In the Championship – Luton take first day honours

Steve Howard - scored Luton's first goal in their win at Palace

Burnley chairman Barry Kilby is often accused of making false promises to the fans, remember the nine new signings two years ago that became three? But Palace chairman Simon Jordan has promised his fans promotion back to the Premiership at the end of this season.

Andy Johnson scored, so there was no surprise there, but Steve Howard and Ahmet Brkovic both scored for Luton and they were even able to have a penalty saved and still go home with all three points.

Whilst on with the missed penalties, Kevin Harper’s will take some beating this season. He’d just come on as a substitute for Stoke at a gale blowing Windy City but blazed his spot kick way over the top at the Boothen End as Stoke failed to see off a poor Sheffield Wednesday side.

They also had the quickest red card of the season with Gerry Taggart going just thirteen minutes into the game although it did look a little bit harsh. It was a weekend of cards though with a staggering 43 yellow and 2 red in the opening fixtures, why is it always the same at the beginning of the season?

Trevor Kettle took the honours with eight yellow cards and a red in the 0-0 draw at Southampton but Harry Redknapp has far more to worry about than the referee. When asked about Clive Woodward’s role he said, “You had better ask the chairman,” and responded quickly to suggestions that the rugby union man might be in the dressing room at half time.

We go to Southampton in December and I don’t expect Redknapp to be there by the time we reach St. Mary’s. They got a 0-0 draw with Wolves but that seemed almost incidental.

Norwich, along with Palace and Southampton, were relegated at the end of last season and their 1-1 away draw (played at home) against Coventry ensured that none of the three got off to a winning start.

Dean Ashton - scored and then hit the bar for Norwich

Two of the defeated play off teams from May got off to a winning start. Ipswich’s new signing Nicky Forster scored a debut goal, the only goal of the game, as they beat new look Cardiff 1-0. It must be a worrying time for Cardiff fans with both Sam Hammam and Peter Ridsdale running the club, not as though anyone else will care too much about the plight of the Cardiff fans.

Preston also started with a win, but they had to come from behind as Adrian Boothroyd’s Watford were quickly looking up with an opening goal from new signing Darius Henderson. Dave Nugent continued where he left off last season with an equaliser and Dickson Etuhu scored the goal of the day to win it for North End.

All is not perfect at Deepdale though and over the weekend they have turned down offers for both Etuhu and Richard Cresswell. It’s former Preston boss David Moyes who wants Etuhu at Everton, he signed him for North End, and no surprise that the manager looking for a new striker and turning his attentions on Cresswell is Neil ‘Colin’ Warnock at Sheffield United.

The Blades were highest scorers on Saturday, beating Leicester 4-1, but the result somewhat flattered them. They won two penalties and three of their goals came in the last eight minutes of the game.

Referee Lee Mason, apart from giving the spot kicks, took centre stage with Leicester’s equaliser with an assist. He got in the way of the ball and inadvertently redirected it to David Connolly who went through to score. So the refs don’t like Warnock, its official now.

Leeds fans shoved two fingers up at Ken Bates yesterday and failed to turn up in numbers for their home game against Millwall. The attendance of 20,440 was over 4,000 less than last season’s lowest and there could be more to come for Bates after the price increases.

David Healy - scored both Leeds goals

Robbie Blake started but was replaced by Michael Ricketts, that doesn’t look good on your CV, but there was no place even on the bench for Ian Moore which leaves him still looking for his first goal since February.

There was no place in the starting line up for John Oster at Reading either, with Glen Little preferred down the right hand side. It was not a good start for Cilla’s boys who were beaten 2-1 by Plymouth. Nick Chadwick got a late winner after Leroy Lita had equalised Micky Evans earlier Plymouth goal.

Phil Brown got a point in his first game in charge of Derby but it took a Mr Karren Brady equaliser after Dean Hammond had given Brighton an early lead.

That just leaves Hull and QPR as the Kingston Communications Stadium hosted Championship football for the first time. A fact I didn’t know but Hull is the largest city in Europe never to have hosted top flight football, I don’t think that will change in the next year.

It was a shocking start for one of Hull’s new signings, full back Mark Lynch who signed in the summer from Sunderland. He was stretchered off in the first minute of the game after a very poor challenge by Paul Furlong (no surprise there). Later news suggested that it was a serious knee cap injury that is likely to keep him out for the season.

It’s a double header now this week with either two home games or two away games for all the clubs. The fixtures for this week are shown below.