Gary Neville says the England players are still upset by the treatment of Rio Ferdinand...get over it man. It's all in the past now or perhaps Gary is just simmering because he didn't get very nice presents at Christmas.

I won't go into the results too much, except to say that Charlton's well-deserved win against Chelsea means that for the time being Man U and Arsenal have the top to themselves, while Spurs sink into the bottom three.

Instead, it might be worth looking at what plans various clubs have for the New Year. Amid much rustling of wrapping paper, Blackburn have discovered that Barry Ferguson is out for the rest of the season and are looking for a replacement. One of their candidates, Bobby Petta has however, joined Fulhma on loan instead. So, they've turned they eyes towards the much-lusted-after Andy Reid of Forest. They're not alone though, as Birmingham and Spurs are also looking to bolster their midfield too.

Out of the top teams, it seems that Man U are the only ones likely to make any serious bids, as Arsene says that he's happy with the youngsters that are coming through. No luck with that bank loan in other words. Chelsea may or may not make an offer for Ayala, but even that is beginning to look very half-hearted. So instead the Red Devils (or Scum as my co-writer Max likes to call them) continue to sniff around Louis Saha, but to drag up yet another old story are interested in signing Arjen Robben to be Ol' Horseface's partner.

So, in hindsight we're as desperate for some real transfer news as all the other newspaper backpages. Round and White will return with an FA Cup preview and a cracking hangover on Friday.

Brown is off to Spurs.

News that Spurs are looking to splash out in the January sales will only be of interest to Spurs fans...and perhaps Sheffield United too, as David Pleat reveals that he has made contact with the Blades in order to have a good long and hard look at midfielder Michael Brown.

Things look to get exciting at Leeds in the New Year too, as they are set to become the first club in English football to hold an independent inquiry into boardroom mismanagement. If the club can stay out of administration, Leeds will then order a warts-and-all inquest into how they have accumulated debts of £80m, losing £952,000 a week in the last financial year. It will no doubt be a very entertaining read, especially for any non-Leeds fans who feel a spot of schadenfreude coming on.

And that's all for now. Round And White may return on Boxing Day or possibly on Sunday, as yours truly will be travelling to Blighty on Saturday.

Sounds dodgy, doesn't it? In fact it's only the news that Man U and a number of other clubs are asking about Louis Saha's availability. Yes, it's yet another item of news about Man U. How dull. Although West London's undertakers will be happy to hear Chris Coleman say that Saha would leave the club "over my dead body". Expect an invite to Putney Crematorium sometime in January.

Just in case things were not heated enough on the South Coast, wee ginger Gordon has had a go at Harry Redknapp for moaning. My! That return leg at Fratton Park will be a friendly affair.

says Louis Saha in The Sun. He wants that move to Man U, despite Chris Coleman's plea for him to sign a new contract with Fulham. There's no news any offers so far though, so Diego shouldn't buy a new benchwarming cushion just yet.

Pav has been named 2003 European Footballer of the Year. However, Round and White would like to clarify that the Pavel in question is Nedved and not Portsmouth stalwart, Srnicek.

"Shocked and devastated". Guess who? At least those 8 months off should give him enough time to buy a decent personal organiser.

More garbage from the mouth of Sepp Blatter as he says that Manchester United are not permitted to fight Rio Ferdinand's eight-month ban in a civil court. Please Sepp, go on holiday and just give the world of football a rest. Just for a while.

And he's banned for eight months after forgetting to miss a drugs test and later claiming it was because he was moving house on the same day. The same day that he was photographed shopping in Manchester. So that forces him out of the rest of the season, from January for the scum and Euro 2004 for England. In my opinion I think the F.A. are right to dish out such a harsh punishment. Footballers getting paid so much must be able to attend things of such seriousness. Hopefully it will send out a warning to the rest of the football league.

