Staff at the National Portrait Gallery may seem especially cheery today in response to the news that the Aston Villa boss, Randy Lerner, has made a gift of £5 million towards the development of the collection of faces as well as vital display, education and outreach work. This is definitely a good thing. At a time when public funding for the arts is increasingly competitive and not something to be relied on, private philanthropy......

In part two of our follow up to last year's article on which player's our Premiership clubs should buy we cover Tottenham, West Ham and Fulham. Click here to see yesterday's piece on Chelsea and Arsenal. TOTTENHAM HOTSPUR What was the problem position? Left wing. What did the club do about it? Like rivals Arsenal over their goalkeeping situation, not much. Indeed, Spurs eventually sacrificed England world cup winger Aaron Lennon to the ol'......

> Once again it's the time of year when even many half-hearted football fans feel duty bound to enter a fantasy competition or two, where they choose a portfolio of players whose real Premiership performances earn them points in mini-leagues against friends, work colleagues and, indeed, complete strangers. Everybody has their favourite superstars, but when you've spent half the game budget on four household names, where do you go to fill in the rest of......

We were delighted last week to discover that Cherno Samba, the former Millwall youth striker once courted by Liverpool, has pitched up again in this country after a spell on the continent, trying (but sadly failing) to earn a place in Bristol City's squad for the upcoming season. We remember him with affection as the spearhead of more than one of our Championship Manager 3 sides from the top-selling computer game's heydey around the......

Last week , our American visitor Barry Petchesky crashed and burned with a half-hearted 2 out of 5 correct predictions. It was painful stuff, especially after 'guaranteeing' a score of at least 4 and we hope that Barry has been able to spend the last week slowly mending his crushed ego, piece by piece, step by step. We also made an attempt in our last edition, to reach out to YOU, the reader and......

Association football was once again dominated by clubs from the Midlands and the North in 1905, with Newcastle United winning the League Championship and Aston Villa winning their fourth FA Cup. The Capital's sole representatives in Divsion 1, Woolwich Arsenal, could only finish tenth last season and have started the new campaign in equally dismal form, including a 5-1 reverse against Derby County. These are unsettling times at the Manor Ground, with persistent rumours......

We're not sure if you've noticed (probably not, you're no doubt more interested in FILMS or THEATRE or POLITICS and all that rubbish, well it's your loss, because as any fule knos, SPORT is really IMPORTANT) but we are actually very poor at predicting the results for the Premiership's London clubs evey weekend. We've been compiling the stats (stats are IMPORTANT as well), and it appears that we have a success rate of 37.5%.......

Thursday afternoon in the Londonist dungeon, and the fetid air is filled with the sound of blistered and bloodied fingers tapping manically on keyboards. The Editor pokes his head out of his luxury climate-controlled office.... "Premiership Preview Bloke...in here. Now." "Yes boss?" "Your predictions are a disgrace." "But I got two right last week." "TWO?!? Hardly Alan Hansen is it? And your attempt to jump on the Chelsea backlash bandwagon was laughable. You missed......

English football is feeling rather sorry for itself right now. Relegated from prime position on the the back pages by the gentlemen in white and hammered by those who are still paying attention for yet another woeful display from an inept national side, it's currently slumped on a sofa and picking half-heartedly at a ready meal as it watches Kinight Rider repeats on Bravo. Yet as football does its level best to dodge those......

“I am not quite sure whether I am dreaming or remembering, whether I have lived my life or dreamed it. Just as dreams do, memory makes me profoundly aware of the unreality, the evanescence of the world, a fleeting image in the moving water.” ~ Eugene Ionesco Chelsea, then. Not quite champions yet. Not quite one of Europe's best clubs. Not quite given the respect they think they deserve. They're away to Bolton on......