Premier League Schedule – December 26-27

The best game of the weekend is Aston Villa at Arsenal on Sunday. Each team has 35 points and a victory could vault the winner into second place, depending on the result of the Manchester United game. Liverpool desperately need a win to get their season back on track (I feel like I’ve written that sentence a lot this year.)

Saturday, December 26
Birmingham vs. Chelsea – 7:30 a.m. ET/ESPN2 (Live)
Fulham vs. Tottenham – 8 a.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Live)
West Ham vs. Portsmouth – 7:55 a.m. ET/Setanta (Live)
Burnley vs. Bolton – 2:30 p.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Delayed)
Manchester City vs. Stoke – 9:55 a.m. ET/Setanta (Live)
Sunderland vs. Everton – 10 a.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Live)
Wigan vs. Blackburn – 3 p.m. ET/Setanta (Delayed)
Liverpool vs. Wolves – 12:30 p.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Live)

Sunday, December 27
Arsenal vs. Aston Villa – 8:25 a.m. ET/Setanta (Live)
Hull vs. Manchester United – 11 a.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Live)

Terrible outing by Liverpool

After dominating the first half hour against Portsmouth, the wheels completely fell off for Liverpool on Saturday.  Midfielder Javier Mascherano picked up a dubious red card, as well as an injury, towards the end of the first half.  From that point on, the Reds looked completely out of whack.  Although it was nice to see Fernando Torres back in the starting lineup, he got increasingly frustrated and kept talking back to the ref, something he doesn’t usually do.  The passing wasn’t crisp and they hardly challenged the Portsmouth goal at all in the second half.  Keep in mind, they were playing Portsmouth, the team in LAST PLACE in the league, a team Liverpool should be able to beat.  It’s a extremely frustrating loss in an increasingly disappointing season for Liverpool.  

Fulham pulled off another upset on Saturday as well, knocking off Manchester United, 3-0.  League leader Chelsea failed to take advantage of United’s slip-up and were only able to take a point from a 1-1 draw with West Ham.

Premier League Schedule Dec. 19-21

Manchester United looks to go joint top with a win over Fulham on Saturday, while Chelsea looks to keep a three-point gap from their closest challenger against West Ham Sunday.  Meanwhile, Liverpool needs a win over bottom-dwelling Portsmouth if they want to keep any hope of a top four finish alive.

I will add the US broadcasts for Fox Soccer games later tonight as the new Foxsoccer.com website doesn’t seem to want to give me that information at the moment.

Saturday, December 19
Portsmouth vs. Liverpool – 7:45 a.m. ET/ESPN2 (Live)
Aston Villa vs. Stoke
Blackburn vs. Tottenham
Fulham vs. Manchester United – 9:30 a.m. ET/Setanta (Live)
Manchester City vs. Sunderland
Arsenal vs. Hull

Sunday, December 20
Wolves vs. Burnley – 8:25 a.m. ET/Setanta (Live)
Everton vs. Birmingham
West Ham vs. Chelsea

Monday, December 21
Wigan vs. Bolton

Champions League 1st knockout round set

One of the most intriguing matchups is Chelsea playing against former manager Jose Mourinho and Inter Milan.  Defending champion Barcelona ended up with Stuttgart. In a change of format, four first leg games will be played Feb. 16 and 17 while the other four first leg contests will be Feb. 23 and 24. Second leg matches are March 9-10 and 16-17, respectively.

AC Milan vs. Manchester United
Lyon vs. Real Madrid
Bayern Munich vs. Fiorentina
Porto vs. Arsenal
Olympiacos vs. Bordeaux
Stuttgart vs. Barcelona
Inter Milan vs. Chelsea
CSKA Moskva vs. Sevilla

And since I’m a Liverpool fan and they are now in the Europa League, here’s the round of 32 draw for that competition. These fixtures are numbered because they are used to establish the draw for the round of 16. For example, if Liverpool wins at No. 9, they will play Lille or Fenerbahçe, the winner of No. 14.

1. FC Rubin Kazan vs. Hapoel Tel-Aviv
2. Athletic Club vs. RSC Anderlecht
3. FC København vs. Marseille
4. Panathinaikos vs. AS Roma
5. Atlético de Madrid vs. Galatasaray
6. Ajax vs. Juventus
7. Club Brugge vs. Valencia
8. Fulham vs. Shakhtar Donetsk
9. Liverpool vs. Unirea Urziceni
10. Hamburger vs. PSV Eindhoven
11. Villarreal vs. VfL Wolfsburg
12. R. Standard de Liège vs. Salzburg
13. FC Twente vs. Werder Bremen
14. LOSC Lille Métropole vs. Fenerbahçe
15. Everton vs. Sporting
16. Hertha BSC Berlin vs. Benfica

Crunch time in Champions League

The big clash today is between Bayern Munich and Juventus.  Bayern needs a win in Turin to advance, while a 0-0 draw is good enough to send Juve through to the next round.  In group C, Madrid and AC Milan hold the top spots, but that’s all up in the air if Marseille can beat Madrid.

Tuesday’s games
Juventus vs. Bayern – 2:15 p.m. ET/Setanta (Live)
Maccabi Haifa vs. Bordeaux*
Beşiktaş vs. CSKA Moskva
Wolfsburg vs. Manchester United* – 2:30 p.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Live)
Zurich vs. AC Milan – 9 p.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Delayed)
Marseille vs. Real Madrid – 7 p.m. ET/Fox Soccer (Delayed)
Chelsea* vs. APOEL
Atletico Madrido vs. Porto*
*indicates has already clinched spot in knockout stage