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Saturday, August 31, 2013

NFL - Tim Tebow cut by Patriots - what now?

The New England Patriots released 25-year-old Tim Tebow on Saturday, deciding to carry just two QBs on their final 53-man roster.

Head Coach Bill Belichick and the New England Patriots took a chance on the former Heisman winner in pre-season, but Tebow went 11 for 30 for 145 yards, two touchdowns, two picks and a dreadful seven sacks.

Belichick apparently didn't see much better in practice and the Pats essentially gave up on using Tebow, an excellent athlete, in any non-quarterback role such as running back or tight end.

This might be it for Tebow in the NFL, and it's been a downward spiral since January 2012 when Tebow he connected on an 80-yard touchdown pass to lead the Denver Broncos to an overtime victory over Pittsburgh.

At that moment he was probably most famous player in the NFL. While there were still plenty of doubts about his ability, the idea he wouldn't throw a single touchdown in the 2012 season and not be picked up by any NFL team in 2013 was unthinkable.

So what now? Sitting on the free agents list waiting for a call from a team that suffers a series of injuries? That's not supposed to be how it goes for Heisman winners !

Friday, August 30, 2013

SUPER CUP : Bayern Munich beat Chelsea on penalties after last gasp equaliser.

Bayern Munich grabbed hold of the UEFA Super Cup, winning on penalties after the two sides battled to a 2-2 draw in 120 minutes.

Fernando Torres had given Chelsea the lead early in the first half, but Frank Ribery scored to level the scores just after halftime.

Eden Hazard gave Chelsea a 2-1 lead early in extra-time, but Javi Martinez equalised in the 120th minute to send the match into a penalty shoot-out.

The first nine penalties were all converted, but Chelsea's Romelu Lukaku decided on a stutter-step with the final kick and keeper Manuel Neuer made a sprawling save to claim the trophy.

FINAL : BAYERN MUNICH 2-2 CHELSEA
Bayern Munich win 5-4 on penalties.

Thursday, August 29, 2013

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE - Group Stage Draw announced


The draw for the group stages of the UEFA Champions League has been made, and there are some big clubs that will clash in group play.

Group B sees Real Madrid and Juventus facing each other, while Group H has Barcelona and AC Milan as the top two seeds.

 Arsenal have a tricky start versus Borussia Dortmund, Marseille and Napoli while Manchester United is up against Shakhtar Donetsk, Bayer Leverkusen and Real Sociedad.

Bayern Munich take on Manchester City, CSKA Moscow and Viktoria Plzen while Chelsea have an easier group of Schalke, FC Basel and Steaua Bucharest.

The first round of group matches will be played on 17-18 September.

Full Champions League draw:
--------------------------------------------
Group A: Manchester United, Shakhtar Donetsk, Bayer Leverkusen, Real Sociedad
Group B: Real Madrid, Juventus, Galatasaray, FC Copenhagen
Group C: Benfica, Paris St-Germain, Olympiakos, Anderlecht
Group D: Bayern Munich, CSKA Moscow, Manchester City, Viktoria Plzen
Group E: Chelsea, Schalke, FC Basel, Steaua Bucharest
Group F: Arsenal, Marseille, Borussia Dortmund, Napoli
Group G: Porto, Atletico Madrid, Zenit St Petersburg, Austria Vienna
Group H: Barcelona, AC Milan, Ajax, Celtic
 
The 2014 Champions League final will be held at Benfica's Stadium of Light in Lisbon.

TRANSFER - Arsenal bring in Mathieu Flamini on free transfer

Former Arsenal midfielder Mathieu Flamini has returned to Arsenal on a free transfer.

Flamini had been training with the north London club in recent weeks after being released by AC Milan in the summer. The 29-year-old France international, spent four years at the Gunners from 2004 to 2008.

Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger said of his new signing :
"He is a player of real quality, with a fantastic work rate and great mentality."

"He can play as a defensive midfielder or provide cover for first-choice full-backs Bacary Sagna and Kieran Gibbs."

"As we know, Mathieu is a strong midfielder, but is also comfortable playing in defence too. He is a very good addition to our squad."

Saturday, August 24, 2013

BETTING : Bet365 give risk-free £25 in-play bet on Man Utd v Chelsea.

Top UK bookmaker Bet365 are giving a risk-free £25 in-play bet on Monday nights feature game between Manchester United v Chelsea at Old Trafford.



To qualify for your free In-Play bet, simply place a bet on Manchester United v Chelsea at Bet365 before kick-off, then once the game starts place another bet on any In-Play market.

If your FIRST In-Play bet loses then Bet365 will refund this stake, up to the same value as your largest pre-match bet (max £25 or currency equivalent).

