Nick is a soccer and motor 
sport fan, video game junkie
and appreciater of all things 
Japanese, trapped inside a 
mundane office job and looking 
for a way out.

Any offers? Send them here...
or check out his LatAm futbol 
blog here.

Sunderland



Players In: Dickson Etuhu (Norwich, £1.5m), Kieran Richardson (Manchester United, undisclosed), Greg Halford (Reading, £2.5m), Russell Anderson (Aberdeen, £1m), Michael Chopra (Cardiff City, £5m), Paul McShane (West Brom, £2.5m), Craig Gordon (Hearts, £9m), Roy O'Donovan (Cork City, undisclosed).

Players Out: Kenny Cunningham (released), Tommy Miller (Ipswich, released), Stephen Elliott (Wolves, undisclosed).

Roy Keane did brilliantly to win the Championship and secure promotion to the Premiership in his first season in charge.

He has signed a mixture of solid young players and a few with a point to prove, who will join players such as Dwight Yorke who already have Premiership experience.

Keane might not have the most talented squad at his disposal, but if even half of his winning mentality rubs off onto his players then Sunderland should be able to survive instant relegation back to the Championship.

It will certainly be interesting to see him face off against the likes of Jose Mourinho and Alex Ferguson on the touchline.

Prediction: 16th
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Tottenham Hotspur



Players In: Gareth Bale (Southampton, £5m), Adel Taarabt (Lens, undisclosed), Yuri Berchiche (Athletic Bilbao, undisclosed), Darren Bent (Charlton £16.5m), Younes Kaboul (Auxerre, £8m), Danny Rose (Leeds, undisclosed), Kevin-Prince Boateng (Hertha Berlin, undisclosed).

Players Out: Emil Hallfredsson (Lyn-Oslo, undisclosed), Reto Ziegler (Sampdoria, undisclosed), Mark Yeates (Colchester, undisclosed), Charlie Daniels (Leyton Orient, loan).

Spurs have added a lot of competition for places with their summer signings and now have one of most impressive looking squads in the Premiership.

Younes Kaboul has looked extremely solid in defence in pre-season and offers real quality cover whilst Ledley King is injured for the early part of the season.

Darren Bent adds extra pace to their frontline and has already struck up a good partnership with Dimitar Berbatov in pre-season.

They’ve brought in Gareth Bale to solve their problems at left-back, although their left side of midfield still looks a little weak. Young Frenchmen Adel Taarabt may be the one to fill it, as the player dubbed in France as ‘the new Zidane’ embarks on his first full season in England.

I expect Spurs to be the mix with the top five throughout the season, and they should have enough to steal 4th place, and the last Champions League place away from North London rivals Arsenal.

Prediction: 4th
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West Ham United



Transfers In: : Scott Parker (Newcastle, £7m), Julien Faubert (Bordeaux, £6.1m), Richard Wright (Everton, free), Craig Bellamy (Liverpool, £7.5m), Freddie Ljungberg (West Ham, £3m).

Transfers Out: Paul Konchesky (Fulham, £3.25m), Nigel Reo-Coker (Aston Villa, £8.5m), Tyrone Mears (Derby, £1m), Yossi Benayoun (Liverpool, undisclosed), Marlon Harewood (Aston Villa, undisclosed), Teddy Sheringham (Colchester, released), Shaun Newton (Leicester, released), Roy Carroll (Rangers, free).

West Ham narrowly avoided relegation last season on the final day of the season, but should improve significantly over that this time around.
They have signed players with Premiership experience, and a forward line of Craig Bellamy and Dean Ashton has the potential to be very profitable.

However, they still don’t look to have enough to break into the top half of the table and the loss of Carlos Tevez will have a much greater effect than many at Upton Park expect it to.

Prediction: 12th
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Wigan Athletic



Players In: Antoine Sibierski (Newcastle, free), Titus Bramble (Newcastle, free), Mario Melchiot (Rennes, free), Andreas Granqvist (Helsingborg, undisclosed), Carlo Nash (Preston, £300,000), Jason Koumas (West Brom, £5.3m), Michael Brown (Fulham, undisclosed).

Players Out: Leighton Baines (Everton, undisclosed), Lee McCulloch (Rangers, £2.25m), Matt Jackson (Watford, free), Arjan de Zeeuw (released), David Unsworth (released), Andreas Johansson (AaB Aalborg, free).

Wigan only escaped relegation on the final day of last season and look set for another struggle this season.

Inspirational manager Paul Jewell left the club over the summer and his replacement Chris Hutchings had an awful the record the last time he took over from Jewell at Bradford in the late nineties.

Their signings fail to inspire and the inevitable result seems to be relegation.

Prediction: 18th