Premier League 2016/2017 Predictions

Not relevant to this competition, but my money is on Phil Brown at Southend.

 

Rafa's not looking too secure

 

Top 6: Man City, Man Utd, Chelsea, Tottenham, Liverpool, Everton
Relegation: West Brom, Watford, Wet Spam
FA Cup: Tottenham (its well overdue)
League Cup: Chelsea
Top Scorer: Aguero.
P.O.T.S: De Bruyne.
Y.P.O.T.S: Inheachu
Surprise team of the season: Everton
Signing of the season: Jansen
Champions League: PSG.
Europa League: Sevilla.
Manager of the season: Guardiola

 

Anybody want to change their prediction yet?

 

Probably take Southampton out of relegation places and put Stoke in. But that's all.

 

So nobody predicted the England manager would be off before any Premier League manager?

 

Can see the league pretty much splitting into 3 from here :

Spurs, city, united, goons, chavs, everton, mousers

southampton, leicester, watford, palace, bournemouth, west brom

Burnley, hull, middlesborough, west ham, stoke, sunderland, swansea

 

I agree that the top 6 is looking much more predictable than last season. Looks as though Leicester were a very bright flash in a very small pan.

But those bottom two groups are far harder to call. West Ham, Stoke and new look American Swansea all have the capacity to our good runs together, whilst Leicester are in freefall and Watford or Palace always run the risk of imploding as they did last season.

Sunderland, Hull and Boro are gone as far as I can see. Three truly abysmal teams lacking quality everywhere.

 

I'll give odds of 100,000/1 on Leicester retaining their title if anyone's interested?

Minimum stake £1,000

 

You can put the 100 mill down on the table, yeah ?

 

I'd even consider sticking Leicester in that bottom pot. They're near enough looking back to being a side that scraped relegation two seasons ago and I think the CL is going to prove very challenging for them to manage, they've had a great start in it but having that and the Prem with what I'd consider a small and somewhat average squad, it's extremely tough. The loss of Kante has hit them harder than I think their fans and team expected, while Vardy and Mahrez are naturally being taken much more seriously by opposition defences and thus far they've struggled to overcome that added pressure.

 

They've had quite a tough fixtures list, though. The extra games are probably hurting them, but they've played a lot of the stronger teams.
Arsenal, Liverpool, Man Utd and Chelsea (twice) will all be looking for a Champions League spot.
Southampton are also a very decent side this season. They did lose to Hull, but they beat the other sides that you'd expect them to.

I agree that they've missed Kante badly and their replacements haven't worked out for them, so far.
They've gone to bits on set-pieces too and that could cost them badly against some sides that aren't that good.

 

Yeah granted their fixtures haven't been easy for the most part but the manner of some of their losses has been poor. They were battered comfortably by Chelsea, Liverpool and thus far an average looking Utd. When considering last season, where they only lost I think 3 or 4 times throughout the whole campaign, it was only the Arsenal game that they took a beating and in fairness, it was a decent end to end match in which on that occasion, Leicester weren't the more clinical ones.

I feel like they've had a mare in general though, losing Kante has turned them from an extremely solid defensive unit to an average one such was his quality, while their replacement for him has made no impact and their summer business in general was poor by the standards of a team looking to defend their title. Their two big money signings were from leagues outside of the European top five while the others seem to have come in as back ups. I get that maybe Ranieri wanted to be loyal to the guys that won him the league but there are too many in Leicester's XI that just aren't good enough, it worked well last season as they were underestimated and rode the wave but it's a different ball game this time around.

 

If we weren't so ****ing dreadful at defending corners we'd probably be in a Europa League spot right now.

The only real disappointments (from a results perspective) so far have been Hull away and Southampton at home. The papers have been full of people saying things like "We've been proven right". But I'd say that we've been about where we thought we'd be. Fixture list has been a blessing in disguise. We're able to concentrate on the Champions League when we've got tough away games prior to them and once we've qualified we'll be able to have a right good go at our favourable November/December fixtures quietly.

