It is just possible that maybe this predictions malarkey is not as easy as it might at first seem if the first week’s attempt is anything to go by. Naturally, we both did better than the luckless Lawro but that really isn’t such a proud boast is it? We have to believe that our indifferent performance was a down to an interrupted pre-season causing a lack of match fitness and that we will be far sharper in the coming weeks.
Below is the current state of play based on our own scoring system of 1 point for the correct result plus 2 bonus points for the correct score. As you can see we all got at least half the games completely wrong although Rich has managed to sneak into an early one point lead
| Lawro | Geoff | Rich | Actual | Lawro | Geoff | Rich | |
| Hull v Leicester | 0-2 | 1-2 | 1-2 | 2-1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Burnley v Swansea | 1-1 | 2-1 | 1-1 | 0-1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Crystal Palace v West Brom | 2-1 | 3-1 | 2-1 | 0-1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Everton v Tottenham | 1-1 | 0-2 | 1-1 | 1-1 | 3 | 0 | 3 |
| Middlesbrough v Stoke | 1-0 | 1-1 | 0-0 | 1-1 | 0 | 3 | 1 |
| Southampton v Watford | 2-1 | 1-0 | 2-0 | 1-1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Man City v Sunderland | 2-0 | 4-0 | 3-0 | 2-1 | 1 | 1 | 1 |
| Bournemouth v Man Utd | 0-2 | 1-3 | 0-2 | 1-3 | 1 | 3 | 1 |
| Arsenal v Liverpool | 1-1 | 2-2 | 1-1 | 3-4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Chelsea v West Ham | 2-0 | 2-0 | 2-1 | 2-1 | 1 | 1 | 3 |
| 6 | 8 | 9 |
New TV scheduling means that the weekend starts here on a Friday evening this week with the Zlatan circus at Old Trafford and ends on Sunday with the Hammers hoping to find 11 fit players to put out against Eddie Howe’s Bournemouth. Worryingly, all three of us are forecasting a home win to christen the league debut at the Olympic/ Tesco/ London stadium.
| Lawro | Rich | Geoff | ||
| Friday 19th August | Man Utd V Southampton | 2-0 | 2-1 | 2-1 |
| Saturday 20th August | Stoke V Man City | 1-2 | 0-1 | 0-2 |
| Burnley V Liverpool | 0-2 | 1-3 | 1-1 | |
| Swansea V Hull | 2-1 | 2-0 | 0-0 | |
| Tottenham V Crystal Palace | 2-0 | 2-0 | 3-0 | |
| Watford V Chelsea | 0-2 | 1-2 | 1-1 | |
| West Brom V Everton | 1-1 | 1-1 | 0-1 | |
| Leicester V Arsenal | 1-1 | 2-2 | 1-3 | |
| Sunday 21st August | Sunderland V Middlesbrough | 1-1 | 1-1 | 1-0 |
| West Ham V Bournemouth | 2-1 | 3-1 | 3-1 |
I stick to a number of personal rules when I am betting.
And of course nobody did bag the £50 million. The odds of correctly forecasting 20 different clubs to finish in a particular order is, according to my calculations, somewhere between 2 and 3 million million millions to one. That’s 18 noughts. I’d call it trillions but that’s not strictly correct. Even if you thought that the top six were cast in stone, and the 14 other clubs had no chance of coming out on top, then perming the favoured six in any order followed by the remaining 14 in every combination would still result in around 63 million millions to one.
Under The Hammers 