Premier League 2012-13 Season: 10 Bold Predictions

The dust is only just settling after the Olympic Games in London, and the realisation that the new Premier League season is just days away begins to dawn.

We are about to replace two weeks of the most glorious and purest sporting achievement with nine months of adolescent tantrums, arrogant posturing and training ground bust-ups. If we're lucky, we might even get the odd bit of football, too.

As we look forward with dread to what will happen over the coming season with tongue firmly in cheek, here are 10 things we can expect to happen between now and May.

A Tweet Will Lead to a Sacking

Twitter has quickly become such a conspicuous and wide-reaching part of football that it is difficult to imagine life before it.

Ever since Ryan Babel, then of Liverpool, was disciplined for tweeting a photoshopped picture of referee Howard Webb in a Manchester United shirt, players have fallen foul of the authorities for transgression in 140 characters or fewer with increasing regularity.

Joey Barton has skated pretty close to the edge, but as yet no Premier League player has had their contract terminated as a result of something they have tweeted. However, it is only a matter of time.

QPR Will Enter Two Squads

When the new season kicks off on August 18, it will be exactly a year to the day since Tony Fernandes completed his takeover of Queens Park Rangers.

Since then the Malaysian tycoon has signed 15 new players for the club—not to mention changed managers—and there is ever suggestion that he is not done spending this summer, either.

This would be fine, were it not for the fact that QPR now have almost 40 players on their books. One more major splurge from Fernandes and the Rs will have enough of a workforce to field two 25-man Premier League squads.

Spurs Will Fall for the Adebayor Trap

Few would doubt the talent and striking prowess of Emmanuel Adebayor, but what has stopped him making the step up to being one of the Premier League's truly top strikers has been his perceived attitude and behaviour.

After bursting on the scene at Arsenal in 2007-08, when he scored 24 goals in the league, his form dipped as his publicly desired move to AC Milan failed to materialise. When it became clear that he would not emerge from his sulk as an Arsenal player, he was offloaded to Manchester City.

After another excellent start to life at a new club, Adebayor again began to mope when his place in the side was under threat.

Last season he was sent out on loan to Tottenham, where once more he shone. It looks like Spurs are going to be the latest club to fall into the Adebayor trap.

Stoke and Swansea Will Make into the Guinness Book of World Records

It is difficult to think of two teams who both occupy places in one of Europe's top league whose styles clash more than Swansea and Stoke.

The Swans have won plenty of admirers for bringing the slick short passing game rarely seen performed so well outside of the Iberian Peninsula to south Wales. The Potters, conversely have become synonymous to some of the most one-dimensional football seen in the English top flight since Wimbledon were relegated.

In the 2010 Olympic spirit, this season Swansea and Stoke should both bid for world records, respectively for the most passes made in a football match and the least.

Rickie Lambert Will Be Top Scorer

Forget all the stories about the Premier League's top three clubs fighting over Robin van Persie, because it doesn't matter.

Wayne Rooney may have had his best-ever season last term, but only because Manchester United has got used to teams waving the white flag before they even arrive at Old Trafford.

Sergio Aguero? Why, he's just a flash in the pan, a one-season wonder.

Next season's top scorer in the Premier League does not ply his trade at a big club, play international football or even hail from an exotic location.

His name is Rickie Lambert, he plays for newly-promoted Southampton and he is about to take the Premier League by storm.

Wigan Will Have No Points in January but Still Stay Up

At the midway point of last season, it looked as though the Wigan Athletic fairytale was finally going to end. The Latics couldn't buy a win and were not even able to play the attractive, technical football which had become something of a hallmark under Roberto Martinez.

But, just as they have done before, a late-season flourish was enough to preserve their top-flight status virtually at the last minute.

Don't put it past Wigan to be without a single point by the end of January, only to win their final 14 games of the season between February and May, accruing enough points to make them safe for another year.

Roberto Di Matteo Won't See It to September as Chelsea Manager

Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich is well known for his itchy trigger finger. How many other chairmen would have sacked Carlo Ancelotti for a trophyless season a year after he won the double?

Di Matteo is already well aware of the precarious nature of his job. Even after winning the FA Cup and the Champions League as caretaker boss, that was only enough to earn him a one-year contract as full-time manager.

He has already lost his first match in the job proper and his first trophy, following defeat to Manchester City for the Community Shield. If the Blues lose their European Super Cup clash against Atletico Madrid on August 31, Di Matteo could be handed his P45 in a corridor at Monaco's Stade Louis II.

Arsenal Will Resort to Espionage to Deal with Newcastle

Arsene Wenger has justifiably earned himself a reputation as one of the world's finest spotters of footballing talent, especially when it comes to players from the French-speaking world.

Sure that skill got Arsenal a few trophies in the past, but what has it done for him lately? The pattern which seems to have developed over the past few years is that all the gems he discovers leave for bigger clubs when they reach their peak, and all the new talents he brings in are done at higher prices than the Gunners are used to spending.

Meanwhile, Wenger can only look on enviously as Newcastle, and their chief scout Graham Carr in particular, manage to acquire hugely talented players from Wenger's old turf for low prices.

The only solution may be for the Arsenal manager to task spies with tailing Newcastle's talent-spotters and use honey traps, fiendish diversions or even assassins to throw them off the trail and take the prize for themselves.  

Liverpool Will Announce Final Scores Before Matches Are Over

When Liverpool hired Brendan Rodgers as their new manager it was widely understood that they did so with an eye on the future, but no one quite understood how much the club desired to control beyond the present.

Last week, the club's television channel announced that striker Luis Suarez had signed a new contract hours before the deal was officially announced. This came just a couple of weeks after NESN, a U.S. sports network owned by Anfield proprietors NESV, reported that Clint Dempsey was a Liverpool player despite, even now, still being on Fulham's books.

These reports were written off as erroneous by the majority of people, but another way of interpreting them is that Liverpool, desperate to get a firm grip on their own destiny after a turbulent few years, could in fact be attempting to control the future by simply stating their desired outcome as fact.

The next logical step is for them to announce a home victory over the Anfield PA when there is still 20 minutes on the clock, and even if they are losing at the time. Maybe follow that up by declaring a few star signings, or releasing information about record profits and, hey presto, it's theirs.

Noel Edmonds calls it cosmic ordering. Liverpool call it their fast lane back to the top.

Ryan Giggs Will Sign a New Five-Year Contract

Sir Alex Ferguson has already hinted that his longest-serving player at Manchester United planned on playing on not just until the end of the next season, but the season after that, too.

That would take the Welshman close to his 41st birthday, within touching distance of Teddy Sheringham's record for the oldest outfield player in Premier League history. Two years hence, it's the all-time record, held by former Manchester City goalkeeper John Burridge.

There are still so many records for Giggs to chase. If he wins one more league title he will have 13 to his name, the same number as Arsenal have in their entire history. As long as he can carry on playing, who at United is going to tell him to stop?