Venue: St James'Park, NE1. Date: 5th February 2012 Kick Off: 1.30pm Referee: Mark Halsey. Well, it was another three points in the bag for the Magpies as they passed the supposedly "magical" 40 point mark, with no less than 14 games of the Premiership season to go. Apart from this though, the most obvious salient [.

By FRANCO PANIZO

It took Clint Dempsey nine years to score the first hat-trick of his career, a feat he accomplished on January 7 in an FA Cup win over Charlton Athletic.

It did not take much longer for him to do it again.

Dempsey became the first American to net a hat-trick in the Premiership on Saturday.

Gone too soon

It has been a difficult period for the sport. This weekend, Socrates, the cerebral and commanding midfield general of the 1982 and 1986 Tele Santana led Brazilian teams passed away, battling the physical ravages of alcoholism. Last week, Gary Speed the effervescent Wales manager and Leeds standout tragically ended his life for reasons as yet unknown.

Leroy Lita had the chance to cover himself with glory against Villa last week. After superbly turning the Villa defender, he dragged his shot just wide of the post. That sums up Swansea's problem in their first Premiership season. This lack of a cutting edge may eventually drag the Swans back into a relegation dogfight.

It's not a particularly new question but in the light of recent Spurs results it's one that's worth asking once again.

Unless you're lucky enough to remember the great double winning side of 1960/61, you'll probably recall the trophy winning teams of the last forty years: Four league cups, 3 FA Cups and 2 UEFA wins with sadly no league triumphs mixed in.

There have been some reports that Newcastle United's top scorer in the Premiership season so far, Demba Ba, may miss Newcastle United's next game with Tottenham Hotspur in two weeks. According to the AFP (Agence France-Presse) newsagency, the player turned his ankle before just before being substituted by Peter Lovenkrands in yesterday's game with Wolves [.

These are exciting times to be supporters of either Manchester United or Manchester City. The two Manchester clubs are currently slugging it out at the top of the Premiership. Whatever City can do with their expensively assembled superstars, United are outdoing them with their expensively acquired youngsters!

Wolves' manager Mick McCarthy's only injury concern is over Matt Jarvis but the Molineux side expect him to be fit and take his place in an unchanged line up tomorrow. That will see Jamie O'Hara face his old club for the first time since completing a £5m move from White Hart Lane in the summer.

Just as it was expected, Manchester City striker, Edin Dzeko received acknowledgment for his recent fine performances in the league after being named as Barclays Player of the Month.

Obviously the award was designated for the player's fine form in August, scoring in all of Man City's matches for that month, including the wonderful quart-trick he bagged against Tottenham Hotspurs on City's latest premiership match.

photo by Joe Toth/ISIphotos.com

By FRANCO PANIZO

Jozy Altidore isn't the only one lighting up the scoreboards during the early part of the European season.

Robbie Findley scored his third goal of the season across all competitions for Nottingham Forest in its 4-1 loss to West Ham United.

Look who's back. the reunion is earlier than expected

And we thought we could get a few months to move on, pretend he never existed, and then came Thursday and the Champions League Draw.

Lets step back and take a look at the last few days and two very positive and exciting pieces of news.

Manchester United are one of the most dominant footballing forces in the world. Since the Premier League began back in the 1992-93 season, The Red Devils have won the prestigious title a total of 12 times – more than any other Premiership club. Another impressive statistic is the fact that they've never finished outside the top-4.

Old hat it may be for everyone else, but here at AANP Towers we bounce around the walls like toddlers on a strict diet of fizzy drinks and E-numbers as we await the start of our Premiership season. Still, rather than pacing the corridors, rubbing hands together in feverish anticipation until tomorrow night, it occurred to me that the time is rather ripe for making public the various musings that have echoed around the walls of AANP Towers all summer.

Stop me if you've heard this one before but it seems that Spurs have defensive problems ahead of the away leg against Hearts on Thursday night and the start of our premiership season.

William Gallas is struggling with the injury that kept him out of Tottenham's entire pre-season campaign while club captain Ledley King is approaching what for him is match fitness and has an outside chance of making it for the game with Manchester United.

Eyes on new-look Liverpool as Sunderland spoil the party is a post from: Just Football

by Nate Williams

Sebastian Larsson made a superb start for Sunderland to score on his debut and earn them a point at Liverpool.

