Goodbye, Lawrie Sanchez

Another Premiership manager has bitten the dust as Fulham fired Lawrie Sanchez today with immediate effect.

Sanchez joins Martin Jol, José Mourinho, Chris Hutchings, Sammy Lee, and Billy Davies as managers who started the year with a Premiership club and have been fired or have left by "mutual consent" during the season. Steve Bruce left Birmingham to join fellow relegation candidate Wigan in mid-November as well.

After a decent start to the season, Fulham have struggled recently and are in 18th place in the Premiership right now. The Cottagers haven't won since November 3 when they beat Reading and have picked up just one point in their last five league matches. To be fair though, they've been one of the most unlucky teams in the Premiership all season. Fulham very nearly won at Chelsea on September 29 but had to settle for a 0-0 draw, outplayed Arsenal at the Emirates for 80 minutes in the first game of the season but lost 2-1, were robbed of a point by a poor refereeing decision (what else is new?) at Middlesbrough on August 18, conceded a 90th minute goal to lose 2-1 at Aston Villa the week after the Boro loss, and on and on and on.

The injury bug has also hampered Fulham, with Brian McBride's absence due to a dislocated kneecap since that Boro defeat really limiting the options Sanchez could throw out there up front and making it much tougher for the London club to score goals. Creative midfielder Jimmy Bullard has been out for over a year with knee ligament damage but is back in training and could return to the lineup within a week or so, and McBride was no more than a month away from doing the same.

Still though, the Premiership is a business and Fulham have decided to cut ties with Lawrie Sanchez and move on. This club is too talented to be relegated in my opinion, but with Sanchez gone, you'd have to believe that the Northern Irish players he brought in this summer may want to leave during the January transfer window.

Former Fulham midfielder and Scotland international John Collins is now the favorite to replace Sanchez as the former just resigned from his managerial post at Hibernian. Collins is relatively young for a manager at 39 years of age and is very inexperienced as a manager, having only coached Hibs. He was at the helm for 54 games with the Hibbies and won 23 of them, with 15 draws and 16 losses as well.

UEFA Cup Draw--Rounds of 32, 16

Wow, we've had draws galore over the past couple days what with the Carling Cup semifinal draw yesterday and the UEFA Cup Round of 32/Round of 16 and the Champions League Round of 16 draws today. I'll get to the Champions League draw in my next post, but right now I want to shine the spotlight on Europe's second-tier club competition, the UEFA Cup.

Sevilla have won the UEFA Cup twice in a row now but won't have a chance to make it a trifecta. The Spanish side qualified for the Round of 16 in the Champions League this season, where they'll meet Fenerbahçe; but again, I'll discuss those pairings later on today.

The UEFA Cup final will be played at the City of Manchester Stadium this year, the first time it's been in held in England since the UEFA Cup switched from a two-legged final to a one-off affair in 1997-1998.

The draw for both the Round of 32 and the Round of 16 was made today in Nyon, Switzerland, the headquarters of UEFA. The eight UEFA Cup group winners were drawn against the eight third-placed teams, while the eight second-placed teams were drawn against the eight teams who finished third in the Champions League groups. Teams from the same country or the same group can't be drawn against each other.

Round of 32 draw: (Note--The team listed first plays at home first, then away)

Aberdeen vs. Bayern Munich
AEK Athens vs. Getafe
Bolton Wanderers vs. Atletico Madrid
Zenit St. Petersburg vs. Villarreal
Galatasaray vs. Bayer Leverkusen
Anderlecht vs. Bordeaux
Brann vs. Everton
Zurich vs. Hamburg
Rangers vs. Panathinaikos
PSV Eindhoven vs. Helsingborg
Slavia Prague vs. Tottenham Hotspur
Rosenborg vs. Fiorentina
Sporting Lisbon vs. Basel
Werder Bremen vs. Sporting Braga
Benfica vs. Nuremberg
Olympique Marseille vs. Spartak Moscow

The first legs are scheduled for February 13/14, and the second legs will be played on February 21.

Round of 16 draw: (Once again, the first team listed is home first, then away)

Anderlecht/Bordeaux vs. Aberdeen/Bayern Munich
Rangers/Panathinaikos vs. Werder Bremen/Sporting Braga
Bolton Wanderers/Atletico Madrid vs. Sporting Lisbon/Basel
Galatasaray/Bayer Leverkusen vs. Zurich/Hamburg
AEK Athens/Getafe vs. Benfica/Nuremberg
Rosenborg/Fiorentina vs. Brann/Everton
Slavia Prague/Tottenham Hotspur vs. PSV Eindhoven/Helsingborg
Olympique Marseille/Spartak Moscow vs. Zenit St. Petersburg/Villarreal

The first legs will be played on March 6, and the second legs will be contested on March 12/13.

•British teams are highlighted in bold.

You have to believe that Bayern Munich are the favorites to win this competition. They are on top of the Bundesliga (tied with Werder Bremen) with 36 points from 17 games heading into the winter break. With Luca Toni, Lukas Podolski, Franck Ribéry, and Miroslav Klose, the German side are more explosive than anyone else left in the UEFA Cup and to be honest, I believe they would've qualified for the Round of 16 in the Champions League this year if that would've been possible.

As far as the British clubs go, Everton and Tottenham seemingly have the best chances to progress further in this competition. Everton should take care of SK Brann, the Norwegian champions, without too much trouble (although it'll be miserable when they go up to Norway to play) and Tottenham should handle Slavia Prague as well. Rangers should also progress to the Round of 16, but I don't like their chances against Werder Bremen whereas I think Everton would prevail over two legs against relative lightweight Rosenborg or Fiorentina and Spurs would likely do the same against PSV Eindhoven.

Here are my predictions to advance to the Round of 16:

Bayern Munich
Getafe
Atletico Madrid
Villarreal
Bayer Leverkusen
Anderlecht
Everton
Hamburg
Rangers
PSV Eindhoven
Tottenham
Fiorentina
Sporting Lisbon
Werder Bremen
Benfica
Spartak Moscow