Suedehead2

Crystal Palace chose to allow Macclesfield to keep all the gate receipts from their match, foregoing the share they were entitled to. Man City were asked by cash-strapped Exeter if they could have more than their designated share. Mega-rich City refused.

Best Yazoo - Only You Depeche Mode - The Meaning Of Love Adam Ant - Goody Two Shoes Echo And The Bunnymen - The Back Of Love New Order - Temptation Tie break - Associates Worst Shakin' Stevens - Shirley Nicole - A Little Peace Junior - Mama Used To Say

Bizarrely, it is 117 years since the holders last lost to a non-league team. The winners on that occasion? A team from Croydon .

Yes, it is the biggest gap - 117 places. Therefore, in purely numerical terms, it is the biggest upset ever.

Crystal Palace now have the record for the worst ever defence of the FA Cup apart from the year Man U didn't take part

I couldn't think of one, but was still quite surprised to confirm it using Polyhex!

This week's musings, with more than a couple mentions of a hit television programme, is available form the Blogs section or the Forums Index page.

After missing out on a return to the top spot last week by a mere 500 “sales”, Taylor Swift’s The Fate Of Ophelia made another attempt to get an eighth week at number one. In the four weeks since the song fell from the top, there has been a new number one each week although that included two non-consecutive weeks for Wham’s Last Christmas. However, Taylor Swift faced opposition from Djo’s End Of Everything. There are a lot of Stranger Things=related songs in the chart this week (more on that later), but the highest doesn’t actually appear in the show. Joseph Kerry is an actor in the show but released End Of Beginning under the name Djo as a separate project. The song reached number four last March in a seven-week run in the top ten. It returned to the top ten last week and this week it climbs to a very top to give the 33-year-old his first number one single with a song first released in September 2022. Taylor Swift, therefore, has another week in the runner-up spot with The Fate Of Ophelia. Raye’s Where Is My Husband falls to number three after completing a thirteen-week climb to the summit last week. Dave and Tems are at number four with Raindance. Two more songs about rain will be along later. Olivia Dean’s So Easy (To Fall In Love) is down one place to number five. She is also at number six with Sam Fender collaboration Rein Me In and at seven with Man I Need. Thanks to his presence on YouTube and elsewhere James Marriott has two top twenty albums to his name, including a number one with Don’t Tell The Dog last year. He now has his first hit single with California Rain at number 22. Apple Music describes Katseye as some sort of cross between K-Pop, the Spice Girls and Pussycat Dolls. That isn’t exactly a description that inspires me but, in the interests of fairness, I have listened to Internet Girl. While I wouldn’t exactly go out of my way to hear it again, I did at least get to the end of the song that is a new entry at number 24. It is the first top forty hit to include the word internet in the title. Sienna Spiro enters at number 37 with You Stole The Show, following her top ten hit last year with Die On This Hill. It sounds like an attempt at an Amy Winehouse song, with an inferior voice and without the same songwriting talent. A chart showing the progress of Sienna Spiro’s singles is known as a Spirograph. The highest entry into the chart was last in the top forty in 2016 following the death of Prince. Purple Rain jumped back in at number six, beating its original 1984 peak by two places. Thanks to Stranger Things, it is the second rain-related song to enter this week and it lands at number twelve. It was played in all its nine-minute glory on the Radio 1 Chart Show in 2016, but they omitted it this week. Every Breath You Take became The Police’s fifth number one single in 1983. I was to be their final chart-topper; indeed, they only had one more top ten single. It entered the lower reaches of the chart after the first batch of the final series of Stranger Things was released in October. Now it crashes back into the top forty at number seventeen. Fleetwood Mac’s singles chart history is a rather odd one for one of the biggest acts of the last 50-60 years. Albatross is one of their best-known tracks and remains their only number one. However, other well-known songs by them have done rather less well. Go Your Own Way and Don’t Stop both reached the top 40 without advancing into the top 30. Dreams did make the top 30 but Rhiannon din’t even get into the top 40. The Chain was never released as a single but has made the lower reaches of the charts since the addition of streaming. That chart history gets another twist this week with the arrival at number twenty of Landslide from their eponymous album released in 1975. Stranger Things has helped one of the bands lesser-known songs get to number twenty. Some good news regarding Stranger Things is still to come but first it’s time for some standard eighties disco dross. Diana Ross made her name in the 1960s as part of The Supremes who had classic hits with songs such as Where Did Our Love Go and Stop In The Name Of Love. The Supremes were then rebranded as Diana Ross and The Supremes before Ross left to pursue a solo career. Her willingness to embrace various musical styles of the day meant that her singles chart career extended into the 1980s. I wasn’t a fan of her collaborations with Chic but they were one of the biggest acts of the day and they gave her a number of hits including Upside Down. The song reached number two in 1980 and it is back in the top forty this week at number 26. Ten years ago tomorrow (10 January) David Bowie died after being diagnosed with cancer. As he had chosen to keep his condition private, the news came as a huge shock to the music world. In a clear sign that his music lives on, he is back in the top forty this week. Peter Gabriel's excellent version of Bowie’s classic song Heroes was used in earlier series of Stranger Things, but the original version was used over the credits of the final episode which was released last week. Bowie’s version therefore makes a welcome return to the top forty at number 34. It reached number 24 in 1977 before reaching a new peak of number twelve immediately after Bowie’s death. It is back this week at number 34. His Legacy compilation returns to the albums chart at number 30. The final Stranger Things-related song in the chart is the wonderful Should I Stay Or Should I Go by The Clash. The band emerged in 1977 as part of the punk wave of the period. While much of their later material veered towards reggae in style, Should I Stay Or Should I Go still owed a lot to their punk roots. The song was first released as part of a double A-side with Straight To Hell in 1982 when it reached number seventeen. The song was reissued in its own right in 1991 after its use in a jeans commercial and it spent two weeks at number one. Now it is a hit for a third time, re-entering the chart at number 40. The two Stranger Things tracks in last week’s chart both climb. Tiffany’s I Think We’re Alone Now climbs two places to number 27. Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill also climbs two places, to number fourteen. As mentioned last week, we are now in a very quiet period for new album releases which leaves the way open for older albums to grab a week or two at the top. Last week Olivia Dean’s The Art Of Loving took advantage and it remains at number one this week, giving it a total of four weeks at the summit. Sabrina Carpenter is still at number two with Man’s Best Friend. In the week that Fleetwood Mac get their eleventh top twenty hit single, their 50 Years - Don’t Stop collection, released in 2018. reaches a new high of number three. Taylor Swift falls to number four with Life Of A Showgirl. The Weeknd’s Highlights compilation is at number five. There are no new entries this week.