Okay well my predictions weren't that far off. Again, I did well with Newcastle's game (predicted they would draw 1-1 with Liverpool, Shearer would score twice vs Spurs) and got today's goalless draw with Charlton right. Not bad, is it? Chelsea carried on their winning ways today, winning at local rivals Fulham. So their slight dip in form didn't last long. Everton squeazed past Leicester in a five-goal thriller, whilst Villa won at Blackburn and Bolton held Arsenal at home. It's gonna be an exciting title race this season! Even if it is a clear 3-horse-race. Beats the SPL anyway. The Wolves-Liverpool and Birmingham-Middlesbrough were both postponed, and no one's happy.

Okay, some more predictions for Sunday:

Come on Spurs, beat the scum. Tottenham 2-0 Man U.
Southampton 0-0 Portsmouth

Okay you should know by now that you can't rely on my predictions. They've been really mixed so far, with correct predictions and totally awfully wrong ones. But I do tend to get some things right - Shearer did score twice last weekend, didn't he.

Okay here's this week's lot...
Birmingham 1-0 Middlesbrough
Blackburn 1-1 Aston Villa
Bolton 1-2 Arsenal
Charlton 0-0 Newcastle
Everton 3-3 Leicester
Fulham 1-1 Chelsea
Wolves 0-0 Liverpool

And Houllier's woes continue. That's yer lot. Have a good weekend.

...which has been a bit of an anti-climax so far, as we were expecting to hear all sorts of juicy gossip. Instead, the most exciting thing that happened was that Rio turned up an hour early. While this might be a novel idea for Mr Forgetful, it's not exactly gripping stuff for you, the reader.

So instead we turn our gaze towards the glory-filled halls of White Har...wait that's not right...towards White Hart Lane, where the possibility of Stephen Carr's impending departure may create a vacancy for a certain French right-back. Stevie has been the living embodiment of 'Should I Stay Or Should I Go' for the last 3 years, but with Newcastle hinting at an interest in him he might finally sling his hook. However, the news that Newcastle chairman Freddy Shepherd believes Alan Shearer would be an ideal replacement for Bobby Robson, might make Carr reconsider. Just imagine the frolics at the training ground with Al. In any case, there have been rumours since the age of dinosaurs that Carr would like to follow Sol to Highbury. We shall see...

Anyway, back to that right-back rumour. It would appear to be the case that two unnamed Premiership clubs are sniffing round Willy Sagnol of Bayern Munich. Despite him apparently having the "best tackling statistics" in the Bundesliga, Bayern may well be looking to liven their team a bit and Willy be off on his way. The identity of the other English club is still unknown, but I'll stick my head out and say Arsenal.

It's all change in Germany at the moment, as the league entered the winter break on Wednesday and all sorts of rumours are beginning to fly around. Firstly, Schalke are looking to continue in their quest to snap up anything that moves, as there is news of interest in Marcelinho, struggling Hertha Berlin's best player. Schalke have already signed up Bremen's inspirational pot-bellied forward Ailton for next season and having had their coy glances at Stuttgart's Kevin Kuranyi rejected are bound to look for even more players. Stuttgart, too, are seeking fresh talent, as their promising autumn at the top of the table went off the rails a bit in December with two successive scoreless draws followed by two successive defeats to Leverkusen and to Bayern, the latter having come back, Man U-esque, from being 9 points behind the leading pack in November to sitting pretty in second place. Nevertheless, Penfold-lookalike Felix Magath, has hinted at some, well a new player for Stuttgatt, plus they'll have their defensive stalwart Bordon back from injury. With the top four teams separated by 4 points, the return leg looks to be a cracker.

Perhaps when Max has finished that crate of champagne, he may deign to post some predictions.

While Round And White dreams of Christmas, Rio has other things to look forward to...such as...damn, I forgot what it was now...ah yes, his dope trial. We'll be posting more on that when news gets in.

Meanwhile, disturbing news from Aston Villa, where Juan Pablo Angel is finally starting to look as if he was a good buy. The Guardian reports that this is partly due to the fact that he has moved next door to O'Leary, who tracked down the striker in South America after taking over at Villa to stress how much he wanted him. So perhaps stalking a player until he starts scoring goals is the way forward.

Spurs lost on penalties. 'nuff said.

