A busy sporting schedule this weekend and I will be making forecasts for Rugby, Football, Tennis, Cricket and Golf.
Golf's world championship has been underway for a few days now and whilst Ireland have led from the start, Italy and Sweden have closed the gap and I am going for Sweden to triumph tomorrow.
Tennis's ATP Tour finals have been underway in London all week and I doubt many pundits would have predicted semi-finals without Nadal, Murray and Djokovic, all of which is leading me to predict a win for Federer in the tournament.
The one day cricket series has been underway for a week now between South Africa and England. It is so far all square and I am going for an England win on Sunday but they will need a better batting performance than last night.
We are a third of the way through the football season and the premier league already has a familiar look to it with only Liverpool of the big teams not having performed this season. I have got four predictions again this week and when I looked at the fixtures for the weekend it looked that nearly all games could end in a draw. This is unlikely but I am still going for three draws in the games between Wigan and Sunderland, Aston Villa and Tottenham as well as the Liverpool derby game. At Fulham I am going for a home win when they host Bolton.
The final sport for predictions this week is my own sport of rugby when the last of the autumn internationals take place. From what I have seen over the preceding few weeks none of the northern or southern hemisphere teams are setting the world alight and perhaps the only shock result has been Scotland's win at Murrayfield last week against the Wallabies. This week I am going for a narrow Irish win over South Africa, France who have looked perhaps the best team this month to beat the All Blacks, Argentina to bring the Scots back to earth by winning in Edinburgh and finally the Australians to get last week's loss out of their system by turning over the Welsh in Cardiff.
After last week I am £9.50 down and so could do with some a better ratio of success this week. In summary the predictions are:
World Championship Golf
Sweden to win at 2/1
ATP Tennis Tour Finals
Federer to win at Evens
One Day Cricket
England to win fourth one day match at 7/4
Premier League Football
Wigan to draw with Sunderland at 5/2
Aston Villa to draw with Tottenham at 12/5
Everton to draw with Liverpool at 12/5
Fulham to beat Bolton at 10/11
Rugby Union Internationals
Ireland to beat South Africa at 5/4
Argentina to beat Scotland at 15/8
Australia to beat Wales at 10/11
France to beat New Zealand at 11/8
Saturday, 28 November 2009
What do I know about my own sport?
Last week predicted three rugby results and got them all wrong so what do I know about the sport I play every week. Perhaps England losing to the All Blacks was not a shock but having been at the game I can say it wasn't a classic. Wales winning against Argentina was another game not to shock the pundits but it was Scotland's win over Australia for the first time in nearly thirty years was the result of the weekend.
Thankfully my football predictions were more accurate with three from four including Spurs' thrashing of Wigan, Manchester City continuing their run of draws against Liverpool and Manchester United winning to keep the pressure on Chelsea. The one I didn't get was Sunderland beating Arsenal where I had expected Arsenal to struggle but to have got a draw.
With only three out of seven correct forecasts it meant a slight loss for the week of 50p.
Thankfully my football predictions were more accurate with three from four including Spurs' thrashing of Wigan, Manchester City continuing their run of draws against Liverpool and Manchester United winning to keep the pressure on Chelsea. The one I didn't get was Sunderland beating Arsenal where I had expected Arsenal to struggle but to have got a draw.
With only three out of seven correct forecasts it meant a slight loss for the week of 50p.
Friday, 20 November 2009
Football and Rugby with some brave predictions!
Just two sports this week will be the subject of my predictions - Premier League football and the continuation of the autumn internationals in rugby union.
After last week's fairly neutral predictions I am going to be a bit braver this weekend. In the football I am going for Manchester City (the league's draw specialists) to hold Liverpool at Anfield in the big game of the weekend. In my second draw prediction I'm thinking that Arsenal who have been on a roll recently to be held at Sunderland as well. My other two predictions involve the second and fourth place clubs who I am forecasting will both complete home wins - Manchester United who host Everton and Spurs who are visited by Wigan on Sunday.
