Our star-gazing scribes crash to earth as Premier League punditry falls below expectations
We hate to say we told you so. So it is with great relief that guardian.co.uk/sport today declares: we didn’t tell you so. We predicted that Liverpool would win the Premier League and, er, that proved about as shrewd as your average Rafa Benítez signing.
But let us refine our definition of ‘we’. Our pre-season predictions were the aggregate of the forecasts of a dozen scribes, so under our collective brolly some prescient folks jostled with the wallies. However, in the spirit of solidarity which has long been synonymous with the Guardian, we shall refrain from publicly naming those who tainted the others. Internally, of course, a severe beating has been administered to Jamie Jackson.
Andy Hunter was assigned the task of writing the preview and it was clear that he felt our prophesy could be fulfilled only if Benítez got busy in the remaining weeks of the transfer window. “Xabi Alonso represents a serious loss,” noted Andy. “Should [Alberto] Aquilani overcome his injury problems and settle instantly – a prerequisite with the title at stake – a forward of the calibre of Valencia’s David Silva arrive and defensive cover in the form of Sylvain Distin, for example, be brought in, then Benítez will have achieved his summer goals and Liverpool will embark on the new campaign wiser and stronger. The title may rest on Benítez’s next moves in the transfer market.”
Many posters were more strident: “First? No chance,” scoffed eljezabel. “They only have one recognised (ie talented) striker. They’ll do well to finish above Arsenal and there’s no way they’re coming second.” But someone called Prawns was more upbeat about Liverpool’s chances, thundering, entirely wrongly, as it turned out, that: “The nonsense about over-reliance on them [Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard] is wide of the mark and bordering on far-fetched.”
“I don’t see why Liverpool finishing first is so implausible,” agreed SteveH (or was it G?). “They only finished four points adrift last season and finished the season by far the better team, scoring 32 goals in their last 10 games to Man U’s 20. Obviously Torres and Gerrard are important to their title challenge but they still beat Man U and Chelsea without them. If they can turn just a few of those 0-0 draws into wins then they’re definitely in for a shot.”
As for the winners, our combined soothsaying put Chelsea in second place, though, again, the person charged with writing the preview was not so sure about that prediction: “[Ancelotti] has, as yet, been denied the ‘marquee signing’ both the owner, Roman Abramovich, and the captain, John Terry, had been seeking, yet there is still enough ammunition in the squad to sustain a challenge,” wrote Dominic Fifield who like Amy Lawrence and, ahem, myself, tipped them to be champions.
“There is nothing to suggest they will not be contenders,” concluded Dominic, despite dissent from many posters, including Indrossi, who snorted: “A new manager, one new signing and a decrepit, ageing team that’s one year older from last year when their manager said that ‘this was this group’s last chance to win the Champions League’ – and you’re quoting them Premier League winners?”
Manchester United finished second. That, I admit, is within the top four so, from a nitpicker’s point of view – I was wrong when I said that they would miss out on the Champions League spots. The combined Guardian prediction placed them third, though once again the author of the preview, Paul Wilson, did not concur with the consensus: “It is a jump to conclude that United will miss their most conspicuous asset to the extent that other teams are now favourites for the title,” wrote Paul.
“A somewhat self-centred Ronaldo did not always manage to galvanise the team in some of the big games last season and at no time during the league campaign that brought Sir Alex Ferguson a record-equalling 18th title was anyone remarking that United were a one-man team … a fourth consecutive domestic crown is possible, maybe even probable. But unless the Berbatov-Rooney axis can be very clever indeed, it is equally likely United will be rumbled again in Europe.”
Someone called Frameboy sounded very sure of himself when he summarised United’s chances as follows: “Two moody headcases and a benchwarmer up front, 106 year-old-Ryan Giggs and creaky old Paul Scholes in midfield, one and a half centre-backs and the manager losing it on Charity Shield [Community Shield] day? Fifth or sixth. Or lower – certainly lower than Man City and Fulham.”