Carling Cup Semi-final Draw
Bolton v Aston Villa
Arsenal v Middlesbrough

We'd also like to congratulate Max on becoming the winner of the under-18s category in the 2003 Guardian Best British blogs thing.

...until Chelsea threw in their bid for Ruud. The Beeb reports that Chelsea's acting chief executive Paul Smith made the comments just days after failing in a formal bid for Arsenal's Thierry Henry. "If Van Nistelrooy was priced at £60m and we considered it a good investment, then we would probably pay," he said. So does that mean that you want him or not?

Pat Vieira Finds Love Exclusive!
It's all about Ruud today, as Vieira accuses van Nistelrooy of "acting" to get him sent off against Manchester United. We at 'Round and White' thought that this story was dead and buried, but it seems that Pat is looking to keep this feud alive until they meet again. Nevertheless he does find time to bury the hatchet with Roy Keane; "He said 'appeal, Patrick'. He was trying to help me. He saw I was really upset and he kept me out of trouble". It's all rather touching isn't it?

And Sepp Blatter has accused Europe's richest clubs of 'despicable' behaviour and engaging in 'social and economic rape'. He may have a point, but this is rich coming from the man with a dubious financial past who in addition runs FIFA, a 'non-profit' organisation which certainly has money-grabbing tendencies.

So yeah my predictions didn't exactly go too well, although I did predict correctly that Middlesbrough would yet again draw at home, goalless. And that Shearer would score twice.

Let's see van Shitestillroy will be staying at the scum for the rest of his career. If only Massaimo Taibi had said that, too. Oh, did anyone see... Thierry Henry, the second best player in the world! Congratulations are in order... sounds about right... Ronaldo third. Although I was listening to talkSPORT this morning, and Mike Porky Parry was saying it was an outrage Ronaldo could be the third best player in the world. "He's too fat," said the ginger Parry, who looks like he might just have had a few pies down the years himself. This is also the same bloke that said two years ago that Celtic and Rangers would be in the Premiership in 2002. No chance. Not now, not ever.

Pennant's staying at Leeds. I actually this this lad's a real class act, and would play him in my Premiership all-stars team. I saw him a couple of years ago for one of the England younger teams and he really is an exciting talent. Why Arsenal don't play him themselves is beyond me. Just look at the way he ran through the Chelski defence last week!

Man City and Norwich want Darren Huckerby. Is he still alive? I remember he was pretty good at one point, but then did the worst thing anyone could ever do to their career. He moved to Elland Road.

Carling Cup Predictions
Bolton will carry on their cup run and good form by knocking out Southampton at the Reebok stadiums, while Arsenal reserves will beat West Brom comfortably away from home.

But don't take my word for it!

Well Max, your predictions had mixed fortunes. You got the goalless bit right for Boro v Charlton, although reports that Danny Mills (who else?) stamped on Di Canio's head should make life exciting for someone somewhere.

The wins for Arsenal and Villa were to be expected, but only a blind optimist would have gone for an away win for City in the Manchester derby. Interestingly, Man City are slowly, but surely sliding to the bottom of the table weighed down by several high-pad, but low-performing players such as Seaman, McManaman and Fowler. They are 50 million quid in debt and are possibly in danger of "doing a Leeds".

Chelsea lost surprisingly at home to Bolton, which means that they drop to third and swap places with Man U. However, the boys in blue are still 11 points clear of fourth-placed Fulham, a clear indication that this season will almost certainly remain a three-horse race. Interestingly enough, there are still only 14 points between them and Wolves who are bottom and will still be there are Christmas (and we all now what that means). So in theory, pretty much anybody (bar Wolves) could challenge for that elusive 4th place. Annoyingly it looks like Newcastle will be the team that gets it, especially after Liverpool's home defeat to Southampton.

Gossip-wise there isn't too much to report. Roman formally made a pass at Thierry, but got his wrist firmly slapped by a protective David Dein. In any case, the soon-to-be World Footballer of the Year has never shown any inclination of leaving the Gooners and fair play to him. No doubt the other suitor, Real, will have taken note of this and will probably concentrate on pulling Ruud. Enough on that, as it will no doubt drag on for a good 6 or 7 months yet.

