Everton at Manchester City: Writer Prediction League

The RBM Writer Prediction League is back in full swing as we head into our second week of the season.

Our writers had their first crack at prognostications ahead of last week’s match against Stoke City, and this week they’ve got much tougher (or perhaps much sadder) job with the Toffees facing Manchester City away. The optimism of our predictions between this week and last week is as stark as the difference in quality between Mark Hughes’ and Pep Guardiola’s sides.

Let’s start by reviewing last week’s picks — correct guesses are in bold, and each writer’s points accrued are noted at the end of his row.

Mike and I were the big winners this week, as we both predicted 1-0 wins for Everton. The match was predictably ugly, and our picks reflected that likelihood.

Calvin and Brian L. picked up a point for correctly predicting the opening goalscorer and Everton’s man of the match, respectively. All writers but Brian L., Callum, and Chris also got two points for correctly predicting Everton would triumph.

After one week, the league standings look like this.

This week, Everton faces much stiffer opposition, and our picks reflect that. The Toffees may have added Gylfi Sigurdsson, but he likely won’t start the match, and his addition doesn’t negate Everton’s clear need for a top-level striker as well.

As a result, no one picked Everton to win. Our complete picks are below.

Only Sean has predicted that Everton will score first, while every other writer has City getting on the board to start things off. Only Mike and I think Everton will get completely shut out though.

Callum, Sean, and Tom have boldly predicted draws, while the rest of us have Manchester City winning the match by 2-0, 2-1, or 3-1 scorelines.

Unsurprisingly, new signing Gylfi Sigurdsson didn’t factor into any of our predictions, despite Ronald Koeman’s claims that he could feature in the match.