If you took the 20 clubs in the English Premiership and had to sort them into three different categories ("Masterful," "Mediocre" and "Anti-Soccer"), which teams would go into what buckets?

Interesting question, right? My point is that wealthy clubs such as Chelsea, Man United and Liverpool have created such a gap between the rich and the "poor" in the league. All that the smaller, weaker teams can do is play to avoid defeat. The end result is an anti-soccer style of play epitomized by the 4-5-1 formation.

Here's my attempt to place the teams into the appropriate buckets. The decision, of course, is made harder by the very inconsistent performance by some teams.

Masterful: Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, and Wigan.
Mediocre: Spurs, Fulham, Manchester United, Manchester City, Aston Villa, Middlesbrough, Newcastle, Birmingham, Blackburn, Charlton, West Brom, and West Ham.
Anti-Soccer: Portsmouth, Everton, Bolton, and Sunderland.

Twenty percent of the teams are in the Masterful category (and Anti-Soccer), while the lionshare of teams (60%) make up the Mediocre category. How does this compare to previous seasons?

If you'll be in the South Florida area on Sunday, February 5th, you're invited to the official launch of the EPL Talk web site, starting at 11am EST.

We're throwing a huge party to celebrate the launch of the site. Plus we'll be showing the Chelsea v Liverpool game live, which is only available on Pay-Per-View. If you're interested, e-mail thegaffer@epltalk.com for a personal invitation.

Who will replace Sven-Goran Eriksson? Read my prediction from the January 5th blog posting.

Graeme Souness knows his days are numbered. And it's his own fault. His extremely negative attitude the past few weeks when answering questions from the press has had a detrimental effect on the team's play.

He's been clutching on to the injury excuse for a while now, but the fact remains that Newcastle's performance since last summer has been very lacking.

Contrast this with Rafa Benitez. In January of last year, Florent Sinama-Pongolle became the 11th first-team player to suffer a long-term injury at Anfield that season following problems for Cisse, Chris Kirkland, Milan Baros, Xabi Alonso, Harry Kewell, Vladimir Smicer, Luis Garcia, Steven Gerrard, Antonion Nunez, Steve Finnan and Josemi.

What was Benitez's reaction to the injury pileup?

In the November 28th, 2004 edition of The Guardian newspaper, he said: "If you lose your two main strikers, all the other things change. Only time can sort that out, and hard work. If you are working properly, normally you will win, but if you have problems it might take time. I cannot promise we will win the next match, or the match after that, but I can make sure we are properly prepared."

And how did his captain Steven Gerrard respond in the same article? "Things are difficult for us now, so we've got to show some courage. You either go hiding or you show a bit of character. The manager is the same. He's been really unlucky with injuries, but he's told us not to think about them. He's not looking for excuses."

Liverpool, of course, shrugged off their injuries and went on to win the Champions League. It just goes to show what a positive attitude and drive can have on a team -- and it starts at the top.

If you want to discover more about the English Premier League, there's a new search engine that hasn't been launched yet, and you have an exclusive sneak peek. Go right now to the English Premier League page at http://www.squidoo.com/premiership

Squidoo is the name of the new search engine, although it's more like Wikipedia than Google. Squidoo allows contributors to create their own page on their favorite topic.

Check out the other related Premiership pages!

Other observations from this weekend's Premiership matches:

Liverpool's Cisse changes his hairstyle again (sheesh). Newcastle adds a new third strip. This one is the new style that Adidas has launched, and looks almost identical to Liverpool's new home strip (scheduled for release this summer) except that it'll be red (of course) instead of blue. And lastly, what were all of those empty seats at Sunderland's Stadium of Light against Chelsea? If The Black Cats can't sell out their ground against Chelsea, something is terribly wrong.

I finally caught up last night on my weekend-soccer viewing, and I had a chance to review Fox Soccer Channel's new show, Soccer Saturday Plus in more detail.

Here's what I noticed:

1. They showed the highlights of each of the English Premier League matches, except the Fuham v Newcastle and Wigan v West Brom matches. Was it me or did they flub and not show the footage by mistake?