Well I thought I did rather well in last weekend’s Premiership predictions. Especially predicting the 1-1 draw at Newcastle and that Leeds would cause an upset against Chelsea. Although, Leeds fans, don’t get too carried away. You are Chelsea’s jinx after all. In fact, you even won that fixture last season – Milner getting his first Premiership goal.

So let’s see.. early kick-offs tomorrow will see Leicester beat Birmingham and Man City win at Old Trafford, Chelsea will edge past Bolton at Stamford Bridge, Liverpool will take all three points at home to Southampton with Didi Hamann scoring, there’ll be a dull goalless affair between Middlesbrough and Charlton, Newcastle and Spurs will fight out a scrappy goals-a-plenty draw – Shearer will score a penalty and a header and Pompey will beat Everton. Sunday will see victories for Aston Villa v Wolves, Arsenal v Blackburn, and a draw between Leeds and Fulham. And that’s Mystic Max’s weekend preview!

So what’s in the news at the moment… well some unheard of bloke’s throwing a tantrum at the Premiership’s TV deal with Sky, the UEFA Cup produces ‘kind’ draw for our British trio of representatives and Ronaldo (the good one, the world cup winner, not the shite ass with cack in his hair) has urged Real Madrid to sign Thierry Henry. So Emile Heskey not good enough for yer, Ronny?

Stuttgart v Chelsea
Porto v Manchester United
Real Sociedad v Lyon
Celta Vigo v Arsenal
Bayern Munich v Real Madrid
Sparta Prague v Milan
Deportivo la Coruna v Juventus
Lokomotiv Moscow v Monaco

Well, well. Stuttgart v Chelsea should at least be entertaining, but I suspect that the Schwaben-Express, which has been struggling in recent weeks, will come to a halt against Chelski. Man U should be relatively happy with their draw of Porto, who shouldn't really provide them with any difficulties. Given that Bayern are just about managing to keep up with the top three at home and only managed to get through the first round due to a dubious penalty, then you almost have to expect (and hope) that Madrid will thrash them. And Arsenal can't be too unhappy that they got Celta Vigo, perhaps the easiest Spanish team of the draw.

Apart from Sparta v AC Milan, the other draws would appear to be relatively unpredictable. Monaco go to Moscow, who may well surprise them, Lyon v Real Sociedad could really go either way, while if you consider Juve's recent league form, I wouldn't necessarily guarantee a win for them against Deportivo.

Yes, you've read it correctly. Following the crowd trouble in Gelsenkirchen, Ken Bates has finally said something halfway intelligent by asking, "If they (UEFA) can fine one man for spitting within 48 hours and ban him for eight matches, then what should they be doing to a club who don't seem to be able to control their fans?" It's valid point, so expect UEFA to hand out a £20,000 fine shortly.

Pleat to stay: even for Spurs fan this isn't exactly mind-blowingly exciting news.

The Guardian (and I suspect so does everyone else) is beginning to sniff a story in Real's increased interest in Ruud. However, the article points out the various tactic employed by Real and is drawing comparisons with their purchase of Beckham last season.

"Madrid traditionally sign a galáctico every year, a process that can usually be split into five stages. It begins with rumours, then there is usually a leak to the Spanish press, followed by a vague admission from within the Bernabeu. In the case of Van Nistelrooy, Valdano's statement yesterday means Madrid are currently at this juncture. The next stage is for Madrid to issue a string of denials. Perez said of Beckham last season: "Never, never, never." After that, and having made sure the player is aware of their interest, Madrid then officially begin business with the selling club."

In any case, I can't see how Real could possibly prise the Dutchman away from Man U, especially considering the fact that Ferguson pretty much waited for two years to get his man. However, it does very much depend on what Van Nistelrooy wants too, especially as there are suggestions that he would be a better partner for Raul than the Brazilian tub of lard.

More later, once the Champions League draw has taken place.

Even us at Round And White have to work occasionally. So a sarcastic round-up of Wednesday's games will probably be posted tomorrow.