We're 4 points off where we were this time last season. It's well early days yet and a top ten finish is still well within our reach. Probably even top 8.

 

They have had a blessed CL group.
No excuses for not being able to beat at least two of their group with ease and still
be up for PL fixtures the following weekend. They have had to play 3 games in 7
days once (big deal - Spurs have already done it twice) .

The loss of one player (Kante) has shattered them, and the refs edicts on Huth-ball
in the penalty box has taken its toll. And as for the attackingest football ... best not
mention the Chelsky game eh.

 

Agree it's early days but I think your poor (well, in my opinion poor) transfer window is going to cost you any top 8 spot. For a start you've added no proven-Prem quality players, we at Spurs know far too well how risky that is when we signed the "Magnificent Seven" after selling Bale, only two of them now remain.

Losing Kante was huge and you haven't replaced him with adequate quality, in fact in general I don't think you've added legitimate quality with perhaps the exception of your £28m man, Slimani.

Mendy is an unknown and isn't anywhere near Kante's level, granted the latter was also an unknown when coming to England but he proved himself instantly and became arguably the best DM in the Prem, so to replace him with an unknown who thus far I don't even think has gotten into the team regularly was poor decision making, should've gone for someone of a much higher pedigree.

Hernandez is a really lack-of-ambition signing, a free transfer from a mid-table Spanish club... Really? That's what you'd expect Watford/ West Brom/ Palace to go for, not the defending champions.

Imports from the Russian league have often been poor, Arshavin & Pav enjoyed moderate success but ultimately neither kept their positions, Jo was **** at City, Pogrebnyak at Reading was Championship calibre at best and I'm sure more can be added to that list, thus far Musa is looking likely (albeit as we've both said, it's early doors).

I also think you needed to improve on a number of players, or at the very least add true quality to compete for their positions. Ask yourself honestly, does Simpson, Morgan (mainly due to age rather than skill, I do like him), King, Drinkwater (maybe harsh but there's a bunch of quality CM's), Albrighton and Okazaki make any top 6 squad? They certainly wouldn't make first XI's. I get Ranieri and your board perhaps wanted to remain loyal to the players that had just won the Prem but any man and his dog outside of Leicester City could tell you that these sort of guys aren't the type to remain consistent season upon season, they're just not good enough.

 

Mendy is an interesting one. We wanted him over Kante last season. He's injured and hasn't had a chance to prove himself yet.

Musa, in my opinion, is a shocking player. Not seen anything from him that's impressed me yet. Really hope he turns it around.

Hernandez has looked superb in Europe but shaky in the League. He's a weird one, he's too slow to be a right back but not big enough/imposing enough to be a centre half in this league. I personally like him though.

Slimani is the real deal. He's been a superb signing.

Zieler has upped Kasper's game significantly. Kasper has always needed another keeper to keep him on his toes. Kasper's last two or three performances have been brilliant.

We should have done better in the summer. I'd rate our window at a 6/10. We really should have pushed the boat out for Andre Silva (we apparently are in January).

 

Yeah the school of Russian strikers/ Russian imports have often let down those in the Prem.

I've always rated Schmeichel to be fair, even when years back he and Hart were competing for the Man City number one shirt, I thought he was the better of the two. Certainly is his father's Son.

Silva could be a class act but again, it's another import, do you not think a bit of Prem experience is vital? Quite surprised we had easy pickings of Wanyama, think he'd have been a perfect replacement for Kante for you guys, £11m for him is one of our best bits of business in a long while and shamefully I was somewhat dubious at his initial signing due to his red card plagued season last year.

 

I'd put Leicester in 6th and bump Liverpool and Arsenal up one. Still can't see Chelsea challenging for the top 4 and doubt United will be in the title race so I'm sticking with the rest. At the bottom I'd only stick with my choice of Hull to finish bottom, I'd probably swap Watford and Palace for Boro and Swansea.

 

I'd currently change Pool to go into fourth and Everton into fifth, pushing Utd & Chelsea into 6th and 7th. Would also switch West Brom out for Sunderland in the relegation spots.