I’m glad you brought Fulham up, Frameboy.
While many predicted a season of struggle for the Cottagers, owing to the additional demands of a Europa League place, the man entrusted with writing our preview was more on the ball. “We should never underestimate the expertise of Roy Hodgson,” wrote, oh look, it was me. And I added: “There are grounds for believing Fulham could surpass last term’s triumph.”
“You certainly have faith in Roy, which does help this ever-increasing worrier of a Fulham fan,” trembled Svencojones, who went on to list some of his causes for concern – and whinge about one of the revelations of the season, Bobby Zamora. “Nevland and Kamara …[scored] more than Zamora despite a 10th of the playing time. Yeah I know, he holds the ball up well. But he also missed a fair few sitters and despite getting massive backing from the Fulham faithful, decided to focus on the odd few who gave him stick.”
Doctoroncall contributed what turned out to be an excellent diagnosis: “Hodgson is a great tactician, if he can get more goals out of the strikers to add to the solid platform at the back I can see them doing well, especially in Europe.”
Complicating our previews was the fact that they, of course, had to be published long before the closure of the transfer window, meaning there was ample scope for squads to change. No side seemed to have a greater capacity to transform themselves in the space of a few weeks than oil-cash-powered Manchester City, meaning some of our scribes (specifically the one named Louise Taylor) reckoned they would be champions. Others were confident City would make a balls of their recruitment and writhe in mid table. All in all, however, we ranked them fourth. Collectively, we identified Arsenal as the team to make way for them.
Amy Lawrence did not share that view but nor was she convinced that Arsenal were ready to challenge for the title, surmising that would entail Arsène Wenger re-investing the windfall he got from City from the sales of Kolo Touré and Emmanuel Adebayor, which, she correctly deduced, he would not do. “If you think that will drag him into buying a job lot of monsters to do the team’s dirty work, you underestimate his exceptional bloody-mindedness,” warned Amy.
As for the relegation spots, is it wrong to big up our predictions that Hull and Pompey would go down?
“Phil Brown is the co-owner of a race-horse called Gifted Leader but all evidence of inspirational management seemed to have deserted him last spring as the impressive tactical acumen so evident in the autumn became imperceptibly clouded by the Hull manager’s overblown ego,” wrote Louise Taylor, who decried Hull’s scoring problems and, anticipating the sale of Michael Turner, foresaw defensive disintegration. “The cold reality on Humberside is that if Hull do not sign a few quick, clever, goal-poaching players they will be back in the Championship,” continued Louise. “And Brown can expect to be unemployed by Bonfire Night.”
According to the crystal ball that, rest assured, we have taken back to the shop, the third team to be relegated would be Wolves. Again, however, the person ordered to write our preview dissented – sort of. “It will be tough again this time but Wolves and Mick McCarthy should at least make a fight of it,” reckoned Stuart James.
Some Wolves fans couldn’t even muster confidence about that. “I can’t help feeling that 20th would be an optimistic placing for us,” howled DylanWolf. “Even in winning the Championship last year we went on an 11-game run with only one victory. The fact that we won the title after, for much of the time, looking so incredibly mediocre shows that any team out of the top half of the table could have been promoted. The fact that Wolves were the most consistent side still seems frankly incredible.”
Our predicted table (actual final positions in graphics)
1 Liverpool (7)
2 Chelsea (1)
3 Man Utd (2)
4 Man City (5)
5 Arsenal (3)
6 Everton (8)
7 Tottenham (4)
8 Aston Villa (6)
9 Sunderland (13)
10 Fulham (12)
11 West Ham (17)
12 Blackburn (10)
13 Bolton (14)
14 Stoke (11)
15 Wigan (16)
16 Burnley (18)
17 Birmingham (9)
18 Wolves (15)
19 Portsmouth (20)
20 Hull (19)
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