I have followed English football since I was in secondary school. I was even in Bolton, England. The closest I got to a football match was shopping at Tesco under the Reebok Stadium. My daughter Elaine does not follow football. She asks the odd question and get answers from me (Arsenal fan), Joshua (Chelsea fan), and Matthew(Liverpool fan). Yet she has entered the Old Trafford of the Manchester United
Football Club and watched a football match where the host played West Ham Utd. You can call this grace! The person who worked got nothing; the one who was not even looking experienced the Old Trafford atmosphere. I sent her a terse message on her wall in her Facebook, “Dear, if you decide to become a Man Utd fan, don’t bother to come home. Love, Dad”


My prediction has gone awry. In August my prediction of the English Premier League 09/10 was: first, Chelsea; second, Liverpool; third, Manchester United; and fourth, Arsenal.
I have been an Arsenal fan for ten years now. But it was not so before. When I was in Swiss Cottage Secondary School, I was a Derby County fan and then a Nottingham Forest fan. I liked manager Brian Clough and followed wherever he went except for his Leeds blip. He brought the best out of his teams on a tight budget and that could only mean he was a genius.
them to play together like a premier orchestra. He transformed boring Arsenal into exciting Arsenal. That converted me into a fan. This is the only British team that plays with a Brazilian attacking flair. They are entertaining, and I hate it so it when they play against leg-kicking, anti-football teams. Yesterday, Arsene Wenger became the longest serving manager in Arsenal’s history and I hope he continues with the club till death do them part. This is unrealistic. Succession would be a real problem. They have to find someone with the same philosophy of football. It could be someone from the “Invincibles” team like Henri Thierry. Or Tony Adams. As long as the baton exchange takes place without incident. I really wish Arsenal well in the post-Arsene era.
So its official. Usain Bolt is the fastest man in the world having just broken the world record for 100m at 9.58 seconds. The second fastest man in the world is Cristiano Ronaldo who bolted from Manchester United for Real Madrid in record time. Third fastest man would be Elijah who ran away from an angry woman, mainly out of fear for his life but most men would add, out of wisdom too. Fourth, would be Charles ‘Chip’ Goodyear who ran away real fast from the Temasek stable, some say for the same reason as Elijah, but I think his appetite for risk outstripped that of his board. Fifth, is Gareth Barry who wanted to move from Everton to play Champions League football, but ended up in oil rich Manchester City who are not in the Champions League. He ran so fast everybody was surprised, especially Benitez. Sixth fastest man was Jonah, who was running away from a God assignment; he ran a slow time – taking a slow boat to Spain. Seventh was Adebayor who bolted from Arsenal. His timing was slow because he hesitated, hoping Manchester United or Chelsea would offer him more $$$$$. Some of the fastest men are the ones in Wall Street; they ran out of trouble through government help and back into it with outrageous bonuses, and are still running, so we have yet to complete timing them to rank them among the top runners. So this is my list of the fastest men in the world. You may beg to disagree of course.
I don’t play football. I watch the occasional “big” matches, or watch the Footytube.com video clips of the goals that were scored. And I do like reading up news about football. Its a habit from the time I was in Secondary school. Reading the news from the sports page at the back to the headlines in the frontpage. Now the news are more up to date online. Since I started blogging, I have tried predicting every year but got it right only once. Forgot which year. But its very unpredictable the Premier league, more so with the rise of the Asian dragons and tigers and their bookies. Yes, of course there probably is some “betting” influence on the major games. I may sound cynical, but actually I am being very realistic about human greed. But before I ramble off on a tangent, here are my personal predictions based on gut feel: