The Fratton Faithful Championship Preview: Part I

Welcome to Fratton Faithful's big Championship season preview 2010/2011! Here is a brief lowdown on all 24 teams in the division, with fans of each club giving their thoughts on the upcoming season and their thoughts on Pompey.

Barnsley

Last Season: 18^th

Ground: Oakwell (Capacity: 23,009)

Manager: Mark Robins - Most famous for scoring the goal that "saved Alex Ferguson's job". Robins cut his managerial teeth at Rotherham, leaving in 2009 to take over from Simon Davey at Oakwell, taking them from bottom of the Championship to comfortable safety.

Barnsley fan Craig Smith on the upcoming season: It's been an exciting pre-season for us. Robins has brought in a lot of new faces as well as handing squad numbers to a few exciting youth players.

He's also had a major clearout with no less than five of last season's regulars leaving. With the exception of Anderson De Silva I can't say I'm sad to see the back of any of those who've left and even with Anderson I can see why he did. There are still areas for improvement but Robins has stated he plans a foray into the loan market and overall I think we're in good shape.

I have high hopes this season. It's been by far the best pre-season since we first came back up in terms of anticipation and I sincerely believe the many football fans expecting us to have a difficult season are in for a real shock. My expectation is a top 10 finish, top 12 at least and hopefully better. Throw in a good cup run and I'm a happy man.

Craig's Key Player: Adam Hamill - With the wholesale changes at Oakwell in the last few months it would be hard to pick a key player. But of the players from last season Adam Hammill is a real dangerman. He loves to run at defenders and has the pace and ball control to do it well plus a deadly shot with either foot.

Craig's Barnsley Prediction: My expectation is a top 10 finish, top 12 at least and hopefully better. Throw in a good cup run and I'm a happy man.

Craig's Pompey Prediction: I predict a tough season for Pompey with all that's gone on but not a catastrophic one. Between 16th and 20th.

Bristol City

Last Season: 10^th

Ground: Ashton Gate (Capacity: 21,497)

Manager: Steve Coppell - Managed Crystal Palace in four separate occasions from 1984 - 2000 bringing them relative success and is also Manchester City's shortest reigning manager. Arguably his best achievement to date is winning the Championship with a record 106 points in 2006.

Bristol City fan Tom Burnell on the upcoming season: Coppell has already made some moves into shaking up the squad post Johnson; especially our defence which was a legacy of our League One days.

David James is a real surprise signing, we all know a lot of it is due to the geographical situation he's after for his family/football mix but to have signed someone who's last game was for England in the World Cup is still a massive coup for us.

Fans were beginning to be concerned over the lack of signings but with James, Hunt & Stewart all joining in the past week we're a lot stronger than we were. Rumours are still strong with us being linked to various Premier League forwards on loan. It's a new period of moving forward for us; hopefully the new stadium will be started soon and we can get back to the play-off tussle rather than finishing 10th again.

Tom's Key Player: David James - Hopefully inspirational rather than injured. His work ethic and general standing in the game should benefit us massively.

Tom's Bristol City Prediction: 6th hopefully. I doubt we'll challenge early in the season but I'd hope we have a good second half after bedding everyone in and are decent contenders come the play-off lottery.

Tom's Pompey Prediction: If you finish August still in business it'd be an achievement it seems. Unfortunately for you, I can't see anything other than relegation and a miserable future. It may change but when will you ever get the break required for it?

Burnley

Last Season: 18^th (Premier League - Relegated)

Ground: Turf Moor (Capacity: 22,456)

Manager: Brian Laws - Former Clarets player who couldn't stop Burnley from being relegated after Owen Coyle left for Bolton. Sacked from Sheffield Wednesday last year but had success at Scunthorpe, getting them promoted twice.

Cardiff City

Last Season: 4^th

Ground: Cardiff City Stadium (Capacity: 26,828)

Manager: Dave Jones - Began his managerial career at Stockport before an ill-fated spell at Southampton where he accused of child abuse, though the case was thrown out in the first week. Jones has since won promotion to the Premier League with Wolves and taken Cardiff to Wembley twice, losing to Pompey in the FA Cup Final in 2008 and Blackpool in the play-off final last May.

