, I will try to update my fellow colleagues with the latest in football as well as my own take on the current happenings in sports in general. I do hope that my colleagues, fellow readers would benefit from these mini articles. Please do also bear with me as I am no professional columnist. All this writing is done solely for the affection of sports.

I will provide my take mainly on matches which I have managed to watch and NOT summarizing newspaper articles, as this is my personal opinion.

For Match-Day 1, I was able to watch 2 matches. Arsenal vs Aston Villa & Everton vs Watford. Both matches were being played simultaneously and I had to skip between channels.

Arsenal vs Aston Villa
Arsenal kicked off this match as strong favourites, as many pundits and football tipsters predicted it to be a walk in the park for the Gunners. Playing at their new stadium (Emirates Stadium), Arsenal obviously had an obligation to perform well to their home crowd’s expectations as for the first time, the London club managed to accommodate over 60,000 fans at home.

Both teams started the match fairly, and the visitors managed to score first in the 53rd minute through a Olaf Mellberg goal. The Swedish national team captain guided the ball into the back of the net with a rather straightforward header as the Arsenal defence was just disorientated.

New manager Martin O’Neill rejoiced as the mighty Gunners were silenced temporarily. O’Neill, a high profiled manager, is known for his safe plays and being a master tactician, so the next obvious decision by him was to make his team (Aston Villa) sit back, defend and hit on the counter attack.

Then came teenager Theo Walcott into the frame. His speed and mazy runs were evidence that somehow Arsenal we going to stage a comeback. And in the 84th minute, the young Walcott set up Gilberto Silva for Arsenal’s equalizer.

Through most parts of the second half, Aston Villa looked to have snatched the first competitive match victory at the Emirates Stadium, and I would say that sheer determination and some luck managed to save Arsenal from a humiliating defeat against a team most people would believe are candidates for relegation from the Premiership.

Final Score: Arsenal 1 – 1 Aston Villa

Everton vs Watford
As both teams’ starting 11 were unveiled before the start of the game, 2 reserve goalkeepers from Manchester United were to play against each other. American Tim Howard lining up for The Toffees (Everton) while on the other end of the field, Ben Foster started for The Hornets (Watford).

As Watford had just been promoted to the Premiership this season, I was hoping that they would do better than their opposition. This coming from the view point of a neutral who has supported Manchester United since 1992.

Watford played with confidence throughout the match, and almost took the lead rather early in the game. In that occasion, Tim Howard was called to make a save from an Ash Young shot from almost 20 yards.

Andrew Johnson cost Everton £8.6 Million when they acquired him from Crystal Palace in May ’06. And the former Crystal Palace top scorer would score the 1st in this match after placing the ball to the top corner of Ben Foster’s goal.

Watford then kept the pressure on for Everton with their key striker Marlon King leading the Watford charge. It was down to luck that Everton scored the 2nd goal, when Chris Powell was unjustly punished by the referee in the penalty area for handling the ball from an Everton cross. TV replays clearly showed that the ball had not hit Powell in the hand or arm, but on the head. Everton were however awarded a penalty which Mikel Arteta duly converted. 2-0 to Everton by a dubious penalty.

Watford’s late rally only yielded them a consolation goal, when Damien Francis’ shot was deflected to the right of Tim Howard’s goalmouth by Alan Stubbs.

Final Score: Everton 2 – 1 Watford.

Elsewhere there were good fortunes for the other 2 newcomers to the Premier League. Sheffield United held Liverpool to a 1-1 draw at Bramall Lane, whilst Reading (pronounced as “Reh-Ding”) beat Boro 3-2 at Madejski Stadium.
For Boro, Gareth Southgate, the former defender and team captain, who has since gave up playing football to be the new manager of Boro needs much thinking, on which player to buy in order to succeed him in defence as it was clear, they had trouble in that department.

Telebiz Sport

Gameweek 2.1

Gameweek 2

EPL 2006/07