Check it out at Bet365 Now.

bet365

BETTING : Coral offer free £10 in-play bet on Fulham v Arsenal

Fulham v Arsenal – Coral offer free £10 in-play bet on Fulham v Arsenal.

Have a £/€10 bet before kick-off on the Fulham v Arsenal match and Coral will give you a free £/€10 bet to use in-play during the match.

TERMS AND CONDITIONS :
Offer applies to website & mobile Coral customers aged 18 years or over whose accounts are registered in the UK or Republic of Ireland.

Free bet Token will be credited to customer at 12:46 BST, and will expire after the match is finished.

Check it out at Coral now.

And of course if you are not a customer of Coral already you can join up and get a further £50 free bet as a new depositing customer.


Tuesday, August 20, 2013

Brazil World Cup 2014 Tickets go on sale

Tickets for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil went on sale on Tuesday August 20th, with fans able to apply on FIFA's website.
 
FIFA is expecting a similar demand to Germany 2006, when there were about seven applicants for every ticket of the 64-match tournament, Around 3.3 million tickets will be available for the tournament.

Tickets will range in price from US $90 for first-round matches to $990 for the final at Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro.
 
As the process will be massively over subscribed, all applications made before 10 October 2013 will enter a random selection draw.
 
The sales of the leftover tickets will begin on 5 November on a first-come, first-served basis. Another phase will begin on 8 December after the draw is made.
 
The tournament begins on 12 June, with Brazil playing the opener in Sao Paulo.

Sunday, August 18, 2013

BETTING : We won the football pools - how did your weekend go?

We won the pools on Saturday!
We won the pools! That's right - we had a winner in the opening weekend at ColossusBets ! 

OK - it was not the 10 million GBP Colossus pool ... but it was still a winner.

After 3 games on Saturday, we had 3 winners and our writers syndicate decided to cash in our HDA 5 ticket in the Bundesliga for a an early payout.

And there does seem to be a bit of value in the HDA pools betting concept too - especially with the early cash out feature.

We had Bayern Munich, Leverkusen and Monchengladbach on Saturday ... all favourites that won and would have paid out at 5.66 at the bookies ...

But due to the guaranteed pools prize of 1,000 and the fact that there were only 39 tickets remaining we got a return of 23.01 at odds of 11.50 ...

That's a reasonable return, and twice what we would have got in the high street. It's an interesting concept for regular accumulator punters.

You can checkout the Colossus Bets website here ... just remember to use the bonus code of GOONER3FREEBETS and you will get 3 free lines to play with your first deposit of £10 or more

See our full page review of ColossusBets Pools Betting on the main site.

Win £10,000,000 at Colossus Bets

Thursday, August 15, 2013

BETTING : Colossus Bets - Pools Bettting - How to Play Video

Colossus Bets has recently launched offering normal Home-draw-away polls betting as well as their groundbreaking “Pick 7 Correct Scores” COLOSSUS football pool product.

There are all sorts of features, including the ability to "sell back some of your ticket" and bank some guaranteed profits over the course of the games.

To help new players build awareness of how much control they have over their picks, Colossus Bets has released an informative How-To-Play video via YouTube.

Watch it here!



You can check out their website at Colossus Bets now

Monday, August 12, 2013

BETTING : BetVictor offers to match your first EPL treble with a FREE treble!

UK online bookmaker BetVictor is offering a FREE matched treble to get your new seasons betting up and running.

Place a Treble on the Opening Weekend of the Premier League season and get a FREE treble on the following week's Premier League matches!

Check it out at BetVictor now.


-----

Terms And Conditions :
1.Offer applies to your first Treble in the Match Odds market across the opening set of fixtures in the Barclays Premier League, Aug 17th - 19st, inclusive.

2.'Match Odds' market means the 90 minute Win/Draw/Win market which is the main market on the match.

3.Best Bet Bundle or any other Enhanced markets featuring three teams or more will NOT count.

4.Max Free Bet stake is £/€25 per person or household.

5. Offer is open to new and existing customers from UK, Ireland and Greece

Saturday, August 10, 2013

FOOTBALL : Arsenal beat Manchester City in pre-season friendly

Arsenal enjoy Helsinki trip with a 3-1 friendly win against Manchester City.

The Gunners took an early lead when Theo Walcott chipped over Joe Hart when played in by Aaron Ramsey.
 
Walcott returned the favour after the break for Ramsey to round Hart and score in the 59th minute and 3 minutes later another Walcott pass saw Olivier Giroud lift in a third goal for Arsenal to take a 3-0 lead.
 