If you don't think those predictions are that brave then you may not think my forecast of Australia to beat Scotland in their rugby match all that unthinkable. However, my final two predictions are that England will triumph at Twickenham against the All Blacks and the Argentinian Pumas to beat Wales in Cardiff. There is some method in my madness and that is firstly England are due a decent performance and will want to end this phase of the season on a high, secondly the All Blacks have lost their aura in the last 18 months and having lost to France in the summer have not looked as invincible as their predecessors in their most recent games against the impotent Welsh and the Italians. Maybe like England they are due a big performance and if both teams do up their performance then I could be in for a special afternoon at Twickenham.
As for the Welsh, I mentioned above they looked impotent and even though Argentina lost to a poor England performance last week, they had only got together as a squad a few days before and I think the combination of their team being on the up and their hosts slipping from the levels they achieved a couple of seasons ago will see the result favouring the South Americans.
In summary therefore this week's predictions are:
Barclays Premier League Football
Liverpool to draw with Manchester City at 5/2
Sunderland to draw with Arsenal at 14/5
Manchester United to beat Everton at 2/5
Tottenham to beat Wigan at 1/2
Rugby Union Internationals
England to beat New Zealand at 7/1
Argentina to beat Wales at 4/1
Australia to beat Scotland at 2/9
After last week's fairly neutral predictions I am going to be a bit braver this weekend. In the football I am going for Manchester City (the league's draw specialists) to hold Liverpool at Anfield in the big game of the weekend. In my second draw prediction I'm thinking that Arsenal who have been on a roll recently to be held at Sunderland as well. My other two predictions involve the second and fourth place clubs who I am forecasting will both complete home wins - Manchester United who host Everton and Spurs who are visited by Wigan on Sunday.
If you don't think those predictions are that brave then you may not think my forecast of Australia to beat Scotland in their rugby match all that unthinkable. However, my final two predictions are that England will triumph at Twickenham against the All Blacks and the Argentinian Pumas to beat Wales in Cardiff. There is some method in my madness and that is firstly England are due a decent performance and will want to end this phase of the season on a high, secondly the All Blacks have lost their aura in the last 18 months and having lost to France in the summer have not looked as invincible as their predecessors in their most recent games against the impotent Welsh and the Italians. Maybe like England they are due a big performance and if both teams do up their performance then I could be in for a special afternoon at Twickenham.
As for the Welsh, I mentioned above they looked impotent and even though Argentina lost to a poor England performance last week, they had only got together as a squad a few days before and I think the combination of their team being on the up and their hosts slipping from the levels they achieved a couple of seasons ago will see the result favouring the South Americans.
In summary therefore this week's predictions are:
Barclays Premier League Football
Liverpool to draw with Manchester City at 5/2
Sunderland to draw with Arsenal at 14/5
Manchester United to beat Everton at 2/5
Tottenham to beat Wigan at 1/2
Rugby Union Internationals
England to beat New Zealand at 7/1
Argentina to beat Wales at 4/1
Australia to beat Scotland at 2/9
Fairly Neutral Last Week
All in all a fairly average week on the prediction front last weekend. Even though I got five from eight correct it only equated to a 50 pence profit for the week because of the odds. This has reduced my overall deficit to £9 but that is nothing to write home about either.
Until the last minute of the Ireland v Australia game it looked like a clean sweep on the rugby following the Australia thrashing of England in the league four nations final and England's union teams less than impressive victory over Argentina. Brian O'Driscoll showed yet again why he is possibly the best player in the world currently with his last minute try that combined with the simple conversion led to the ending of Australia's hopes for a clean sweep of wins against the home nations.