Cardiff fan Gareth Jones on the upcoming season: Well, my hopes are for financial survival; to be in the position to, in future, both book a pre-season tour and actually tour the tour; to sing a song; to dance a dance; to make the play-offs once again; to not sign Marlon King; to keep women away from him if we do; to not have a hooligan-related book published; to put season tickets on sale after November; to see Alan Tate sob through mild dissatisfaction; to pay tax without the need for half a dozen separate court visits; to see Sam Hammam catch genital warts; for Peter Ridsdale to receive a particularly nasty splinter, the kind that tweezers simply cannot grasp.

As for expectations, somewhat less. To finish mid-table, to see an official coined in the head and to visit London's High Court so regularly our chief exec requires a railcard.

Gareth's Key Players: Jay Bothroyd. Also, Peter Whittingham, Michael Chopra, Chris Burke and Jason Koumas. Basically, all the attacking players. 'Tis how you win games 4-3...

Gareth's Cardiff Prediction: 11^th - Nice, steady and boring. That would be a nice change.

Gareth's Pompey Prediction: 17^th - Were I you, I'd divert money from the playing squad to the legal squad...

Coventry City

Last Season: 19th

Ground: Ricoh Arena (Capacity: 32,609)

Manager: Aidy Boothroyd - Rose to prominence by guiding unfancied Watford to the Premier League in 2006 but left the club in 2008 after a poor run of results back in the Championship. Appointed by the Sky Blues this summer after guiding Colchester to 7^th in League One last season but is often criticised for his teams' ugly, direct style of play.

Coventry fan Jakob Lane on the upcoming season: For the season I would hope Cov could finish top half, playoffs would be unbelievably good but I honestly don't think that can happen. Obviously we could get relegated but I'd expect us to avoid that quite easily but I doubt we'll be near the top at the end of the season so I expect a mid table-ish finish; anywhere from 10th to 15th.

I'd like to think that come January we'll still have something exciting to play for and really I'd expect us to be in a position in January where we could possibly push for the playoffs, or at least be one of the teams still in the chase for playoffs, but realistically we will probably never look like making them.

Jakob's Key Player: Keiren Westwood

Jakob's Coventry Prediction: 12^th

Jakob's Pompey Prediction: 8th

Crystal Palace

Last Season: 21^st

Ground: Selhurst Park (Capacity: 26,309)

Manager: George Burley - The former Scotland manager is best known for his long stint at Ipswich, guiding them to 5^th place in the Premier League in 2001 before relegation the season after. Burley also led Derby and Southampton to play-off semi-finals but was beaten in both.

Crystal Palace fan Phil Duffield on the upcoming season: The nature of the division makes it hard to completely rule out having a crack at the play-offs, particularly given Burley's record, but a mid-table season of rebuilding would suffice following the melodrama we've endured over the last six months. The new owners have impressed everyone so far and picked an astute, proven manager to take us forward. The signings George has made have been solid enough without creating much of an ado, but the indication is that there will still be several more to come.

We've got some talented players and the potential to play some good football, but the squad now lacks depth, experience and an out and out goal-scorer. If those deficiencies can be addressed before the transfer window shuts then expectations will inevitably rise, but I think most Palace fans would be happy to consolidate and win more games than we lose, which I think is probably a realistic aspiration.

Phil's Key Player: Darren Ambrose/Julian Speroni - It's difficult to choose between the pair. We relied hugely on the presence of both at their respective ends of the pitch last season in order to stay afloat, although it's easy to forget that the play-offs looked a possibility before the points deduction. They stand out in our squad as the only senior players who could undoubtedly play at a higher level and it was something of a coup for us to hold onto them through administration.

Phil's Crystal Palace Prediction: 10th. I think we will surprise a few people, but ultimately fade away due to a lack of depth and experience. A lot will depend on how the new players bed in at first and how fortunate we are with injuries over the course of the season. The first 8-10 games will be key.

Phil's Pompey Prediction: 7th. Despite a clear need to rebuild, and financial worries which appear to still be somewhat unresolved Pompey have retained a few players of enough quality to build a capable team at this level. A lot will depend on FL restrictions being lifted in time for them to strengthen the depleted squad, but if they can do that then I can see them having a reasonable season.

