lol i'll make Portland Timbers my US team whoever the [censored] they are! yeah, i go to most games

nice

The Portland Timbers play in the USL Div 1, which is similar in stature to the Championship. MLS is the US's top flight. However, the quality of USL Div 1 is most likely more akin to league 1. The Timbers recently beat Preston North End in a friendly 2-1, so take that for what its worth. Portland is also currently in first in the USL-1 ahead of bitter rival Seattle.

Sorry for the tangent.

Who do people think will be the highest impact newcomers this year? Last year's crop included Sheva, Ballack, Julio Baptista, McCarthy, Berbatov, Martins, Kuyt, etc.. Some did very well, some blew.

Candidates: Torres (Pool), Da Silva (Arsenal), Roque Santa Cruz (Blackburn), Nani (Man U), David Nugent (Pompey), Malouda (Chelsea), Bianchi (Man City) and others.

KJS

Rumors are flying that Arjen Robben will be going to Real Madrid pretty soon. Not really that big a loss since Chelsea now have Malouda and a healthy Joe Cole.

I am not sure if this has been discussed already.

We really should have a weekly premiership thread. I am not a forum regular but I come during the EPL season to read the discussion. The thread gets a lot of traffic, why make it such a long unmanageable mess?

about 1/4 of the way through the season it is basically only 4 or 5 people posting. Weekly seems to clunky IMO.

KJS, my votes would go for Eduardo, Malouda, and probably Hargreaves. I don't know how successful Nugent will be, but we will see. As for last year, it had to be Berbatov.

And the thing about the EPL is that the games are pretty much weekly anyways, so all discussion about last week's games are all easy to find. This isn't the NBA, with 30+ teams playing 3 games a week.

Its always impossible to say although I expect some of the blowing players from last year should make a much bigger impact this year.

Think pool will take it this year for some reason

Hargreaves should have a good year this year, but I really think that Nani could be a real revelation. Granted, it's extremely hard to base much of anything off of the pre-season meaningless matches, but he really looks like the real deal and should fill in great as Giggs' replacement in the next few years.

as far as nugent, I think he'll be great for pompey. Will he score 20 this year, that I can't say, but this is a guy with serious talent that could find a great pairing for england with Rooney(and hopefully in the future at ManU ). There is a reason he cost 7m GBP not having spent a single season in the top flight. I think we'll also be hearing the same kind of stuff about Billy Sharp at S****horpe very soon too. Back to Nugent, if you haven't seen him play, get ready to just giggle in delight at some of the great stuff he is capable of doing

How much will Voronin likely play for Liverpool? How did he do in preseason matches?

he had a very good pre season and will hopefully play alot.

scored 2 in his 1st game http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=g0bnEkbR-l0

fwiw

According to my TV, FSC's schedule for Sat. is Man City vs. West Ham, Liverpool vs. Villa, and on tape-delay Portsmouth vs. Derby

also FWIW, Sunday Arsenal v. Fulham is now on TV live. 7AM EST.

I'm sure a lot of people will agree that how will Torres and Da Silva do will go a long way to determining whether Arse or Pool does better this season.

Also, I'm thinking with Ledley King gone for a while, will Younes Kaboul be able to anchor a half-decent defense for Spurs? If not, there's no way they're cracking the top four... though Gareth Bale should be solid at fullback.

Am I the only one who completely missed the whole Torres to Liverpool thing?

GLORY GLORY LEEDS UNITED!!

Check www.Soccertv.com to see full schedules. Unfortunately, the guy who runs it is infamous in poker circles as the guy who represents Jerry Yang. He's selling soccertv.com and who knows if it will be updated.

But for now, it is still up.
Setanta USA is showing
Sat 7:40 EDT: Sunderland v. Spurs
Sat 9:55 EDT: Bolton v. Newcastle
Sat 2:30p EDT: Everton v. Wigan (Delay)

Sun 8:25 EDT: Chelsea v. Birmingham

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

We all hate leeds scum, we all hate leeds scum

leeds getting relegated to league one was the funniest thing since leeds got relegated from the premiership.
plus they're already -15 pts for next season so they're [censored] for that as well.
so sad

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA, Leeds loses their appeal on the points deduction. watch them fall down into the 4th tier. may they rot in hell

anyone else listen to the World Soccer Daily podcast on itunes? Hilarious stuff. Even better than the fox football fone in.

I might as well not sleep saturday night. Come on you Gunners!!!!!

[censored] it is on at 4am for me. I am recording it, but man, I HAVE to watch it live.

Cant wait for Champions League and all the big leagues to start. Last year I said that Chelsea was gonna win it by at least 10 points.
This season I think if they don't have any serious injuries they are gonna win it very early.