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Andre Agassi’s drug-orientated revelations have rocked sport this week; the former 8-time Grand Slam champion admitted to using crystal meth during his playing days and lying to the authorities to be extricated from the ensuing mess. Should we be surprised? Shocked? Confused? Disheartened? Not really. His book tells of far more dramatic and disconcerting scenarios regarding his father, his youth and the strains, both physical and mental, of elite sport.

Indeed, the ‘Adrian Mutu’ rule can be applied here. The disgraced and momentarily bankrupt Romanian forward was ‘sacked’ by Chelsea for failing a drugs test for cocaine. Certainly the use of recreational class-A drugs such as coke and crystal meth should be deplored as a terrible example to the billions of young sports fans across the globe that observe the movements and actions of their idols the fact is, as Mutu claimed, everybody is doing it.

Ok, ok, so ‘everybody’ is somewhat of a dangerous stretching of the truth. Not everybody obviously. But, if asked anonymously, I think the world and the press would be stunned by the large number of current athletes that have, at one point or another, taken recreational drugs. One argument is to consider that, as they bear no aid to sporting performance – the dreaded PED’s that have handicapped the legacy of a generation of cyclists, baseball players and various other athletes as well as disarming the validity of their sports – that they should be only treated as a criminal manner and not one punishable within the sporting realm. But that would be naïve. Governing bodies should be Orwellian in the pursuit of drug-takers, in whatever form, as the media presence around athletes in this era dictates that they be held to the highest moral standards. Kids expect politicians to lie, they don’t expect sportsmen to cheat.

Would it be worse for his public image if we discovered that David Beckham/Lebron James/Lewis Hamilton/Roger Federer/Albert Pujols/Tom Brady/Andrew Flintoff/Usain Bolt had taken a performance enhancing drug or a recreational one? Something to ponder in each case.

Drugs are as much a part of sport as any other facet these days. If you were paid £100,000 a week would you not find the vices of women, drugs, drink and gambling? What else is there to do? The NFL mandates that all new players attend the rookie symposium, an event hosted by former professionals to warn players of the potential failings in regard to money, friends, family, injury and temptation. Such a congress may be much valued within other sports.

Hopefully the various authorities act with discretion and temperance in regard to the use of recreational drugs which, while prohibited by law, are a part of society as much as sport. If the individuals themselves don’t have the support structure and moral education to avoid their lure – and the many others available to them – then it is the sports themselves that are as much to blame. God that’s all a bit idealistic huh? It’s early, bear with me.

Back to business.

Arsenal v Tottenham

The North London derby-ometer has almost always swung towards the Gunners since Arsene Wenger’s arrival. Rarely, however, have Spurs had such reason to travel to the home of their cross-town rivals in such positive mood; scoring freely, 5 wins in 7 away games, 4^th in the table and unbeaten in their last 4 games against Arsenal with last year’s amazing 4-4 draw sticking firmly in the memory for Harry Rednkapp’s troops.

But Arsenal have little reason to fear; a place ahead of Spurs in the table with a game in hand, the league’s leading scorers and only beaten on Manchester soil this term – Arsenal have looked imperious at home throughout the 09/10 calendar.

So, goals? Check. Drama? Check. David Bentley? Maybe. Should be a good one. 2-1 Arsenal.

Everton v Aston Villa

The Toffees, after appearing to recover from a disastrous start, all of a sudden find themselves back on their heels; 14^th in the table, no wins in 5 and are merely peering through the glass of European football right now. Even a Liverpool team in mid-seismic disaster find themselves looking far back at Everton right now. Villa, meanwhile, have looked solid and strong since their opening day reverse at home to Wigan and could go into a coveted top-4 spot with a victory on Merseyside this weekend.

Villa score almost two-thirds of their goals in the 1^st half, Everton two-thirds in the 2^nd half. Just thought you should know. Much like that stat, I’ve got an inkling that neither of these teams are going to matter too much when its all said and done at the end of the season. 1-1…ish.

