Over the weekend, Arsenal's demolition of Spurs and Blackburn's departure from SW6 with a point boosted the portfolio, whilst Man Utd's victory and Newcastle's surprise defeat at the hands of Derby[!!!!] damaged the portfolio. The cash reserves stand at $3.57 before the injection of $1,000 for this round of trading.

Arsenal are now odds-on in my pricing model. However, given the run-up in price (nearly 50%), I am torn between building the position further and taking some profits. So to balance things out, I will simply hold steady this week on that contract.

SELL 43 CHELSEA at 27.0. Dropping points at home is not the sort of thing that clubs with title chances do. While they are only 2 points adrift of first-place Arsenal, comparison between this year and last year's fixtures is decidedly unfavorable (from 5 comparable fixtures, Chelsea are 4 points and 5 net goals worse than last year). In my model, they lost about a third of their value over the weekend; they'll likely need an away win against another Top 4 side or a couple of home wins against the same to convince me to buy them except as a short-covering exercise. The reduced sale this week is largely due to the decline in price.

SELL 42 MAN UTD at 28.1. United finally got their first meaningful win of the season, and it boosted their valuation by more than 50%. That doesn't change the fact that they are still overvalued and the short presents an attractive risk/reward condition.

SELL 46 LIVERPOOL at 25.3. When last I posted I said I saw "Le Arse just beating" the Merseyside franchise for the title. The margin has increased a bit since then, but the Liverpool price hasn't. Memo to Rafa: this isn't a two-legged cup competition (and unlike Spain, the first tiebreaker isn't a season series step)... away draws aren't good by any means.

BUY 22 MAN CITY at 0.6. Sven is a better-than-average league manager. I think Man City have at least one or two more significant results that will boost their price to provide a nice exit point.

BUY 32 BLACKBURN at 0.3. No lucky goals over the weekend, but they came away with a point, something few clubs will leave Stamford Bridge with. Largely due to Arsenal's big run-up, they've given up a bit of intrinsic value, but they're still undervalued.

BUY 43 VILLA at 0.2. Price hasn't really moved since last week. Intrinsic value has dropped a bit, thus the reduced purchase. As with Citeh, I see a possible win streak increasing the price and providing an exit point.

BUY 43 WEST HAM at 0.2. I hate to divide my claret-and-blue-tinted dollars and put myself in a position of pulling for the Cockney, shirt-stealing, cheating thugs, but Wham! have already notched a pair of 3-0 victories; if they can get a couple more, their contracts can make a nice move.

In total, that's $963.50 risked, and now the positions are:

• CHELSEA: short 98 contracts with $683.50 risked
• MAN UTD: short 120 contracts with $901.12 risked
• ARSENAL: long 21 contracts with $23.94 risked
• NEWCASTLE: long 33 contracts with $1.65 risked
• VILLA: long 98 contracts with $1.96 risked
• BLACKBURN: long 77 contracts with $2.06 risked
• LIVERPOOL: short 46 contracts with $343.62 risked
• MAN CITY: long 22 contracts with $1.32 risked
• WEST HAM: long 43 contracts with $0.86 risked
• Cash balance: $40.07

These positions will play out as follows:

• Chelsea win the league: loss of $300.03
• Man Utd: loss of $520.03
• Arsenal: profit of $889.97
• Newcastle: profit of $1,009.97
• Villa: profit of $1,659.97
• Blackburn: profit of $1,449.97
• Liverpool: profit of $219.97
• Man City: profit of $899.97
• West Ham: profit of $1,109.97