Roker Riches: Finding The Hull Bonanza

Full time jammy bastard Simon Walsh is galloping away at the top of the table after making a whopping £60 profit from last weekend's fixtures. He correctly predicted that there would be exactly 3 goals in the Wear-Tyne derby, while also picking a Middlesbrough/Bristol City/Fleetwood treble, all of which won. There were also smaller wins for both me and Dave, with the pair of us having money on Fiorentina to win.

Onto this weekend's picks:

Nick Holden

Hull have been surprisingly decent so far this season, with a solid start seeing them currently sitting tenth in the table - can anyone remember if Steve Bruce has ever finished the season with a side in tenth? For the life of me I can't remember him ever mentioning it - however we desperately need to build on from our win at the weekend and follow a home victory with an away one. The Tigers have been pretty tight defensively so far, whilst not being particularly hot in front of goal. I'm going to back us to get back-to-back victories, with the game containing under 2.5 goals.

Meanwhile Manchester United travel to Craven Cottage to take on a seriously poor Fulham side. Despite their struggles, I think United will manage to cut lose against far inferior opposition (as they did against Norwich in the League Cup in midweek) with their form player Wayne Rooney bagging the first goal. However their defence is still dodgy so I expect them to at least concede. Taking all this into account, I'm plumping for United to win 3-1.

• Sunderland to win and under 2.5 goals to be scored in match - 11/2 - £5

• Manchester United to win 3-1, Wayne Rooney first goalscorer - 35/1 - £5

Simon Walsh

This shit's too easy. Hope everyone was following last week when in very "jammy" fashion happened to say that there would be three goals in the game -- the most popular total in the history of the fixture.

On to this week with Sunderland away at the Hull City Tigers, I predict that things will be a lot closer than anticipated, but there's plenty of value in a Sunderland win. Draw/Sunderland and just a straight up Sunderland win both have very tempting odds.

Elsewhere, wins for Hartlepool, Portsmouth and Leverkusen should all boost your coffers this weekend in a treble.

• Sunderland to beat Hull City Tigers - 5/2 - £5 Stake
• Hartlepool, Portsmouth and Leverkusen all to win - 6/1 - £5 Stake

Stephen Goldsmith

Craig Clark

I'm evidently useless at betting but hey, sticking money on random hopeless players to score might not win me anything but at least the lads did. Onto this week and whilst Hull aren't free scoring at home, they're also very tight at the back. Its reminiscent of our run under Bruce ahead of the 5-1 derby defeat in fact. I'd ordinarily not want to mention that particular game, especially after a derby triumph of our own, but with Bruce on the horizon its hard to avoid it. No doubt he will want to win this one as much as he wanted to beat them lot and here's hoping it goes as disastrously wrong for him...

More realistically, Stoke v Southampton looks like being a low scorer, while Napoli, West Brom and Man City should all win.

• Sunderland to win 5-1 - 500/1 - £1 stake
• Stoke v Southampton under 2.5 goals, Napoli, West Brom and Man City to win - 269/100 - £5 stake

Luke Bowley

I'm sensibly following Simon's lead this week in going for a simple Sunderland win bet. Hull played 120 minutes in mid-week, only to still lose on penalties. Meanwhile, we're fresh as daisies and full of confidence after the Newcastle win, so let's hope and pray we get another good result.

Elsewhere, there's a few teams who are undervalued. Fiorentina are 11/4 to beat an generally average AC Milan, Hertha Berlin are 6/4 to be a similarly 'meh' Schalke, while in France, St Etienne are at evens to win at bottom of the table Sochaux. However I'm going to stick with English football because it's the only country where I'm not pretending to know things about it. Reading are 6/4 to beat bottom of the table Sheffield Wednesday in the Championship, and I like those odds.

• Sunderland to win - 29/10 - £5 stake
• Reading to beat Sheffield Wednesday - 6/4- £10 stake