SportsFilter: Sports Community Weblog

Thursday, May 08, 2008

Wigan coach and former Man U captain Bruce vows 100% effort against former boss Ferguson. The final games in the EPL will be played this Sunday. Chelsea and Man U are tied on points at the top of the league, with Man U holding a 17-goal advantage over Chelsea on goal difference. However, if Chelsea win, and Man U have anything less than a win against Wigan (who won the former League and European Cup honors with Man U), it will be the Blues taking the championship away from the current holders. All this, ahead of a Champions League final between Chelsea and Man U. It's all Man U's to lose. And it's happened before, exactly 40 years ago.

Comments

Oops. Correction: ... if Chelsea win, and Man U have anything less than a win against Wigan (who won the former League and European Cup honors with Man U) ... should read: ... if Chelsea win, and Man U have anything less than a win against Wigan (whose coach Steve Bruce won the Premier League plus domestic and Euro cup honors with Man U) ...

If this was Serie A, I might be concerned about some funny business, but I expect Wigan to give it their all.

Wigan's last few results have made them safe. This would have been even better game had they been fighting to avoid the drop.

Live on Sky Sports 1. What do you mean what's Sky Sports 1? My lot are struggling to avoid the drop. Even a win might not be enough. Looks like we're on our way back down to the Fizzypop League again. No one to blame but ourselves though.

Every spot in the EPL table gets about 500,000 pounds prize money (2004-2006 numbers were the earliest I could find) more than the next spot below it. Wigan has some financial incentive there, if not pride and form, working in their favor, too.

In Spain there has actually been a longstanding tradition of paying crappy teams with no other incentive, to win down the stretch against your rival. It is kind of a loophole, seeing as you don't pay a team to lose, but the newspapers in Spain tend to discuss it each year and debate whether it is a practice that should be cracked down upon or not.

Just before Chelsea played Everton, a friend pointed out that the price of 10/1 being offered on them to nick the title from United seemed a bit premature. I agreed and took them for 20. As a Liverpool fan, I despise them both, but just for today "Come on, Chelsea!"

Arse.

I had 20 Australian on Derby to win, all up Portsmouth to win. You'd think after this season that I'd have learned my lesson. Still, having money at stake made the final day interesting. /that was a joke, Brum, Reading and Fulham fans.

Comments are closed for this entry.