F1: Abu Dhabi Grand Prix

The final Grand Prix of a tumultuous and controversial Formula 1 season takes place in the slightly detached and surreal setting of the United Arab Emirates. It is only fitting, perhaps, that the world’s most glamorous sport should finish its calendar in the world’s richest city and in the sport’s first ever day/night race.

With the title already decided, drivers are vying for air-time for their sponsors, final Championship points and, quite possibly, a seat in a car for next year. Sebastian Vettel, the young German prodigy and winner of three races this term, Rubens Barrichello, the veteran Brazilian, Lewis Hamilton, the disposed champion, and Kimi Raikonnen, soon to be formerly of Ferrari, may have the most to race for in the desert but the neutral might hope that Jensen Button could crown a glorious year with a resounding victory to silence his critics. In the idealistic light of this article, this pundit really hopes so.

Jenson Button may have just dethroned Lewis Hamilton as the F1 World Champion but the real British sporting duels come into view this weekend. There’s football, American football and probably a bunch of other stuff I just don’t have time to write about.

Liverpool v Man United

Crisis? Defeat against their fiercest foes would leave Benitez’ boys 10 big points away from United and consign them to their fifth straight defeat. Since mauling Hull 6-1 at the end of last month, Pool have scored only once and seen their domestic and European prospects slip; one more loss and they will have suffered their worst run for 56 years and will officially be playing for fourth.

The team and it’s managers future appear inextricably tied to their two star players. The loss of Steven Gerrard and Fernando Torres has exposed the sides lack of attacking options but the pair were both absent when Liverpool defeated United at Anfield in the same fixture last year. Both are doubtful for the game.

The Red Devils could also be without their talismanic forward – Wayne Rooney is struggling with a calf injury – but in Michael Owen and the resurgent Dimitar Berbatov, United have capable alternatives. Man U enter on an 11-match unbeaten run and lead the league.

In the league’s most aggravated game form matters little and, despite United’s strong record at Anfield since the Premier League’s inception and Liverpool’s current plight, the home team win this game 2-1.

West Ham v Arsenal

The Hammers have still yet to win at home in front of their bubble-blowing faithfuls and find themselves in the bottom three. They were slow to start under Zola a year ago and have a squad stacked with England hopefuls (Upson, Cole, Parker, Green, Ashton), England U-21 talent (Hines, Stanislas, Noble, Tomkins) and enigmatic foreign players (far too many to name) but have not won since the opening day.

While West Ham have quietly slipped into the relegation zone, the Gunners have quietly mounted a title challenge; they trail United by four points with a game in hand and have won their last four on the bounce. The returning Tomas Rosicky, the impudent Andrei Arshavin and the imperious Cesc Fabregas form a dazzling creative pivot behind Robin Van Persie – arguably the most technically gifted footballer in the country (if you don’t believe me watch his strike against Birmingham last week or rewind to his volley against Charlton a couple of years ago) – and have made Arsenal the league’s top scorers by a distance.

Arsenal continue to surge, West Ham continue to suffer. The Gunners win 3-1.

NFL: New England Patriots v Tampa Bay Buccaneers

It’s back; the game of power, intensity, drama and cheerleaders returns to these shores as part of the NFL’s International Series and explodes onto British TV screens on Sunday afternoon. The game features three-time Superbowl winners and all-decade team the New England Patriots and one-time champions but currently bottom-feeding Tampa Bay Buccaneers, the Glazers other sports pet.

The Patriots epoch seemed destined to end with Bernard Pollard’s ill-timed tackle on superstar and snappy-dressed QB Tom Brady – husband of supermodel Gisele Bundchen – in the opening game of the 2008 season, causing their star player to miss the entire year and the team to miss the playoffs for the first time since 2002 (despite the emergence of Matt Cassel and an 11-5 record). Brady ruptured his ACL and, until last week’s 59-0 demolition of the Titans, still looked troubled and slowed by the injury but has driven the Pats to a 4-2 record and the lead in the AFC East.