Derby County

Last Season: 14^th

Ground: Pride Park (Capacity: 33,597)

Manager: Nigel Clough - Aspires to do for the Rams what his father did for them back in the 70's. Clough Jr. began his managerial career at Burton Albion in 1998 and guided them to the conference, setting the foundations for their promotion to the Football League before joining Derby in 2009.

Derby fan James Brearley on the upcoming season: It really is a very tricky to try and predict what will happen with Derby this year. We seem to have finally got over that torrid Premier League season, it's more a less our Nige's team now and this year there won't be any excuses on the players not performing.

Last year was very tough for us as we'd had 16 injuries at one point and half of them would have easily walked into our first team and we were left depending on Paul Dickov to provide us with the goals and tells its own story.

The summer has been pretty busy for Derby, our big summer signing has been
Tomasz Cywka from Wigan, he might have signed on a free and not be very known to people other than the Football Manager players among you, but he is an exceptional player.

He was on loan to us last season and looked by far and away our best player, he can glide through defences like they aren't there. If he can add goals to his game then the Championship needs to be worried.

James' Key Player: Shaun Barker - Last year's player of the year and I doubt you will find a better defender in the whole league. If he's in the air to win the ball he wins it and he also chips in with some important goals. He was our second-top scorer last year, that shows how good he was or how bad we were. He has missed the whole of pre-season and will sit out the first game against Leeds, but he will be a major part of our team when gets his place back.

James' Derby Prediction: 6^th - I'm very optimistic, but if we can keep our players fit then we will be a very good team in this league.

James' Pompey Prediction: 15^th - Going to be a very tough season for you lot, but you've got a decent manager in Cotterill and hopefully you will be able to bring in a few players soon who will see you safe. I think you will be among the bottom three until around Christmas time then just pull away and save yourselves.

Doncaster Rovers

Last Season: 12^th

Ground: Keepmoat Stadium (Capacity: 15,231)

Manager: Sean O'Driscoll - The majority of his playing career was spent at Bournemouth where he became manager in 2000, leading the Cherries to League One before leaving for Doncaster where he got them promoted to the Championship in his first full season in charge, playing attractive football along the way.

Doncaster fan Adam Stubbings on the upcoming season: This season I hope we can build and improve on the previous year, as we have managed to do for all but one of the last twelve seasons. We've established ourselves in this division now and have the capability and talent to push on and become a solid top half team. If we can keep hold of key players such as Brian Stock, James Coppinger and James O'Connor and also retain the management team then we can easily mount a serious push for promotion.

A play-off place is not out of our reach and on our day we are every bit as good as any other side in the Championship. The league looks a lot tighter this year than it was last time around, there are no stand-out teams on the level of Newcastle or West Bromwich Albion and likewise no overly weak teams appear to have joined the league like Peterborough. Norwich, Leeds and Millwall could all be in the mix come the end of the season.

Adam's Key Player: Billy Sharp - He was a revelation last season on loan from Sheffield United and that we managed to prise him away from his beloved Blades is testament to the ambition and work of the chairman and the management team. He scored 15 goals last season and can easily improve on that tally if he manages to stay fit for the duration of the campaign. He set himself a target of hitting 20 goals and everyone at the club seems confident he can do it. If we are to mount a serious push to reach the play-offs then Sharp will be key to that.

Adam's Doncaster Prediction: 9^th - This season has the potential to be our best yet in the Championship. Now that we've established ourselves we need to be looking up, rather than worrying about survival, and if we can improve our home form, keep the majority of the squad fit for the duration of the season and possibly utilise the loan market as well as we have in the past then we can finish in the top six. However I think it may be one step too far this season, and expect us to be steady throughout the season, flirting with the play-offs for a time before settling just outside.

Adam's Pompey Prediction: 15^th - It's tough to say what will happen to Portsmouth this season. At this current moment the squad is incredibly short of senior players and it looks almost certain to be a tough season, but at least the club has been allowed to kick-off the season and hasn't been chucked out altogether. If some good players are signed then I don't think relegation will be a worry, Steve Cotterill is a good manager who can probably steer Portsmouth into a lower mid-table position.