It took only five minutes for the first penalty of the premiership season to be awarded after Kieran Richardson tripped Luis Suarez.

Extended match highlights. In what seems to be somwthing of a tradition now, Newcastle United faced their usual stiff test against one of the 'top four' clubs in their first game of the Premiership season. Those who might have been expecting a repeat of the last fixture against the Gunners were to be disappointed.

Both Liverpool and Arsenal are both looking for a top class centre-back to shore up their defences ahead of the new Premiership season, and according to reports they are both trying to decide between the same pair of candidates. The Mail reports that Pat Rice and Steve Crowley were both among the scouts at Tottenham's [.

Football is back. I should be excited. But I'm not. And that's unusual. The impending football season for me is like the unwanted return of the Genital Herpes which you thought you had shaken off, only to return when you least expect it. This really shouldn't be how I feel.

The Championship is a few days away and is swiftly followed by the return of the Premiership season.

I haven't been posting a lot in recent times. But in retrospect, there hasn't been much to be excited about. Prior to the off-season, immense focus was put on the next destination of Cesc Fabregas, Scott Parker, Carlton Cole and the likes. Just like the Premiership season that the Red Devils clinched, the transfer activity has been a damp squib.

Lightning indeed strikes twice in the same spot, but this still remains a less reliable proposition than seeing the Old Firm finishing one on top of another in any given Scottish Premiership season. Despite this, the engagement of a new campaign in the Scottish top flight prompts enough questions in need of answering that makes the competition worth a mention.

As the Premiership season moves ever closer, pundits, armchair fans and football purists make their case for their club.

Will Man Utd once again lift the Premiership crown? Can big spending Man City finally mount a serious challenge to the title? Can Kenny Daglish inspire Liverpool to glory?

Liverpool have been reshaping their squad ever since the January transfer window opened midway through the 2010/11 Premiership season.
Fernando Torres' departure came about as Kenny Dalglish was appointed as the new manager of Liverpool. He soon had to make a fundamental decision along with the support from the owners and the chairman as to whether he should cash in on the out-of-form striker, or hope the once prolific front-man could regain his status as one of the most exciting Premier League players around.

As we draw towards the close of another Premiership season, I wanted to offer a few random thoughts about how things have played out and, of course, a view on Tottenham Hotspur's year.

Tottenham's year

One of the things that has been creeping into conversations I have had recently with fellow Spurs fans, is the desire to avoid being in the Europa League next season, preferring to miss out on Europe all together.

Well it's that time of the year again, with only two games to go until the end of the Premiership season. We will neither be relegated nor qualify for Europen competition, and look set to be comfortable somewhere in the middle in what has proved to be one of the most competitive seasons in Premier [.

STARTERS
The injury to Stuart Holden's knee is so bad that he will be out of action for 6 months, meaning he will miss the rest of this season at Bolton and the Gold Cup with the USA. Via the Guardian.
dN
Clint Dempsey became the first American to score 10 goal in a Premiership season over the weekend.

The Arsenal boss Arsene Wenger has always resisted making gruelling long distance pre-season tours (in favour of low-key European tours like Austria) to help prepare his team to get a flying start at the beginning of the Premiership season. But the Mirror reports today that he has been persuaded by the shareholders to consider a [.

Wayne Rooney set the benchmark to beat for the best goal in the Premiership season. It clinched victory over crosstown rivals Citeh in dramatic fashion. In the most watched derby in Premiership history. But Alex Terra's goal has been adjudged the best in the less celebrated confines of A-League history.

You got it, it's fact of the Day time. But before we get in to it, I'm going to start with another fact: 'This player was the first Norwegian to win an FA cup (1991)'

"Tottenham goalkeeper Erik Thorstvedt became the first Premier League substitute when he replaced Ian Walker in the first Premiership season in 1992″

Related posts:

1. Fact of the Day.

A familiar sight - RVP nursing an ankle

Juventus is reportedly preparing a £20million bid for Robin Van Persie as a replacement for Alessandro Del Piero, now 36 years and close to retirement. This might be a sick twisted attempt to get Van Persie and Giorgio Chiellini reacquainted on the same side of the field.