Counting kicks was probably the most interesting thing you could do while watching England v Scotland last weekend, and Mr TH was pleased to count Jonny Wilkinson's 79th-minute penalty as the 28th successful kick of the weekend's three Six Nations matches. He got his prediction spot on and wins a £200 Total Goals bet for being first out of the hat.
Chelsea v Man City is the Premier League's match of the weekend and we're going to give another £200 Total Goals bet to one person who can correctly guess the Goal Minutes make-up in that one. Email your answers to themole@sportingindex.com before KO at 4pm on Sunday.
avg tries for England against Ireland in last 5 matches
avg points per game France have conceded this 6 Nations
avg points per game Wales have scored this 6 Nations
total points last time Scotland played Italy
avg booking M/U in last 5 meetings between Chelsea and Man City
avg goal mins of Berbatov in last 4 games against Bolton
avg goal minutes M/U in last 6 meetings between West Brom and Arsenal
England might have beaten Scotland to lift the Calcutta Cup and move to within the jaws of Six Nations victory, but their 22-16 victory was all substance over style, so the most enjoyable 80 minutes for most Red Rose fans at the weekend was probably France's humiliation at the hands of Italy. It certainly meant for a happy afternoon for Azzurri supporters and for one in particular, a particularly patriotic signor who sold France/Italy Supremacy at 16 to the tune of £200. The triumph in Rome, only their second in 32 meetings against the French, put our Italian friend £3,400 in the black. It doesn't come much sweeter than that, having been staring down the barrel just 30 minutes before when the visitors pulled 18-6 clear.
This week's bad trade comes from the cricket World Cup where India were flying against South Africa after reaching 142 when their first wicket went down. That setback didn't worry the hosts who carried on piling on the runs as Sporting Index punters kept on buying them. Just before Sachin Tendulkar's return to the pavilion, the India Runs spread peaked and quite a few went long at 367. Somehow India then crashed from 267/2 to 296 all out. The worst affected was the punter whose £15 buy cost him north of a grand. Super punter Bill Esdaile deserves a mention too: readers of his diary will know he failed to trade out of his Supremacy bet in-running when India were sitting pretty on 250/1, turning a £500 win into a £430 loss. Ouch.
NPower Championship This week's market move comes from the Npower Championship and involves teams who until recently were vying for a top two finish but nowadays find themselves struggling. Yes, we're talking about Forest, Swansea and Burnley who now all face a battle to secure a play-off place. Forest currently find themselves 6 points off second place and occupying the last play-off place after a poor run of form which has seen them not record a victory in the league in 6 games. Also along the way they have lost their 18-month unbeaten home record when losing to Hull City 1-0. We now have their points quote at 73.5-74.5 a massive 4.5 point drop in the last two weeks.
Another team which is in decline is Burnley, after a disappointing home defeat at the weekend against Millwall, they have dropped 3.5 ticks to 71.5-73, when looking like they were about to threaten for a playoff place or better. Swansea have also dropped two ticks to 77-78 after some poor performances losing to relegation threatened Derby County and Scunthorpe in past weeks.
Above: When he's not dressed head-to-toe in tweed and cheering on nags at Cheltenham, the Mole has been known to cruise around in his pimped-out ride blasting the freshest west coast beats from his home-made sub. So he's totally down with these 16 bars from England's 'hip-prop MC' Alex Corbisiero. Brraap!
Who says goalkeepers are nut cases? Anyone with Jens Lehmann in mind, probably. Apparently stories of Arsene Wenger wheeling him out of football's retirement home aren't a p*** take. This, on the other hand, most certainly is.
