What a game in store for us this afternoon. As was said earlier this week a barometer game. A resurgent Sunderland looking to continue their very surprising run against an Arsenal team confident as a result of last week's big win.

And yet, in my opinion both appear to be skating on thin ice.

By Chris Wright

'Twas a bit of a slow one yesterday as anyone who spent 11-and-a-bit hours 'glued' to the live feed will tell you, with the total spending across the English leagues failing to surpass the £50 million that Chelsea spaffed on Fernando Torres this time last year let alone the ludicrous £225 million that was spent in total in January of 2011.

Goals:
Adam (og) 45'
Maxi 53'
Liverpool have been massively unlucky in an awful lot of matches, but this one's going to take some beating. Another terrible, horrible, no good, very bad home draw in a season already chock-full of them.
Blackburn had exactly one chance, from Dunn in the 79th, on the break and spoiled by his own teammate.

Sunderland may not be in trophy-winning form this season, but their victory in the always-eventful 'sack race' may prove to be a blessing in disguise.

After looking tame and lacking confidence for much of this campaign under Steve Bruce, with a paltry 11 points from 14 matches their return, new club chairman Ellis Short felt the club needed to go in a new direction.

By Alan Duffy

Sunderland 2-2 Aston Villa Premier League 29th October 2011

Aston Villa boss Alex McLeish was left frustrated after watching his side twice throw away a lead, with Sunderland's Stephane Sessegnon ultimately nodding home a late equaliser to give Sunderland a share of the points.

The two Scandinavian's ( N.B-52 + Seb Larsson) were both arguably their countries pin up hero's last week, with featured player Nicklas Bendtner getting the winner and his 15th International goal for Denmark to send them top of their group ahead of an strong Portugal side boasting the likes of Cristiano Ronaldo, Luiz Nani and R.

Video goals, highlights, reaction

The best and the worst of Arsenal were on display yesterday, which is par for the course these days, but the influence and quality of captain Robin van Persie ensured we took three invaluable points.

The first 20-25 minutes were a taste of what this Arsenal side has the potential to do when their tails are up and the confidence starts to flow.

We've already had a look at how things stand going into the final round of qualifying for the 2012 European Championships now lets have a look at the top five important stats so far in the qualifying stages so far.

Top Fives:

Goals Scored:
Holland... 35
Germany...

I have the official starting eleven for Sweden for this evening's away game in Helsinki with the official starting time being 18:15 (Central European Time).

Sweden will appear in the following order:

Isaksson

Lustig, Majstorovic, Mellberg, Olsson

Elm, Källström

Larsson, Elmander, Wilhelmsson

Ibrahimovic

It's the same basic 4-2-3-1 that we have been driving with the entirety of the 2012 campaign.

Sunderland were left shell shocked earlier on when West Bromwich Albion took a 2 goal lead in the first 5 minutes. Firstly a foul was given middway through the Mackems half, It was swung in by Chris Brunt and Scotsman James Morrison got on the end of it with a header to put the visiting side in the lead.

Nicklas Bendtner was starting for the third time in a row when Sunderland travelled South to take on newly promoted to the Barclays Premiership, Norwich City. You could tell that Nicklas and co were getting a little more used to their roles and how each other play with some nice crisp passing and some nice movement between all the new signings.

By Alan Duffy

Despite spending a fair amount of money on his Sunderland team, Steve Bruce has endured a rather rubbish start to the season. However, at home to Stoke on Sunday, the Black Cats finally marked their territory by weeing all over the Potters.

Not famed for his goalscoring ability, Titus Bramble opened the scoring while summer signings Craig Gardner and Seb Larsson also helped to give the Black Cats their first win of the new season.

On Saturday NB52 made his debut Vs Chelsea, he had a decent game and came deep at times to link up play with old team-mate Seb Larsson, at times maybe he was a bit rusty, which you can understand, but he is a top player with alot of all round talent... Anyway heres his debut and thanks to MilanKakaBaros, A.

Nicklas Bendtner had started the game on Saturday afternoon against a really strong Chelsea side and put in a decent job. It was hard for NB to be fair at times because Chelsea had much of the ball against a Sunderland side that look still to be gelling with all the signings they've made post season.

We haven't mentioned Joey Barton's performance much in yesterday's terrific 1-0 win at Sunderland. Joey Barton - Tarzan after throwing shirt to fans But it was Joey's header that was going into the goal before Seb Larsson handled the ball, to prevent it going over the goal line after only 15 minutes.

