Cardiff City Fans Face Transport Problems

Miller celebrates his decisive goal 

Whilst Cardiff’s 1-0 win at Upton Park against West Ham last Sunday was overshadowed by the events in Tottenham, crowd trouble of a different kind is aggravating Cardiff Fans. Arriva Trains Wales have decided to stop trains calling at Ninian Park station for Bluebirds' home games during a 3 hour period.

Arriva claim the decision was taken so as to “better suit the needs of passengers.” Yet the Cardiff City Supporter’s trust thinks differently, and has urged Arriva to reconsider the decision. The Arriva Chair, Tim Hartley said he does not believe there are capacity issues at Ninian Park station ahead of games because "supporters do not arrive in huge numbers at the same time". Hartley also added that there was a lack of consultation about the decision, which means fans will have to use Grangetown station, which is further away from the stadium, a good ten minute walk compared to the convenience of using Ninian Park.

Arriva said to those placing Bet365 Free Bets that the plans for the suspension of services to Ninian Park were made in conjuction with the British Transport Police, Cardiff City FC, South Wales Police and the Welsh Assembly Government.

In other news there has been no end in sight to the confrontation between the Football League and the news organisations that saw coverage of the first round of Championship matches being severely restricted in comparison with the start of last season Sports journalists from national titles, news and picture agencies were locked out of all but a handful of the 36 football league games after talks broke down last Wednesday between the Football league and a media coalition. Many, but not all, national newspapers dropped match reports over the weekend, with a number also dropping, or limiting, mentions of sponsors' names.

Many regional newspapers which take copy and pictures from news and picture services were also affected after the Press Association, a major supplier of sports content, last Friday that it would not be covering any Football League fixtures over the forthcoming weekend. Speaking of this weekend, it is time to look at Bookmakers Free Bets  and decide who you are backing for the win!

Can Manchester City Win Without Tevez?

Tevez suspended for City's match against West Ham

Any player who has a record of 30 goals in 50 Premier League appearances is going to be missed, so it is understandable that Roberto Mancini is calling for his Manchester City players to stand up, and be counted in the absence of Carlos Tevez.

Those following the Live match score centre closely when City are involved will note that they have won just one game without Tevez goal all year – a 2-0 win away at West Brom – and he has scored nearly half of all their goals this season, 10 out of 21.


His goals have blasted City up to fourth in the table and a win at bottom-placed club West Ham on Saturday will see them leapfrog Chelsea into third.

Considering the amount of money spent at the City of Manchester Stadium in recent years, it is surprising to see them rely so heavily on one player. However, thanks to a fifth yellow card of the season picked up against Bolton last week (where he scored the only goal of course), Carlos Tevez will be suspended.

Mario Balotelli will take Tevez's place against West Ham

With fellow striker Emmanuel Adebayor unable to train this week thanks to a groin injury, £25 million striker Mario Bolotelli looks set to step in.

Livescore football pundits note that the  controversial 20-year-old striker has yet to really settle since his big money move from Inter Milan in the summer, and was involved in a training ground altercation with team-mate Jerome Boateng earlier this month. However, City assistant boss David Platt believes the Italian is the best finisher at the club and has backed him to do the business against the Hammers.

In the absence of the influential Tevez, it’s Bolotelli’s big chance to prove it. What do you think? Can Manchester City win without Tevez? Comment below!

Boateng to Manchester City and Hitzlsperger to West Ham

While there have been plenty of injuries with the upcoming World Cup like Ferdinand, Ballack, Pirlo, Altidore, Robben, Essien, and Africa's very own Drogba, there have been two very interesting signings which have made their way to the English Premier League.

Both of them are German and only one of them will be going to the World Cup, they're Jerome Boateng and Thomas Hitzlsperger.

Boateng at the age of 21 made the 2010 Germany World Cup team and was signed by Manchester City from Hamburg for an undisclosed fee although it seems like Manchester City will be paying about 15 million dollars to the German club. Boateng has signed a 5-year deal and is the third player to move from Hamburg to the blue side of Manchester, Mancini said that he wanted a quality player that could play in a variety of defensive positions, and Boateng could be the perfect player for the Italian.

Hitzlsperger on the other hand was left out of the German team traveling to South Africa and is 28 years old, so the German was looking to revitalize his career. Hitzlsperger was included in the 2006 World Cup squad and in the 2008 DURO squad, so Thomas will be looking to make the squad for the 2012 EUROs. What better way to do that then to join Avram Grant, the manager who took Chelsea to the champions League final and revitalized what seemed like a dead and buried Portsmouth. What's also great is that the stingy owners at West Ham landed this top quality player on a free-transfer, so we could see some more cunning signings by West Ham as they hopefully steer clear of relegation next season.

Gianfranco Zola shocked by fan hooliganism at West Ham vs Millwall

Gianfranco Zola stated that he was shocked by the fan violence at the Carling Cup game between West Ham and Millwall, the two clubs are long time rivals and much hooliganism is in the form of gangs.

West Ham won the game 3-1 in extra time, first Harris scored for Millwall in the 26th minute, then West Ham equalized in the 87th with Stanislas to take the two London teams into extra time. In the 98th Stanislas scored again from the penalty spot and Hines finished it off in the 100th minute