Life for the Bucs and first-time NFL Head Coach Raheem Morris has been much more challenging; a lack of identity on offence and talent on defence have seen them yet to win a game and look well out of their depth. They recently traded former 1^st round pick Gaines Adams to the Bears for a 2^nd round draft choice as they look to rebuild for the future and have their most recent top draft selection, QB Josh Freeman, waiting in the wings.

New England win in England as Brady and co. are relatively untested. 28-7.

And now the race begins; 55 players have been members of England  squads selected by signore Capello since his appointment as England supremo, following the team’s latest qualifying debacle, and will all be playing for a place on the plane next summer. Some, like Joe Lewis, the Peterborough goalkeeper, Michael Mancienne and Luke Young can start deciding between Mauritias and the Bahamas for their summer retreat, others, such as David Bentley, Joe Hart, Dean Ashton, Tom Huddlestone, Jimmy Bullard, David Wheater and Chris Kirkland, will need Sea-the-Stars-esque finishes to their seasons to warrant a broken-English phone call from the boss and let’s not open the Michael Owen debate for fear of riot. And I’m tired. And it’s late.

Rio, JT, Coley, Bazza, Lamps, Stevie G and Wazza appear to be the only dead certs for South Africa. Sorry, how very Steve McClaren of me…still can’t quite get the taste of him out of my mouth. God that sentence sounded a lot better in my head… Still, he’s not doing a bad job at FC Twente and it’s not as though there were any standout candidates for the role at the time and….I digress.

So, here’s to you James Milner, Ben Foster, Carlton Cole, Michael Carrick and the rest: What can you do to force your way into the 23-man squad for the 2010 World Cup? Go on, impress me. Play out of your mind! Score a goal! Throw a pie! Whatever! The clock is ticking…

Aston Villa v Chelsea

The likely home of Capello for this Saturday afternoon; both teams boast a number of England hopefuls but, unfortunately for Villa, their contingent are far more likely to be sweating come squad-announcement time. Emile Heskey needs more first team football, Ashley Young needs to recapture his form of last season and Stewart Downing needs to get fit. It’s only a broken foot man! In my day….

Chelsea have won 10 of 11 this season and are coming off their biggest win to date, a methodical win over rivals Liverpool. 11 from 12? Yup. 2-0 to the Blues.

Sunderland v Liverpool

Should Sunderland win this fixture, they’ll move above the Reds in the table, and in Kenwyne Jones and Darren Bent have one of the league’s most dangerous front pairings; Bent, renewed with confidence, has 7 goals, 6 in the first half, while Jones has 5, 4 in the second half. Good stat that.

Liverpool have not struggled to hit the net themselves with only Arsenal scoring more in the Premiership. Their concerns appear to be at the other end of the field where Jamie Carragher and Martin Skrtel have reneged on their commitment to quality and endeavour. Torres and Gerrard, Liverpool’s finest, will both miss the game.

Sunderland have signed Bolo Zenden? Really? The things you learn…

Got to hide behind the agnostic shelter of a draw here. 1-1in Wearside.

Portsmouth v Tottenham

The International hiatus could not have come at a worse time for Pompey – they’d just won a game for the love of God! They still have yet to break their home duck but can now call upon the experience and grizzly features of Avram Grant as well as a squad that will surely be more confident from victory and congealed through time after being thrown together at the last-minute like a Halloween costume for that party I completely forgot about. It’s not even Halloween for two whole weeks! Give me a break!

As for Spurs, well, they just like scoring goals – 29 in 10 competitive games to date – and they will add to that on Saturday. And they’ll win too. I think. 3-1? Yeah, why not.

England U21’s just beat their Macedonian counterparts 6-3 in a thriller at the Ricoh Arena in front of a solid 20,000+ crowd. Too much to hope that such a compelling and exhilarating fixture would be repeated by the senior side on Saturday night right? Well, even if England and Ukraine can throw together a fine soiree featuring goals, drama and perhaps a half-time magic show then it might not really matter if nobody can see it.
That’s right, the nations most prized sporting asset can only be viewed on a 15 inch screen in the family room with the kids screaming or in the corner of the dated monitor on your work laptop. Or wherever.
Say it with me… ‘boooooo’…that’s better now isn’t it. Ok, now let’s move on.