Pretty much every newspaper has the news that Nicky Butt may be looking to move, while there are rumours that Barcelona and Madrid will table bids for Thierry and Ruud respectively. I'm not going to even comment on the miniscule chance of those actually happening. Similar optimism is apparently being demonstrated by Pompey who are hoping to lure Dado Prso away from Monaco. Yes, that's right, from the French Riviera to Fratton Park.

More gossip if and when it turns up.

Just as day turns into night, it was obvious that there would be trouble at the Besiktas - Chelsea game in Gelsenkirchen. Besiktas manager Mircea Lucescu claimed star striker Ilhan Mansiz had been elbowed by John Terry and Marcel Desailly, and went onto to state that "the referee didn't see that twice our player Ilhan Mansiz was elbowed - that is much more dangerous than throwing paper." Unfortunately, he somehow failed to mention the coins, flares and other interesting objects were thrown onto the pitch and into the Chelsea fans' enclosure. Perhaps he's been visiting Arsene Wenger's optician too.

Still, Round And White is happy to report that Chelsea deservedly won 2-0, especially so as this provided Sparta Prague with the opportunity to progress through to the knock-out stages, which they did by sneaking in an injury time winner against Lazio.

Man U made short work of Stuttgart, with admittedly excellent performances by "old Horseface" and Giggs confirming a 2-0 win and their place at the top of the group. Nevertheless, Penfold-lookalike Felix Magath will be happy to see his team qualify for the next round, where they will be joined by AC Milan, Celta Vigo, Real Madrid and Porto.

...Sir Alex obviously can't, as he is reported to have gone "berserk" about the Neville brothers Vodafone ad with Beckham. The Guardian reports that this is apparently because he thinks it highlights the perception of Europe's elite that bugs him the most - that Manchester United are inferior to Real Madrid. We at Round And White don't want to incur the wrath of the Man U manager, (for the sake of his heart, you see) so we'll leave you to make your own minds up about that one.

At least he doesn't have the problems that Ged now has, as Liverpool chairman David Moores yesterday made it clear that, "I have repeatedly stated the over-riding objective is consistent qualification for the Champions League." Moores added that this was Liverpool's "minimum acceptable target" this term after failing to qualify last season. No pressure there then.

Meanwhile, Gazza is looks to be one step closer to completing his life's goal, i.e. playing for every one of the 92 league teams.

Finally, West Ham's "popular" chairman Terence Brown is beginning to accept the obvious; that Jermain Defoe is going to leave Man U....I mean the Hammers (oops, slip of the tongue there). He also makes some odd remarks on Rio; "What you've got there is a boy who's then decided that he's going. And there were issues - I'm not going to go into them - but people felt perhaps if he left London, especially if he went to Milan or Barcelona, it would be in his best interest to perhaps get away from London. I don't want to go any further than that." He really knows how to build up the suspense doesn't he?

Ho-hum…there didn’t seem to be any vastly exciting games this weekend. Sure, Leeds decided that getting at least one point before Christmas would be a good idea, while Arsenal put Alec Ferguson's Thierry Law to the test and promptly drew at Leicester.

Clearly, minds are elsewhere at the moment, Sir Alec's on that new contract, his team’s on the Stuttgart match and Arsenals’ on that crucial game against Lokomotiv Moscow. Happily, at least one Premiership manager was able to keep his mind on the league…well, sort of. Bobby Robson finally realised on Saturday, a good 3 months after everyone else, that Newcastle’s title race is over.

Nevertheless, there were quite a few goals, particularly for Man U as they put four past Villa, a scoreline matched in a surprising (considering the Blues’ early season stalwart defence) win for Blackburn at Birmingham. Spurs also felt that the home game against Wolves deserved a few screamers. And so it proved to be the case, with a Robbie Keane hattrick, Kanoute's second after his return from injury and "a real snorter" (said David Pleat) by Dalmat.

