All new articles are now appearing in the new blog entitled 2012-13 and there will be no further updates here although all the older content from previous posts is still right here and has not been deleted.

Euro 2012 had begun and we got together on the second day of the tournament to make some predictions for some of the results and to predict the final four and eventual winner. I actually made my predictions before the second day action got under way whereas both George and Gino did there's knowing that Holland had lost in their opening match. Never the less - Gino has still predicted the Dutch to be one of his final four so fair play to him for that.
Both Gino and I were obviously impressed by the Russians and it also noticeable that none of us have gone for Spain to reach the semi-finals - I even had said that I don't think that they will even get out of their group! Of the three of us it is George that has selected England amazingly but he has done this in the past (I think it puts a curse on us!)
Even though I had explained a few things to the boys George still made the error that I was trying to avoid as he originally had selected Spain in his final four but after I explained it again he changed it to Poland.
The reason for this (just in case you are not aware) is that George's original prediction would have been impossible as he would have had three nations coming from either groups C or D with only one from either A or B and the format of the competition means that there must be two nations from either side of the draw reaching the semi-finals.
We did make some predictions on this tournament back in January and that podcast is on our Facebook fan page. It is also interesting to note that this time around the predictions were made more with the head than the heart as initially both George and Gino had Italy winning the cup (not to say that might still happen of course) but then again I believe with every tournament before it has begun they have had Italy winning it!

All the results are now in for May and we have a tie! George and I both scored 11 points with Gino scoring 9. It must be mentioned that Gino was the only one to correctly predict the relegated teams from the Premier League. The only results that we all completely failed on were Udinese taking the Serie A Champions League spot (we had all gone for Napoli) and Fernando Alonso leading the F1 Championship - we had all gone for Vettel. Between us we all predicted the correct play-off winners with Gino getting West Ham, both George and Gino getting Huddersfield and George getting Crewe. I was the only one that saw York winning the Conference match. Perhaps the most interesting one was predicting which Premier League manager would be the next to either be sacked or resign. George and Gino were both right with Alex McLeish and I had said Kenny Dalglish - and he was gone just 24 hours later!

As the regular season is just about to end, for May we have made a series of broader predictions. We made these on the night that we recorded Podcast #15 so before any of them were decided. In fact with some we did not even know for sure which teams would be automatically promoted, going into or making the play-offs. The options shown are obviously not all of the options in some of the cases. 2 points will be awarded for each correct outcome and with some of the questions posed there are two possibilities (eg - the relegation from the Premier League and the La Liga Champions League spots) hence we have all given two answers. It was also amazing that when we were selecting our choices for the Premier League Champions League spots that we had already assumed that Arsenal were virtually there. We also did not bank on Newcastle destroying Chelsea leaving them realistically with the only way of qualifying via winning this seasons Champions League - that leaves George in a little bit of a quandary as he has backed Bayern to win the cup yet backed Chelsea to still qualify. 

We have a new champion for April with George taking top spot after a solid second half of the month. There were just a handful of points between all three of us going into the last two games that have just been played tonight as I write this which we sat and watched together. Gino went a little crazy when Newcastle scored a second at Chelsea in the 94th minute to deny a 3 point bonus; however it would still not have been enough to catch this months champion.
This weeks scores:- George 7, Gino 3, Graham 3 (we all did badly this week!)
APRIL'S FINAL TABLE:- George 38, Graham 33, Gino 31

With the regular season coming to a close, for May we are going to do something a little bit different and that next post with our predictions will be posted here very soon.

Well it is now neck and neck between all three of us as we give our final set of predictions for April (I know - some of these just run into the beginning of May!). If Gino's prediction of a 5-1 win for Manchester City next Monday night comes true he deserves to win it! 

These results from the last seven days are a little bit difficult for me to take! Having had a commanding lead it has now virtually vanished and perhaps I should have known better - Gino had a big lead in March and it evaporated right at the end and it was me coming from nowhere to win. This time it could be the other way around as Gino has had a sensational week with his predictions. So much so that when we met up on Tuesday night and he told me that he had had a little flutter at the weekend he went a little crazy when I told him how well he had actually done with these predictions (as he had only done wins and not score-lines). He even told me that he had felt a little shake in his wrist which he claims was a sign of something telling him that he had missed doing something - he did not even have West Brom to win at Liverpool as he did below here!  This weeks scores:- Gino 16, George 12, Graham 5. 
Overall scores with the month:- George 31, Graham 30, Gino 28.

I could not get this up as soon as I would have liked as I had to wait for Gino's predictions for the second legs of the Champions League matches as none of us wanted to make a guess before the first leg matches had been played. The opening fixtures of this weeks predictions have already been played and I see Gino has hit a double bonus with his beloved QPR already! But here are the predictions for the rest of the week.

I guess the law of averages means that sooner or later we are all going to have shocking weeks. For me - it was the worst one I have had since we started making weekly predictions. Both FA Cup semi-finals saw all three of us blown out  as we also were with Wigan's win at Arsenal. If we had made the Champions League predictions after the FA Cup semi-finals we may have thought differently about Chelsea and in fact on podcast 13 I am actually heard saying that. We also made some predictions for the Grand National and George managed to get third and I got fourth. When we were selecting our horses we ran through the list of runners to produce a shortlist and mine had four on it - the one I cut out was Neptune Collonges! Typical - last year I got my first winner ever and this year so close yet so far. Together with the bonus points from the National this weeks scores were:- George 8, Graham 4, Gino 3. The overall scores now for April are:- Graham 25, George 19, Gino 12.

Gino's love-in with QPR appears to be set to continue (he even wore a blue & white hooped shirt on Weds night!) This week we are doing a special as we have also selected 3 horses each for this weekends Grand National. If we happen pick any horses that finish in the top 4 then any horse that does so will give us bonus points towards the April league table. Points will be awarded as follows:- 5pts = 1st Place  3pts = 2nd Place  2pts = 3rd Place  1pt = 4th Place.