England v Ukraine

The Three Lions will play a full-strength side on their trip to the Ukraine with only Joleon Lescott and Paul Robinson unavailable. Eight wins from eight games have seen England already qualify for the finals in South Africa next year and the nation buoyed by the quality and ruthless nature of the performances. The 5-1 victory over Croatia was the latest highlight of the Capello era.

The team and manager could be forgiven for relaxing and experimenting in both their remaining games but that would not follow the Capello mantra; professionalism, discipline and execution. He will expect to win the game.

That will be no mean feat. Ukraine are unbeaten at home in the qualifying stages while conceding just the one goal. They know that victory over England, who they troubled at Wembley back in April, will leave them ahead of Croatia in the table with only Andorra to play. The bulk of the squad are prized from Dnipro, Shakhtar and Dynamo Kiev with only Liverpool’s Andrei Voronin and Bayern Munich’s Anatoliy Tymoschuk playing their football abroad. Andrei Shevchenko, formally of Chelsea and more notably AC Milan, will captain the side but is a waning power. Artem Milevskiy, a tall and creative forward, might prove to the biggest threat to England’s 100% record.
England might just lack a little motivation and comfort in Ukraine and get held 1-1.

Ireland v Italy

Now now, let’s not get too excited. Even if Ireland beat Italy at Croke Park they would still be relying on the Azzuri to drop points at home to Cyprus if they were to win the group and the (almost) assured playoff spot comes with it the intimidating challenge of France, Croatia, Portugal, Russia or some such European heavyweight down the line. Giovanni Trappatoni, manager of Italy between 2000 and 2004, will be familiar with a number of Marcello Lippi’s squad; Andrea Pirlo, Gennaro Gattuso, Fabio Cannavaro, Gianluca Zambrotta and Gianluigi Buffon all featured in either the 2002 World Cup or EURO 2004 under Trap and are all still integral to the Italians ambitions next summer.

Italy have hardly looked impressive in their qualifying campaign or the Confederations Cup (the 3-0 defeat to Brazil might be as low a point in the team’s recent history) but that is rarely their way. Ireland stole a point at the Stadio San Nicola, thanks to a debatable third minute sending off and a late Robbie Keane equaliser, but have not exactly terrorized the likes of Montenegro, Cyprus and Georgia in qualifying either. Indeed neither of these teams have scored more than 2 goals in any group fixture.

Two Italian coaches. One point suiting both teams. One likely result. 0-0 draw.

Other fixtures

This is the sharp end of qualifying and there are several key games across Europe that will define the immediate futures and holiday plans for some of continent’s finest.

Denmark host Sweden with victory guaranteeing the Danes passage to South Africa while the Swedes need a point to hold off the charging Portuguese. They play Hungary at home later in the evening knowing anything but a win will likely see Ronaldo et al working on their tans rather than skills next year.

Greece and Latvia meet for a chance to be the probable playoff representatives from Group 2, Poland travel to the Czech Republic in a virtual knockout game in Group 3 and Germany and Russia battle for automatic qualification from Group 4.

Screw it, I might as well just delineate the entire picture by predicting every single result . I can do that. I can! Don’t believe me? Hah! Here we go…

Denmark 1-1 Sweden
Portugal 2-1 Hungary
Luxembourg 0-3 Switzerland
Israel 2-0 Moldova
Greece 2-1 Latvia
Slovakia 2-2 Slovenia
Czech Republic 2-1 Poland
Finland 0-0 Wales
Russia 1-1 Germany
Liechtenstein 1-1 Azerbaijan
Estonia 1-3 Bosnia-Hercegovina
Belgium 1-2 Turkey
Armenia 0-5 Spain
Belarus 2-1 Kazakhstan
Serbia 1-0 Romania
Austria 2-1 Lithuania
France 4-0 Faroe Islands
Montenegro 0-0 Georgia
Cyprus 0-1 Bulgaria
Or something like that.