2. The show definitely makes the "EPL Review Show" less useful, but the EPL Review show does offer extended highlights, runs 60 minutes and should remain on FSC's programming schedule.

3. The chemistry between Webster and Bretos is solid. You can tell they've had a lot more TV experience than Steven Cohen and Nick Geber.

Fox Soccer Channel must have been reading my mind. Two days after my previous post, FSC announced they were adding a new EPL highlight show entitled "Super Saturday Plus." It wasn't exactly what I wanted, but it's encouraging to see Fox Soccer Channel developing new programming.

Speaking of Fox Soccer Channel, the first issue of EPL Talk Magazine is in development and will be released in early February. Tons more info to come on this must-read magazine, but I do want to mention that one of the articles will focus on other ideas of what Fox Soccer Channel can do to make their programming better.

If you're interested in the magazine and want to be the first to get it when it's released, go to www.EPLtalk.com and click on the 'Newsletter' link, then enter your e-mail address. It's going to be a one-of-a-kind magazine for English Premier League viewers!

Also, if you haven't checked it out, take a look at the Premier League lens at http://www.squidoo.com/premiership

For English Premier League matches on TV, all of us in America know that Fox Soccer Channel is our godsend, broadcasting live and tape-delayed Premiership matches that gloriously consume hours of our life each week.

But if you're an EPL fan who wants to experience the league in real-time, you have a dilemma.

Take, for instance, this weekend's upcoming matches. If you're on the East Coast, you'll watch the 7:30am live derby between Man City and Man U. Easy. And you'll watch the Blackburn versus Bolton match, which will be live at Noon. And then there's the tape-delayed match at 3pm between Arsenal and Boro.

However, the majority of EPL matches kick off at 10am. And, if you're like me, you're tempted not to follow those results in real-time because you want to watch the Arsenal game without knowing the final result.

So, what do you do from 10am until Noon? Do you resist going online to find out the scores? But what about the 10am clash between Liverpool and Spurs? And don't you want to agonize (or chuckle) at Newcastle's demise in their match against Fulham? Plus there are three other matches at that same time that we haven't mentioned.

Fox's answer is to show filler from 10am until Noon with an AC Milan classic match. And offer the Liverpool vs Spurs match on Pay-Per-View for $20+.

My solution is two-fold.

First, Fox should create a new two hour show featuring up-to-the-minute scores (except, on purpose, not mentioning the score of the 3pm taped-delayed game). The show can have it's fair share of advertising breaks, to help FSC pay the bills and make some profit. Plus, the two-hour show can feature FSC pundits discussing the implication of the results, upcoming programming from FSC, and more.

Second, until Fox makes any changes, the best way is to experience it via EPL Talk. It's the reason I created the web site in the first place... to allow EPL fans to follow the scores and commentary in real-time on the Internet, and allowing fans to chat with one another as the goals go in.

With EPL Talk, you can listen to live commentary from the web site by linking to the streaming Talk Radio broadcast (listed under the What's On/Radio section of the homepage). You can follow the goals as they go in under the 'Premiership Results' section of the homepage. The league table is updated in real-time as every goal hits the net. Plus, you can follow the play-by-play commentary of any live match by clicking on any of the team names under the 'Premiership Results' section.

What ideas do you have to improve Fox Soccer Channel? Click on 'Comments' below and share your ideas.

The managers that will suffer the axe in 2006 are:

Graeme Souness, Newcastle. How he's survived this long, I have no idea. The Scot who should have gotten the axe before the season even started will finally get the pink slip after Newcastle's season fizzles to a halt. The Tyneside club have had a severe problem in the back for years now, and even with new players brought in, this hasn't stopped.

Steve McClaren, Middlesbrough. Falling attendances, lack of passion on the pitch. The Boro fans deserve more and could tap into the foreign market for a more exciting manager.

David Moyes, Everton. The Toffee's patience has to run out sooner or later.

I predict that Mick McCarthy will keep his job. After all, he's doing the best he can with what he has. And Steve Bruce, although he should have been sacked ages ago, will keep his job simply because if the board haven't sacked him already, they're not going to do so for quite a while.

