The festive football continues today, with the start of gameweek twenty. And, finally, it looks like we’ll get a full compliment of Premier League fixtures to enjoy. That means five 3pm kick-offs today, followed by two evening games. To follow all the action, join us in our Dugout Discussion, which is now open and will stay open for the entirety of the day’s play…
Team news for the five games starting soon is in, and here it all is…
Spurs XI: Gomes, Hutton, Dawson, Kaboul, Assou-Ekotto, Lennon, Palacios, Modric, Bale, Pavlyuchenko, Van der Vaart.
Newcastle XI: Krul, Coloccini, Steven Taylor, Perch, Tiote, Barton, Routledge, Simpson, Smith, Gutierrez, Carroll.
Starting at White Hart Lane for Spurs’ game against Newcastle and as you can see, there are no major surprises, except maybe that Roman Pavlyuchenko comes in for the suspended Jermain Defoe, and not Peter Crouch.
Stoke XI: Begovic, Wilkinson, Shawcross, Huth, Collins, Pennant, Whitehead, Delap, Etherington, Walters, Jones.
Fulham XI: Schwarzer, Pantsil, Hangeland, Hughes, Baird, Davies, Murphy, Etuhu, Duff, Dempsey, Andrew Johnson.
At the Britannia Stadium, Stoke name an unchanged team from Boxing Day, but Fulham make a couple of notable changes. In comes Andrew Johnson and, elsewhere in the team, out goes Carlos Salcido.
Sunderland XI: Gordon, Elmohamady, Onuoha, Ferdinand, Bardsley, Henderson, Cattermole, Meyler, Welbeck, Bent, Gyan
Blackpool XI: Kingson, Eardley, Cathcart, Evatt, Crainey, Taylor-Fletcher, Vaughan, Sylvestre, Varney, Grandin, Campbell
Danny Welbeck is restored to the starting line-up as expected, having been ineligible against his parent club on Boxing Day. I’m not sure if Blackpool line-up “as expected”, as they play so rarely these days, but Charlie Adam is finally serving his one-match suspension.
West Brom XI: Carson, Jara, Scharner, Tamas, Shorey, Tchoyi, Mulumbu, Morrison, Dorrans, Thomas, Odemwingie.
Blackburn XI: Robinson, Hanley, Nelsen, Olsson, Salgado, Emerton, Dunn, Pedersen, Kalinic, Mame Diouf, El-Hadji Diouf.
Still no Chris Samba for Rovers, which means Grant Hanley gets his second start in as many games. As for the Baggies, Nicky Shorey starts instead of Marek Cech.
Man City XI: Hart, Richards, Kompany, Lescott, Zabaleta, Vieira, De Jong, Yaya Toure, Adam Johnson, Silva, Balotelli.
Aston Villa XI: Friedel, Lichaj, Collins, Cuellar, Warnock, Albrighton, Reo-Coker, Petrov, Downing, Bannan, Agbonlahor.
The (late) team news of the day comes at Eastlands, where Roberto Mancini shuffles his squad massively.