Discipline (or the lack of) raised its ugly head again though in the Arsenal game. Leicester defender Steve Howey has described Ashley Cole's tackle on Ben Thatcher as a "coward's challenge". Which does kind of beg the question of what he thought of Muzzy Izzet’s challenge on Freddie Kanoute from a few weeks ago? I guess we’ll leave that one though, eh Steve? In any case, it was only Ben Thatcher, who has never exactly shied from the odd ankle-breaking tackle himself. But the Arsenal leftback's yellow-red and his subsequent initial refusal to leave the pitch, may also be yet another indication that the Gunners still haven’t quite learnt the lesson provided by the men in blazers. Or perhaps Ashley simply wants a bit more time off for Christmas.

News from Italy now, where Rivaldo has been voted Serie A’s worst player of 2003, even coming in front of Al-Saadi Gaddafi, despite the latter being the son of Colonel Gaddafi and testing positive for nandrolone. With publicity as good as that, perhaps Wolves will still get their man.

Max will be posting again once he's finished his exams.

Round And White will be commenting on the weekend's games later on today, as I have to go home early to wait for the plumber.

The only thing I do have to say on the World Cup 2006 qualifying draw (being half-Czech), is that I cannot believe that we have drawn Holland again. However, England's draw thankfully looks to be relatively straighforward, although I'm sure the team will look to slip up somewhere just to make things exciting.

Finally being part of FIFA comes up trumps. Yes, we could still do without Sepp Blatter, but what a bloody fantastic draw that is. England will play both Wales and Northern Ireland (would it be worth sticking a fiver on NI not scoring again in the whole campaign?) in the World Cup 2006 qualifing. Inevitably we're playing Poland again, but that's beginning to be regulation. All in all, it's a decent draw for England. Wales are strong and will pose a threat, but I think it's safe to say, "bring on Germany 2006!".

On the domestic scene today the scum have apologised for Sir Alex Ferguson's (who, despite all my hatred for, wish the best of luck recovering from his recent heart problems) comments about the FA's alledged deals with Arsenal players regarding punishments following the battle of Old Trafford. Good job.

Right, well as this is my first post on Round and White, how about some Premiership predictions? Newcastle-Liverpool to draw 1-1. David Dunn to score for the Brummies in a victory over Blackburn... Bolton to win at Fulham and, don't laugh, but I think Leeds fans will be getting excited this weekend when they pull off something at home to Chelsea. Hmm, maybe I should take that back to avoid embarrassment. And yes, they're still going down. Also victories for the Gunners, the scum and draws for Middlesbrough-Portsmouth and Spurs-Wolves. Righty ho, have a good weekend.

(Or "The Wolves? Eh?" in Portugese). Yes, that is what Rivaldo's reaction would've probably been on hearing that Wolves were/are one of the three Premiership teams that have taken an interest in his bench-warming expertise. "The answer was pretty much what we expected - Rivaldo feels he has bigger fish to fry," said Dave Jones. What fish? We at Round and White demand to know! Sardines? Sprats?

In addition, it may or may not be the case that Bolton are one of the other two unknowns chasing Rivaldo's signature, but then Sam Allardyce has pulled off this sort of feat before. In fact you probably all expected him to make an offer, didn't you? If that is the case, the Round And White would like to hear who you think is the third Premiership club to have taken an interest.

Just when I thought that today's post would be sparse, I see the news on BBC Sport that Man U are 'targetting Viduka'. Now if there's one thing that will make sure that Sir Alec sticks to a healthy diet, it'll be the sight of the Dom Joly of football in a Man United shirt.

As you may remember, the main reason behind the possibility of this deal taking place is Leeds United's poor financial record. Happily, thanks to an agreement Leeds have signed with their creditors, they have averted the immediate threat of administration, and we will all be able to see them get relegated before the club falls to pieces.

And continuing our Liverpool news from yesterday, Gérard has warned his players that they will "rot in the reserves" if they do not improve from their midweek Carling Cup shambles, although this is something that Bosko Balaban has enjoyed for the last 2 years at Villa. Nevertheless, they finally came to their senses yesterday and paid him off...now for Peter Crouch (rememember him?) and the rest.

Finally, after last week's excitement of the Euro 2004 draw, this afternoon Germany will be hosting the draw for the 2006 World Cup qualifying groups. More on that once it's taken place, but I'm sure that all the guests there will be pleased to hear that Pierluigi Collina has replaced the well-known football legend that is Sting, who pulled out on Monday. See, there is a footballing God after all.

