Opening day fixtures: Arsenal v Leicester City Brighton and Hove Albion v Manchester City Chelsea v Burnley Crystal Palace v Huddersfield Town Everton v Stoke City Manchester United v West Ham United Newcastle United v Tottenham Hotspur Southampton v Swansea City Watford v Liverpool West Bromwich Albion v Bournemouth Final day fixtures: Burnley v Bournemouth Crystal Palace v West Bromwich Albion Huddersfield Town v Arsenal Liverpool v Brighton and Hove Albion Manchester United v Watford Newcastle United v Chelsea Southampton v Manchester City Swansea City v Stoke City Tottenham Hotspur v Leicester City West Ham United v Everton
Newcastle away.....draw Chelsea at home(Wembley) week after...i just dont know how we are going to react to playing there
Quite a few tricky back to back fixtures but no single month or period that stands out as unusually tough. Seems to be a nice balance throughout of 'hard' and 'easy' games. Our last 4 games are relatively easy and likely to be against teams with little to play for (Watford, Brighton, WBA and Leicester).
With Chelsea being our second game, we need to have our business done early this year and have a settled squad so we can hit the ground running. We've dropped too many points early on in recent seasons. Gotta give ourselves the best chance of a strong start.
Interestingly, they'll be substantially changed from the season just ended. Hazard will still be out injured and Costa should be gone. Possible moves suggested for Matic, Fabregas and Williian. Could be a decent time to play them if we make a faster start than in the last 2 seasons. This time out we cured any late season burn out but were too far behind by December.
What the **** is the point of having someone plan these fixtures if they can't be bothered to check something like that? Hope we can just swap our Burnley home and away fixtures so we don't get a pile up. Shame we couldn't start at home for once now we're done at WHL for the time being. Also, Chelsea are going to have played more games at Wembley this season when we play them Pleased we're at home on Boxing Day. Wembley should be quite easy for me to get to, getting to WHL with hardly any transport is always a pain in the arse for me.
So what were they doing when they were compiling this fixture list, then? Did they just ask Sky what they wanted, then a few of their favourite teams and then tell everyone else to **** off? Utterly amateurish. I'm sick of this crap every year, to be honest. I shouldn't be able to predict our opening game. It's a 2.6% chance, I think. Poor old Huddersfield end the season with Chelsea (A), Everton (H), City (A) and Arsenal (H), so they could be very screwed. If they're already down though, then a bunch of the top sides get a free run.
Unlikely straight swap for Burnley as that would give us 3 home games in a row over Christmas . Would be nice though .
If (and it is a big if) we can hit the ground running then facing the Chavs that soon is good. They will have a few key new faces to settle in and I dont see us fundamentally being that different from the side that finished the season so strongly! If it was at WHL I'd be delighetd, but the 'Wembley' factor is just such an unknown quantity. However....... if by any chance we are there or there abouts at the business end of the season I don't think we could have asked for a better run in. COYS!!!!!
When do tickets go on sale for the Chelsea game? I'm on annual leave and should be staying close to London so thats a game I could attend.
That fixture list is RDBD approved. With some real WUM mayhem potential at the Ginger tiddler and Deirdre with the Chelsky fixture.