In the football world cup play-offs I had three out of four successes with only France's win in Ireland not having been forecast - and plenty has been said about the second leg of this tie so probably doesn't need my input. BUT yet again there has been a travesty of justice that with modern technology needn't have happened and as well as Russia it is possible that France would not have been in South Africa next summer either. Of course FIFA won't be complaining because it is the result they wanted, especially after they introduced seeding to the play-offs in the first place.
Finally, in the tennis I was completely erroneous in my prediction of Nadal to win the Paris Masters as his semi-final conqueror, Novak Djokovic, went on to triumph in the final.
Until the last minute of the Ireland v Australia game it looked like a clean sweep on the rugby following the Australia thrashing of England in the league four nations final and England's union teams less than impressive victory over Argentina. Brian O'Driscoll showed yet again why he is possibly the best player in the world currently with his last minute try that combined with the simple conversion led to the ending of Australia's hopes for a clean sweep of wins against the home nations.
In the football world cup play-offs I had three out of four successes with only France's win in Ireland not having been forecast - and plenty has been said about the second leg of this tie so probably doesn't need my input. BUT yet again there has been a travesty of justice that with modern technology needn't have happened and as well as Russia it is possible that France would not have been in South Africa next summer either. Of course FIFA won't be complaining because it is the result they wanted, especially after they introduced seeding to the play-offs in the first place.
Finally, in the tennis I was completely erroneous in my prediction of Nadal to win the Paris Masters as his semi-final conqueror, Novak Djokovic, went on to triumph in the final.
Saturday, 14 November 2009
World Cup Football and Rugby
The main sporting action this weekend includes the first leg of qualifiers for the final spots for European countries at next year's football World Cup in South Africa and a continuation of Rugby Union's autumn internationals.
The weekend started last night with England's cricketers narrowly beating South Africa in their 20/20 international - not a result I would have predicted but will put down to the effect of the weather! I watched Wales narrowly beat Samoa and to be honest felt that Wales were lucky to win in the end but it was a result I expected. Also in rugby union the French beat the Springboks, another result I would have gone for following the results the French achieved on their southern hemisphere tour in the summer. However, these matches have been played and now for the actual predictions.
I'll start with rugby league as it is the final of the four nations tonight and whilst my heart says go with England, I think the Aussies will be too strong and will go for them to win. In the union code my predictions are for England to beat Argentina but it will be close and I am concerned by the conveyor belt of injuries to England props at the moment. In Ireland last week's victors from Twickenham take on the six nations champions and again in a tight game I am going with the Aussies.
As I indicated earlier the main football action this weekend are the games to determine the last four qualifiers for South Africa next year. I was disappointed that teams were seeded to keep them apart and it does mean that perhaps we have been robbed of one or two countries who would in normal circumstances expecting to qualify not making it. My predictions are only for this weekend and not the overall outcome of the ties and I am starting with Russia to beat Slovenia and Portugal to beat Bosnia-Herzegovina. The two ties that are more difficult to forecast are the games in Dublin where Ireland host the runners-up from the last tournament, France and in Greece (the surprise 2004 European Champions) who host Ukraine. In both of these matches I am predicting a draws leaving it all to play for in the return legs next week.
My final prediction for the week is for the tennis in Paris where the semi-final between Nadal and Djokovic will probably produce the tournament winner. I am going for Nadal to triumph both today and in the final tomorrow.
So in summary my eight predictions are:
Four Nations Final
Australia to beat England at 1/5
Rugby Union Autumn Internationals
England to beat Argentina at 1/4
Australia to beat Ireland at 11/8
World Cup Football Play-offs
Russia to beat Slovenia at 4/11
Greece to draw with Ukraine at 9/4
Ireland to draw with France at 11/5
Portugal to beat Bosnia at 1/2
Paris Masters Tennis
Nadal to win tournament at 15/8
The weekend started last night with England's cricketers narrowly beating South Africa in their 20/20 international - not a result I would have predicted but will put down to the effect of the weather! I watched Wales narrowly beat Samoa and to be honest felt that Wales were lucky to win in the end but it was a result I expected. Also in rugby union the French beat the Springboks, another result I would have gone for following the results the French achieved on their southern hemisphere tour in the summer. However, these matches have been played and now for the actual predictions.