Manchester City striker Alvaro Negredo scored a consolation with little more than 10 minutes remaining when he side-footed under Lukasz Fabianski .
 
Arsenal begin their top-flight campaign next Saturday when Aston Villa visit the Emirates Stadium, while Man City play Newcastle at the Etihad Stadium on Monday.

UPDATED:
Link to 5 mins video highlights from official Arsenal website.
 
Arsenal: Szczesny (Fabianski 46); Sagna (Jenkinson 73), Mertesacker, Koscielny, Gibbs; Arteta (Perez 67), Wilshere (Cazorla 46), Ramsey (Hayden 88); Oxlade-Chamberlain (Zelalem 73), Walcott, Podolski (Giroud 46). Subs: Fabianski, Jenkinson, Sebastian Perez, Hayden, Zelalem, Cazorla, Giroud.
 
Manchester City: Hart; Zabaleta (Richards 46), Kompany, Lescott (Boyata 85), Clichy; Milner (Jesus Navas 46), Fernandinho (Rodwell 79), Toure (Javi Garcia 67), Silva (Jovetic 67); Dzeko (Nasri 46), Negredo. Subs: Pantilimon, Wright, Kolarov.
 
 

Friday, August 09, 2013

UEFA : Arsenal to face Fenerbahce in Champions League play-off

Arsenal will face Fenerbahce in the play-off round of the Champions League.

Arsène Wenger's side will travel to Sukru Saracoglu Stadium for the first leg on August 21, before hosting the Turkish side at Emirates Stadium six days later.

In other tough looking games, PSV Eindhoven will take on AC Milan, and Lyon face Real Sociedad.

Draw in full :
Lyon v Real Sociedad
Schalke 04 v FC Metalist Kharkiv
Pacos Ferreira v Zenit St Petersburg
PSV Eindhoven v AC Milan
Fenerbahce v ARSENAL

According to Uefa, the participation of Fenerbahçe and Metalist Kharkiv in the competition is subject to pending disciplinary and CAS proceedings.

FOOTBALL : Fabregas commits future to Barcelona

Cesc Fabregas spurns Man Utd and commits to Barcelona

Cesc Fabregas has pledged to stay with Barcelona, ending Manchester United's hopes of signing the midfielder.

Manchester United had two bids rejected during the close season and were considering a third offer, which would have broken the club record of £30.7m.

Fabregas said : "I am very happy at Barcelona and I haven't spoken to any other club in the last two years ... Triumphing in Barcelona has been my dream since I was a child,"

FOOTBALL : Arsenal complete £8m transfer deal !!

But ... Arsenal are SELLING .. not buying !


Gervinho has joined Italian Serie A side Roma from Arsenal in an £8m deal.

(You had to be mad to think that Wenger had finally prised open his chequebook !!)

Gervinho was signed from Lille by Gunners boss Arsene Wenger in 2011, but managed only four goals in his first season before scoring seven last season. But the Ivory Coast international striker found his first-team opportunities limited at the Emirates last season, mainly because he seemed to waste about five times as many chances as he converted.

An Arsenal statement read: "Everyone would like to thank Gervinho for his contribution to the club and wish him well for his future career."

Gervinho is the 13th signing this summer by Roma coach Rudi Garcia, whose side finished sixth in Serie A last season. THIRTEEN new players !!!

IF you want to see whether Arsenal have spent any money yet - just bookmark our special Arsenal transfer blog post

Tuesday, August 06, 2013

BETTING : Punter turns $10 into over $9000 with MLB parlay bet at BOVADA

One US-based sports punter who reads GoonersGuide had a successful day on Sunday 4th August, turning a single $10 parlay bet into a total return of $9022.29 !!

The reader had a 12-team ML baseball parlay bet at top offshore sportsbook Bovada on a day where 15 games were played and when MOST results went the way they were expected to go.

Detroit Tigers, Boston Red Sox, Baltimore Orioles, Tampa Bay Rays, and the Pittsburgh Pirates all won at home to no-ones surprise, but the bettor still had to get through some tricky results to get a collect.

Did you have the St Louis Cardinals to win in Cincinnati?
Or The Texas Rangers to beat the Oakland Athletics?
Or the San Diego Padres to beat the travelling Yankees?

Our punter did all three as the Cards won 15-2 (!), the Padres beat the Yankees 6-3, and The Rangers beat the A's 4-zip!

Well done Sir, and if you want to start writing a regular column for the GoonersGuide on baseball betting - then we'd be very happy to hear from you and host it!

In the meantime you can visit Bovada Sportsbook here, or read our full page review of Bovada's sports betting site here.