It’s clearly unfair to make any definitive statements about the 20 Premiership teams after 5 weeks of the season. It would be immature, trivial and crude. It wouldn’t be noteworthy. I wouldn’t write it. You wouldn’t read it. Simple.

So, thank god 6 weeks have almost passed.

This week’s Premiership fixtures will stamp some authority on the early season verdicts. Are Portsmouth already doomed for the drop? Can anybody win at Turf Moor? Are West Ham ‘too good’ to go down? Is Craig Bellamy misunderstood? Is Darren Bent a better finisher than Harry Redknapp’s grandmother?

Man United v Sunderland

Teacher and pupil collide at Old Trafford. Ok, collide might be overstating the animosity of the relationship between Alex Ferguson and former United centre-back Steve Bruce or the importance of the tie but this is a preview! Get excited!

Mr D Bent, he of the 6 goals in 7 league games, will carry the torch alongside less prolific but far more exciting Mr K Jones, Kenwyne to his friends. United have won 10 and draw 2 of their past 12 home games in all competitions and have slowly evolved as the season has with new boys Valencia and Owen have settled and old boys Giggs and Scholes have surged.

Is Nani the most frustrating player in the league? Do you think he cooks a great meal and then drops it as he carries it to the table? Or perhaps charms the pants off a girl only to put them back on before getting a taxi home alone? End product kid, that’s what it’s all about.

United win, Sunderland lose, Berbatov scores? Anything could happen. 2-0 to Bruce’s old team.

Chelsea v Liverpool

The second meeting of big-4 monopolisers comes a week after Chelsea’s first setback of the year and Liverpool’s most resounding victory. Then again the Blues won their European tie while the Reds got beat. Does form really matter? If it doesn’t then past history probably won’t either although it is worth remembering that it was Liverpool that ended Chelsea’s long, long, Wimbledon-long-ball long undefeated home record with their victory at the Bridge last October. They also helped shift Luiz Felipe Scolari by defeating them at Anfield 2-0 in February.

Chelsea were poor versus Wigan. More than poor, they made Wigan look very, very good and the Latics were dispatched with ease by Arsenal and Man Utd in recent encounters. Liverpool have their own concerns; they were desperately slow starters in Florence on Tuesday night, have been vulnerable defensively all season and seem far less confident without the departed Xabi Alonso and the injured and under performing Javier Mascherano.

Drogba v Torres, Lampard v Gerrard, Terry v Carragher, Cech v Reina, Essien v Mascherano. The guess would be that such stars cancel each other out but Chelsea, at home and more consistent, should be favoured. 2-1 to the Blues.

Aston Villa v Man City

This must be like a cup final for ESPN’s Monday night broadcast. With apologies to Spurs and Everton, Villa and City may be the two most likely invaders of those coveted, over-promoted Champions League spots and have both won 4 of their last 5 in the Premiership.

While both teams managed a home victory in the 08/09 campaign, City have prospered and progressed far more since last season ended. Adebayor, Tevez, Lescott, Santa Cruz and former Villain Gareth Barry have headed to the City of Manchester Stadium. Headed to Birmingham? Promising yet untested Fabian Delph, James Collins, Habib Beye and former City defender Richard Dunne. You may have noticed I’ve missed out England hopefuls Stewart Downing and Stephen Warnock but I’m making a point.

City have only been beaten the once so far – the wild Manchester Derby if you recall – and, that game and moments against Arsenal aside, have looked the part of a top tier side. Aston Villa have been more susceptible; defeats to Wigan and Blackburn have undermined a strong start.

Martin Petrov is back, Craig Bellamy is playing as well as he may have ever, Santa Cruz is back, Tevez looks pretty decent, the defence is stable…so…City to win? Possible, but I’ll shelter under the prediction of a draw. 1-1.