I'll start with rugby league as it is the final of the four nations tonight and whilst my heart says go with England, I think the Aussies will be too strong and will go for them to win. In the union code my predictions are for England to beat Argentina but it will be close and I am concerned by the conveyor belt of injuries to England props at the moment. In Ireland last week's victors from Twickenham take on the six nations champions and again in a tight game I am going with the Aussies.
As I indicated earlier the main football action this weekend are the games to determine the last four qualifiers for South Africa next year. I was disappointed that teams were seeded to keep them apart and it does mean that perhaps we have been robbed of one or two countries who would in normal circumstances expecting to qualify not making it. My predictions are only for this weekend and not the overall outcome of the ties and I am starting with Russia to beat Slovenia and Portugal to beat Bosnia-Herzegovina. The two ties that are more difficult to forecast are the games in Dublin where Ireland host the runners-up from the last tournament, France and in Greece (the surprise 2004 European Champions) who host Ukraine. In both of these matches I am predicting a draws leaving it all to play for in the return legs next week.
My final prediction for the week is for the tennis in Paris where the semi-final between Nadal and Djokovic will probably produce the tournament winner. I am going for Nadal to triumph both today and in the final tomorrow.
So in summary my eight predictions are:
Four Nations Final
Australia to beat England at 1/5
Rugby Union Autumn Internationals
England to beat Argentina at 1/4
Australia to beat Ireland at 11/8
World Cup Football Play-offs
Russia to beat Slovenia at 4/11
Greece to draw with Ukraine at 9/4
Ireland to draw with France at 11/5
Portugal to beat Bosnia at 1/2
Paris Masters Tennis
Nadal to win tournament at 15/8
An Average Week
Apologies once again for blogs being restricted to predictions at the moment but such are my time pressures since starting new job! It was a fairly average set of predictions last week with only four correct from nine, which equated to a loss of £1.00, meaning my accumulated losses now stand at £9.50.
Whereas in the last few weeks I have had some success with my football premiership predictions, last week was poor as I only correctly forecast that Aston Villa would beat Bolton and my three remaining football predictions were wrong.
In addition Valentino Rossi took his weekend fairly easy in the last Moto GP of the year and never looked like challenging for the win in either qualifying or during the race, but then there was no pressure and he did keep his team-mate behind him. Valencia did produce some success with Andy Murray winning his comeback tournament but the effort involved and a late finish have contributed to his early elimination from the Paris Masters this week.
My final predictions had been in both codes of rugby. England triumphed over New Zealand in the league code to book themselves in the four nations final against Australia today. Mixed success in union as the All Blacks kept up their unbeaten record in the Welsh principality but England failed to fire against the Wallabies and if Jonny Wilkinson hadn't played his first autumn international for seven years you wonder how much more the team may have beaten by.
Watch this space as this week's predictions coming up soon.
Whereas in the last few weeks I have had some success with my football premiership predictions, last week was poor as I only correctly forecast that Aston Villa would beat Bolton and my three remaining football predictions were wrong.
In addition Valentino Rossi took his weekend fairly easy in the last Moto GP of the year and never looked like challenging for the win in either qualifying or during the race, but then there was no pressure and he did keep his team-mate behind him. Valencia did produce some success with Andy Murray winning his comeback tournament but the effort involved and a late finish have contributed to his early elimination from the Paris Masters this week.
My final predictions had been in both codes of rugby. England triumphed over New Zealand in the league code to book themselves in the four nations final against Australia today. Mixed success in union as the All Blacks kept up their unbeaten record in the Welsh principality but England failed to fire against the Wallabies and if Jonny Wilkinson hadn't played his first autumn international for seven years you wonder how much more the team may have beaten by.