Werder Bremen open up a major can o' whupass on Hertha Berlin and spank them well and truly 6-1 in the DFB-Cup (FA Cup equivalent). The main consequence of this is that Huub Stevens, the man who has had numerous second chances to turn things around, finally bids farewell to Hertha and leaves them second from bottom in the league.
It's certainly been a giant-killing round, as Leverkusen lost out to some village team, and Cologne and Freiburg go out to 2nd division teams on penalties and a single goal respectively. Of the top teams, only Bayern and Werder remain, while Gladbach, the third Bundesliga team left in the competition, beat a weakened Stuttgart team 4-2; a noticeable result as the boys from Schwabia have still only conceded 3 goals in the league.

Oh…and those charming Galatasaray fans created 100,000 Euros worth of damage during the Champions League game against Juve in Dortmund this week. And had a pitch invasion to boot. No doubt those nice men at UEFA will have something to say about that. One suspects that Dortmund's neighbours Schalke are now looking forward to their hosting of the Chelsea-Besiktas game next week even more.

Liverpool bow out after what appears to have been a cracking game of football against Bolton. Nevertheless, Gerard must be worried about the fact that yet another door to European football for next season has been slammed firmly in his face.

Man Utd Boys 2nd Reserve team lose 0-2 to the Baggies, but then Alex Ferguson was probably too busy thinking of who else deserves a backlash besides Wenger, the FA, FIFA, etc., than to concentrate on how to beat West Brom. Chelsea make surprisingly hard work of Reading, while Villa...oh who cares about Villa.

Everton, like their Merseyside rivals, go out in the fourth round as they lose 5-4 on penalties to Boro, who will be facing Spurs for a place in the semi's. Perhaps, the most unusual aspect of their 3-1 win against a below-par Man City was that Postiga finally put one in the back of the net (after about 25 attempts). He couldn't have picked a better time as it will no doubt be his last appearence for while with the return of Freddie Kanoute likely to place him firmly back on the bench.

Quarter-final draw
Bolton v Southampton
Aston Villa v Chelsea
West Brom v Arsenal
Tottenham v Middlesbrough

We still don't know who the three Premiership clubs are who have made offers for Rivaldo, but Liverpool isn't one of them apparently. His agent has stated that, "it's not a question of money with him, he wants to play in the right team". Presumably that would be the team that pays the right amount of money. Ah, Mr Abramovich, fancy meeting you here...

Ah...Sepp Blatter. Everybody's favourite FIFA president. The man with a dubious financial history, who also manages to irritate everybody (and I mean everybody) in world football. Remember the 2000 FIFA Club World Championship? That was his brainwave. Hmmm.
And his latest demand is for top divisions to be cut to 16 teams. Which will no doubt go down well in Europe (where the top leagues have 18 teams), but especially so in England whic would mean 4 clubs being knocked out of the Premiership and a loss of revenue for the others. Let's face it, it's not exactly what football needs is it?

Elsewhere Arsenal Youths beat Wolves Old Boys 5-1, while Southampton win 2-0 in the Battle of the South Coast Part 1. Meanwhile three Premiership clubs have apparently made offers for Rivaldo, who is now wandering through Europe after having worn through the bench at Milan.

Ok, so here's my first proper-ish post on Round And White, although the site is still very much under construction and various ideas are still flitting across cyberspace (isn't that right Max?). What's it all about? Well, once things are up and running, Max and I will be attempting to provide regular posts on what's going on in the Premiership, Europe and beyond. At least that's the idea.

Naturally, as we will try and be as objective as possible, but it is likely that we might slip in a bit of Man U-bashing when appropriate. Apart from that we'll be commenting on the day's or weekend's footballing news, results and events, and if it's going well, then we may have to do a Euro 2004 theme too. If you fancy contributing yourself, then email us.

If you've got any good links that you think deserve a place on the site and/or think that the site itself could be improved then let us know.

So go out and spread the word.