Call it a mid-season review, a Christmas-break wrap-up or an end-of-year retrospective. Call it what you like. I hate football now and I'm going on holiday next week and I don't care.
Here are a few facts, reflections and predictions - a First XI - to keep Premier League fans interested while the Kop That blog is on leave:
1. Forgotten fact No 1
There were no draws on August 15, the opening day of the
2009-10 season. Not one flippin' draw! That had never
happened before in the Premier League.
2. Forgotten fact No 2
The first scorer of the new season was Stephen Hunt, on debut
for Hull. Against Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. Chelsea won
2-1.
3. Three results that shocked the
system
The season was barely a week old when tiny Burnley, playing
with the big boys for the first time since 1976, stunned
Manchester United 1-0 at the delightfully named Turf Moor.
It was an "acute embarrassment" and Man United were "shockingly poor'', according to the match report in the Guardian. Just last week, bottom-of-the-table Portsmouth put the boot into slumping Liverpool with a 2-0 win at Fratton Park.
But I think the biggest shock of the season may have
been Wigan's 3-1 pumping of Chelsea late in September, which
was a first loss for the Blues.
4. That f---ing beach ball
Oh . . . my . . . God. Or, as the young punk who was
responsible for the most bizarre goal of the season would
text his pimply mates, OMG.
Sunderland beat Liverpool 1-0 on October 17 thanks to the
influence of a beach ball and a brain-dead Liverpool fan.
Striker Darren Bent, having a fine season since transferring from Spurs, cracked in a shot that was going straight into Liverpool keeper Pepe Reina's arms.
That's when fate, in the form of 16-year-old dunce Callum Campbell, intervened. Campbell had punched a beach ball on to the pitch. it bounced beautifully in front of Bent, deflecting his shot past Reina and into the Liverpool net.
Never mind. The referee, Mick Jones, was on hand. Surely he would disallow the goal for outside interference. Of course not. It's been that sort of season for Liverpool.
5. Nine? Nine???
That was everybody's reaction upon hearing the bizarre
scoreline in the game between Spurs and Wigan at White Hart
Lane on November 21.
Tottenham 9, Wigan 1.That's Tottenham 9, Wigan 1.
Five goals alone for Jermain Defoe, who has never really convinced in an England shirt but has been an assassin for Spurs. It was the first team a Premier League team had cracked nine in a game since 1995, when Andy Cole had five of his own in Manchester United's 9-0 thumping of Ipswich. Bizarrely, it was only 1-0 at half-time.
6. Biggest surprise so far
The collective number of losses suffered by the big four: 19.
Chelsea has three, Arsenal four and Manchester United five. That leaves a ghastly seven for Liverpool.
The big four combined for two fewer losses, 17, over the WHOLE of last season. That's why this is potentially going to be one the best finishes to a premiership season in a long time.
7. Most surprising team
Birmingham. Widely expected to drop straight back down to the
Championship, Alex McLeish's canny mob has done a a great
job.
As I write, Birmingham sits eighth in the table - quite respectable - and has gone 10 games without defeat. Us Liverpool fans would love a streak like that.
8. The forgotten man
Didn't we all assume Manchester United would fall apart
without Cristiano Ronaldo?
9. Next three managers to be sacked
Rafa Benitez (Liverpool)
Phil Brown (Hull)
David Moyes (Everton)
10. Players who will dominate the season from
here
Frank Lampard (Chelsea)
Wayne Rooney (Manchester United)
Cesc Fabregas (Arsenal)
and, God willing,
Steven Gerrard, the Lord of Liverpool
11. Likely finishing order
Chelsea 1, Man United 2, Arsenal 3, Aston Villa 4, Manchester
City 5, Liverpool 6, Tottenham 7, Fulham 8, Sunderland 9,
Birmingham 10, Stoke 11, Everton 12, Blackburn 13, West Ham
14, Wigan 15, Burnley 16, Wolves 17, Bolton 18, Hull 19,
Portsmouth 20.