Watch this space as this week's predictions coming up soon.
Saturday, 7 November 2009
Autumn Internationals and Plenty More
Only nine predictions for this week encompasssing both rugby codes, premiership football, tennis and MotoGP.
It is the last GP of the season for the bikers and whilst Rossi has already been crowned champion again this season there will still be plenty of pride at stake in the race at Valencia. Yet again I am predicting the great man (Rossi) to win and continue to confirm his credentials as potentially the greatest rider ever to grace the sport.
There is also tennis going on in the same Spanish City and my prediction here is for an Andy Murray win to seal his comeback from his wrist injury.
Plenty of football this weekend with the first round of the FA Cup as well as plenty of Championship and Premiership football. I am not making a prediction on the big game, Chelsea versus Manchester United as I think it is too close to call. I do have four predictions and am going for home wins for Aston Villa against Bolton and Wigan who host Fulham. As for Blackburn versus Portsmouth and Hull against Stoke I am going for draws in these matches.'
The four nations Rugby League continues this weekend and I am going for an England win against New Zealand. In my code of Union the Autumn internationals get under way today and my predictions are for the All Blacks to retain their 56 year unbeaten record against Wales but I'm expecting a cracking match. At Twickenham I am going with the home side despite the revamped team because of injury as a certain talisman is back - Jonny Wilkinson.
In summary the predictions are:
Moto GP
Rossi to win at 4/1
ATP Tennis in Valencia
Murray to win at 6/5
Premiership Football
Aston Villa to beat Bolton at 4/5
Wigan to beat Fulham at 11/8
Blackburn and Portsmouth to draw at 5/2
Hull and Stoke to draw at 23/10
Rugby League
England to beat New Zealand at 2/1
Rugby Union
New Zealand to beat Wales at 1/4
England to beat Australia at 2/1
It is the last GP of the season for the bikers and whilst Rossi has already been crowned champion again this season there will still be plenty of pride at stake in the race at Valencia. Yet again I am predicting the great man (Rossi) to win and continue to confirm his credentials as potentially the greatest rider ever to grace the sport.
There is also tennis going on in the same Spanish City and my prediction here is for an Andy Murray win to seal his comeback from his wrist injury.
Plenty of football this weekend with the first round of the FA Cup as well as plenty of Championship and Premiership football. I am not making a prediction on the big game, Chelsea versus Manchester United as I think it is too close to call. I do have four predictions and am going for home wins for Aston Villa against Bolton and Wigan who host Fulham. As for Blackburn versus Portsmouth and Hull against Stoke I am going for draws in these matches.'
The four nations Rugby League continues this weekend and I am going for an England win against New Zealand. In my code of Union the Autumn internationals get under way today and my predictions are for the All Blacks to retain their 56 year unbeaten record against Wales but I'm expecting a cracking match. At Twickenham I am going with the home side despite the revamped team because of injury as a certain talisman is back - Jonny Wilkinson.
In summary the predictions are:
Moto GP
Rossi to win at 4/1
ATP Tennis in Valencia
Murray to win at 6/5
Premiership Football
Aston Villa to beat Bolton at 4/5
Wigan to beat Fulham at 11/8
Blackburn and Portsmouth to draw at 5/2
Hull and Stoke to draw at 23/10
Rugby League
England to beat New Zealand at 2/1
Rugby Union
New Zealand to beat Wales at 1/4
England to beat Australia at 2/1
Almost Good
Last week I was correct with seven out of ten predictions leading to a £4.50 profit and reducing overall losses to £8.50. My successes were in rugby union where both predictions were correct, 100% record in rugby league and three out of four in last week's premiership action. For about the only time this year my forecast of a podium position for Jenson Button also came true and only sport I failed in was my prediction of Cabrera to win the Golf World Matchplay title.
Hope to follow with more predictions for this week so watch this space.
Hope to follow with more predictions for this week so watch this space.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)