The Coca-Cola Football League 2008/2009

With the pre-season and transfers in full swing I thought it might be worth starting a new thread

as I type Cardiff are closing in on signing Marcus Bent from Charlton, whilst Freddy Eastwood has gone to Coventry.

The leagues will consist next year of:

Championship
Barnsley
Birmingham City
Blackpool
Bristol City
Burnley
Cardiff City
Charlton Athletic
Coventry City
Crystal Palace
Derby County
Doncaster Rovers
Ipswich Town
Norwich City
Nottingham Forest
Plymouth Argyle
Preston North End
Queens Park Rangers
Reading
Sheffield United
Sheffield Wednesday
Southampton
Swansea City
Watford
Wolverhampton

This years Championship seems certain to be one of the most competitive for years. Most of the teams in it would claim to being "Premiership Clubs" and justifiably so, with many of them having had Premiership experience very recently or having been in the Premiership less recently but for a significant length of time. Not only that, the teams that perhaps wouldn't be able to make such a claim such as Burnley Cardiff and Plymouth have all shown a great deal of ambition in recent times, come close to making the playoffs and following the example of teams such as Hull City and Stoke, can truly set their sights on Promotion as a realistic target. What will the story be with QPR? Can money truly buy you success at Championship level and how will they cope with the favourites tag for the division. As for the promoted sides, surely they won't be exempt from seeing a second successive promotion as achievable, especially following Bristol City's near miss last season.

League 1
Brighton & Hove Albion
Bristol Rovers
Carlisle United
Cheltenham Town
Colchester United
Crewe Alexandra
Hartlepool United
Hereford United
Huddersfield Town
Leeds United
Leicester City
Leyton Orient
Millwall
Milton Keynes Dons
Northampton Town
Oldham Athletic
Peterborough United
Scunthorpe United
Southend United
Stockport County
Swindon Town
Tranmere Rovers
Walsall
Yeovil Town

League 1 seems like a fairly level playing field, until you see the two big guns of the division Leeds and Leicester, but will they walz to a top 2 finish? Who knows, certainly the mass exodus at Leicester coupled with the fact that Mandaric will sack any manager who goes 5 games without winning is likely to hold them back. Leeds would have to be firm favourites for me for the title this season.

League 2
Accrington Stanley
Aldershot Town
Barnet
Bournemouth
Bradford City
Brentford
Bury
Chester City
Chesterfield
Dagenham & Redbridge
Darlington
Exeter City
Gillingham
Grimsby Town
Lincoln City
Luton Town
Macclesfield Town
Morecambe
Notts County
Port Vale
Rochdale
Rotherham United
Shrewsbury Town
Wycombe Wanderers

...and finally League 2, the big story here is the duel between Rotherham, Bournemouth (both on -15) and of course Luton (on -30) with only two relegation places to be filled. Aside from them, the rest of the division is probably anyones guess.

I think Ivan Sproule will take the league by storm

And David Murphy will be the Championships best LB

As for League One, I'd like to see Leeds get relegated

Kev Phillips will score lots again and Brum will be up there, especially if they hold on to Jerome, Mcsheffrey and Mcfadden.

I also think both Swansea and Forest will do pretty well and could be in and around the play-offs.

The league is very competetive and hard to predict, especially at this point when you have teams like Reading who havnt bought or sold many players but will do in the coming month.

Calidad wrote:And David Murphy will be the Championships best LB

He could've been good for us if he'd actually ever got a game, unlucky for him that Queudrue was about 100 times better than him back then..strange that he's now considered the better player.

Iwelumo is off to Wolves it seems whilst Clinton Morrison is going to leave Crystal Palace on a free as Mark Hudson did, Ben Watson will also be leaving but for a fee and has made public his desire to leave. QPR and Birmingham are the main two interested.

borocooper wrote:

Calidad wrote:And David Murphy will be the Championships best LB

He could've been good for us if he'd actually ever got a game, unlucky for him that Queudrue was about 100 times better than him back then..strange that he's now considered the better player.

It was part in jest really...but that said, I am a fan of Murphy. Good first touch, good delivery, reasonably solid defensively. His achilles heel is his lack of pace.

Another player to watch out for is Kevin McDonald who has signed for Burnley from Dundee. Have only seen him a couple of times, but he impressed. Would have loved to see him at Hibs.

Calidad wrote:

borocooper wrote:

Calidad wrote:And David Murphy will be the Championships best LB

He could've been good for us if he'd actually ever got a game, unlucky for him that Queudrue was about 100 times better than him back then..strange that he's now considered the better player.

It was part in jest really...but that said, I am a fan of Murphy. Good first touch, good delivery, reasonably solid defensively. His achilles heel is his lack of pace.

Another player to watch out for is Kevin McDonald who has signed for Burnley from Dundee. Have only seen him a couple of times, but he impressed. Would have loved to see him at Hibs.

Yeah really good player that should do well next season. Burnley will do well next season, they just need a couple more players on top of Eagles (if they sign him) and they could well make the playoffs.

Its early on, but f@ck it, why not have a go at a prediction? - the championships never predictable at the best of times so its practically just as logical to do one now as to do it on August 8th.

1. Reading - Good manager + plenty of money + enough quality players at this level
2. Birmingham - ditto

3. Ipswich - fair amount of cash to throw about + a decent team anyway with a great home record
4. Sheffield United - Quality shined through at the end of last season, expect it to kick in earlier in this
5. Watford - still a good team with a good manager at this level
6. QPR- money can't buy you instant success, especially not in the championship, but I think QPR will be happy with a play-off finish

7. Charlton - still not good enough for promotion
8. Norwich - an improvement, but not up to play-off standard
9. Wolverhampton - again, they'll probably give it a good go, but they so often come up short
10. Nottingham Forest - good side, good new strike force, should make it v. comfortably past survival
11. Burnley - very average squad, good enough to avoid relegation, but not good enough to excede mid-table
12. Derby - it takes a lot to go from being regular losers to regular winners instantly, especially with an average squad.
13. Crystal Palace - losses of the best defender, midfielder and striker will hurt Palace, wont excede mid-table.
14. Cardiff - very average squad, but good enough to avoid relegation.
15. Swansea - Good enough squad + element of suprise should see them to comfortably avoid relegation.
16. Southampton - Better than last season, more likely to do well at the start then fade, but wont finish near the playoffs
17. Sheffield Wednesday - ditto.
18. Bristol City - element of suprise + a fair few players gone, possibly a relegation run in to contend with
19. Coventry - poor squad but one that should stay up
20. Preston North End - ditto
21. Barnsley - ditto

22. Plymouth - not much of a squad left for the Pilgrims, i predict the worst.
23. Doncaster - May do ok to start with but won't have enough to stay up.
24. Blackpool - stayed up last season due to luck+suprise factor, expect them to be found out this season.

Come on you Bulls! Come on Hereford Utd!

Go Wolves

I like Hereford Utd cause its actually the only english footy stadium I've been to