Is it any coincidence that out of the top five teams in the EPL table, that four of the five managers are from the continent?

Of course, the foreign managers are in charge of big money clubs like Chelsea, Liverpool, Arsenal and Spurs.

But what teams in the EPL would most likely benefit from having a foreign manager at the helm? Birmingham have the money, but Steve Bruce lacks the leadership and know-how to achieve success. A foreign manager, with the same spending money as Bruce, would flourish.

The two other teams that could benefit from a foreign manager would be Newcastle and Middlesbrough. Again, teams that both have big wallets, but where the managers lack skill at putting together the best team on the park.

Having any foreign manager in charge isn't enough (we all saw what happened with Perrin in charge at Portsmouth, and Santini at Tottenham). But the right manager for the right club could be the right move for struggling Premier League sides.

Current Premiership champions Chelsea will undoubtedly win the English Premier League again this year. But that's not my prediction.

Instead, my prediction is that Chelsea will drop points in their race to the top of the EPL. Here's how:

February 5, home, versus Liverpool. The African's Nations Cup will hurt Mourinho more than Rafa, resulting in a tough contest for Chelsea against their bogey team. Prediction: Chelsea 1 -1 Liverpool.

March 11, home, versus Spurs. Just days after the second leg of their Champion's League thriller against Barcelona, the tired legs of Chelsea will succumb to the hungry Spurs team fueled by Martin Jol's technical wizardry. Prediction: Chelsea 0 - 1 Tottenham.

April 15, away, against Bolton. It all depends which Allardyce team shows up, but Chelsea will have a difficult time against the old men from the Reebok Stadium. It'll be a topsy turvy match, for sure. Prediction: Bolton 2 - 1 Chelsea.

Eight points dropped. Worse than the five dropped during the first half of the season, but Chelsea storm to the Premiership title and Mourinho again reigns supreme.

Would you be willing to travel thousands of miles across England and Wales, spending thousands of dollars to see all 92 teams in the Premiership and Football League?

If so, you could join the select group of the 92 Club. Read stories about these soccer mad fans and the Club at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/4586840.stm

We've gone ahead and created our very own EPL Talk radio station for your listening pleasure.

Go to http://www.pandora.com/?sc=sh3472235 and enjoy listening to an unlimited selection of music, courtesy of Pandora. Create your own radio station, or just listen to ours!

It's official. According to scientists in America, soccer is the world's most exciting sport. Finally, we have evidence we can share with the "soccer sucks" crowd.

But wait. The report notes that in the past 10 years, baseball is considered more entertaining than English Premier League soccer. One reason may be because the Premiership has become so predictable (how many teams other than Chelsea, Man United and Arsenal have won the EPL in the past decade?).

Read the article at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4581374.stm

After a disappointing 2006 World Cup where England get knocked out of the 2nd round (losing to hosts Germany), the race heats up for who will replace Sven-Goran Eriksson.

The Special One, Jose Mourinho, is the favorite according to the tabloids and fans. But after talks with his Russian chairman, Jose decides to stay with Chelsea in hopes of bringing home the Champions League trophy in the 2006-2007 season.

Readers, feel free to share your own predictions or comments! I'll post a new 2006 EPL prediction each day.

Before this blog, there was an earlier reincarnation at another blog site. Read the previous blog posts at http://epltalk.wordpress.com

You'll find interesting news about The Treble Talk radio show (recommended listening for EPL fans in the US), a tribute to George Best, the key component that was missing in Manchester United's Champions League collapse, Wigan Athletic and memories of how ESPN ruined soccer in the early 90's.

If you're a fan of the English Premier League, you'll want to keep on coming back to this blog for insights, thoughts and observations on the best club league in the world.

The blog is the perfect accompaniment to the EPL Talk web site (at http://www.EPLtalk.com), which features up-to-the-minute news headlines, latest results, fixtures, TV schedules and more. It's your essential guide to the Premiership.

In the meantime, feel free to send me your comments. I look forward to hearing from you, and thanks for taking the time to read the blog.

Cheers,
The Gaffer