We haven't mentioned Joey Barton's performance much in yesterday's terrific 1-0 win at Sunderland. Joey Barton - Tarzan after throwing shirt to fans But it was Joey's header that was going into the goal before Seb Larsson handled the ball, to prevent it going over the goal line after only 15 minutes.

By Rumour Monger

After spending the summer making a decuplet of signings that all rate somewhere fairly high on the 'impressive' spectrum (Wes Brown, John O'Shea, Connor Wickham, Seb Larsson, Craig Gardner, etc), Sunderland are about to add an eleventh and, perhaps, this one is the most impressive of them all.

• Kop That: Steven Gerrard to begin light training at Liverpool http://t.co/4vWjXLg 22:45:02, 2011-08-15
• Kop That: Raul Meireles is Chelsea's latest target http://t.co/p99Ud3f 22:29:38, 2011-08-15
• Kop That: Steven Gerrard ready to step up rehabilitation http://t.co/QBQTYLZ 20:17:06, 2011-08-15
• The Kop That Daily is out!

Suarez nods home... First of all folks may i say how nice it is to be back blogging! If you didn't know i was in Majorca for 10 days hence the missing Valencia post, whilst i was out there i luckily managed to watch the Liverpool match in an Irish bar, it was bloody sweltering heat and i had to squint all the way through the match but I'm glad i got to watch it all instead of relying on

All the goals from Anfield as Liverpool took on Sunderland on Saturday August 13th 2011 as the new Premier League season got underway.

Suarez Missed Penalty

Liverpool 1 v 0 Sunderland : Suarez (12mins)

Liverpool 1 v 1 Sunderland : Larsson (57mins)

Image: Daylife
Video: matchhighlight.

New Liverpool left-back Jose Enrique was satisfied with his debut performance on Saturday and is not discouraged by the team's winless start.
The Spaniard was thrown in at the deep end, starting the Reds' 1-1 draw with Sunderland after taking part in just one training session with his new team-mates after completing his move on Friday.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Seb Larsson's stunner at Anfield, United's late winner, Gervinho's red card and more pictures of the weekend's sport

Click on the arrows to see a gallery of memorable images from the weekend's sporting action

View the full story here: Talksport

A news article on 2011-08-15 10:33:49 from: Talksport

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Liverpool 1-1 Sunderland: Larsson shocks Anfield with stunning strike to claim point after Suarez misses penalty & scores in dramatic start

Black Cats rally to take a point on the opening day of the season as debutant strikes with stunning volley to eqalise following Uruguayan's opener and penalty miss

View the full story here: Goal

A news article on 2011-08-13 16:00:00 from: Goal

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Liverpool 1-1 Sunderland: Larsson shocks Anfield with stunning strike to claim point after Suarez misses penalty & scores in dramatic start

Black Cats rally to take a point on the opening day of the season as debutant strikes with stunning volley to eqalise following Uruguayan's opener and penalty miss

View the full story here: Goal

A news article on 2011-08-13 16:00:00 from: Goal

This news item has been reproduced from today's media.

Last season's 'prediction' wasn't a complete failure – at least in the top seven. I had Chelsea pipping United to the title (which looked possible until the Blues bought that misfiring traitorous foreigner), City and Arsenal in third and fourth, and Liverpool ahead of Tottenham – insane in retrospect, but still would have happened had Liverpool won its final two matches.

One of Arsenal's promising youngsters is at the crossroads in his career at Arsenal. Former youth team captain Jay Emmanuel-Thomas will find out whether he will remain an Arsenal player or become yet another one of our youngsters to be sold to a Championship team.

Ipswich Town are reported to have offered Arsenal £1M for the utility dynamo.

Liverpool could be set to make a £10million move for Lee Cattermole with the Sunderland player devastated at losing the captaincy to new boy John O'Shea.
Black Cats boss Steve Bruce has handed his recent signing from Manchester United the armband, delivering a massive blow to the tenacious Cattermole.

The media made a big fuss when Liverpool secured the signing of Jordan Henderson for a fee in the region of £20M from Sunderland. Some people even questioned whether Arsenal had been left behind in this deal. Arsenal fans remained silent, not out of shock at missing out on a good player, but because we all knew we had at least three British players on our books better than Henderson.

Liverpool and Arsenal are ready to battle it out for Birmingham City ­centre- half Scott Dann – but prices in the Blues' clear-out are proving too high.
Kenny Dalglish and Arsene Wenger are keen on the 24-year-old defender, who is viewed as a cheap alternative to other targets like Bolton's Gary Cahill and Blackburn's Chris Samba.