Same here!

Remember that alleged attack by Ukraine on one of Putin's homes last week? You know, the one Trump condemned as soon as his mate Putin told him it had happened. Well, and I know this is hard to believe, it seems that Trump has now changed his mind and decided that it didn't happen after all. Naturally, he hasn't mentioned his previous remarks in the hope that everybody will have forgotten them.

Tuesday 6th January West Ham United 1-1 Nottingham Forest (20:00) Wednesday 7th January AFC Bournemouth 2-1 Tottenham Hotspur (19:30) Brentford 0-1 Sunderland (19:30) Crystal Palace 1-2 Aston Villa (19:30) Everton 2-1 Wolverhampton Wanderers (19:30) Fulham 1-2 Chelsea (19:30) Manchester City 1-1 Brighton & Hove Albion (19:30) Burnley 0-2 Manchester United (20:15) Newcastle United 2-0 Leeds United (20:15) Thursday 8th January Arsenal 2-2 Liverpool (20:00)

The EU and NATO, minus the rogue state, need to be having urgent discussions about what they would do if Trump invades Greenland. We can't afford to see them in endless discussions after the event. Just a reminder - a few weeks ago Trump pardoned the former president of Honduras after he was jailed for 45 years for his part in smuggling 400 tonnes of cocaine into the US.

And Diana Ross was at number 79.

Ed Davey has also condemned it, but naturally the leader of 72 MPs is considered less newsworthy than the leader of five. That said, it is a lot easier to condemn US actions from opposition rather than Downing Street. We all know that every previous PM would have said something similar to what Starmer has said. As for the attack itself, it's hardly news that Trump is a power-crazed loon. He will now be trying to grab as much Venezuelan oil as he can.

Aston Villa 2-0 Nottingham Forest Brighton 3-1 Burnley Wolves 1-2 West Ham United Bournemouth 1-2 Arsenal Leeds United 2-1 Manchester United Everton 2-0 Brentford Fulham 1-2 Liverpool Newcastle United 2-0 Crystal Palace Tottenham 2-1 Sunderland Manchester City 2-0 Chelsea

It certainly pleases me. Great to see him back.

The Christmas period has been a problem for the Official Charts Company (OCC) since streaming was included in the calculations for the chart. This became more pronounced when they introduced the Accelerated Chart Ratio (ACR) whereby the value of a song’s streams was downgraded if streams were declining for three weeks and the song had been in the chart for ten weeks. Because streamers started listening mostly to Christmas songs, almost all other songs saw their streaming figures decline. Songs on ACR that experience a substantial increase in streams, relative to the market, can be reset to the standard ratio. However, that would apply to all Christmas songs so the OCC introduced a rule that all songs over three years old were on ACR permanently (with some exceptions which we will come to later). However, this still meant that songs in the chart towards the end of the year were treated unfairly simply because of the dominance of Christmas songs. The OCC had a number of options to tackle this. Doing nothing would arguably have deterred record companies from releasing singles at a time when they would be adversely affected by the rules, so that was not an attractive option. They could have suspended the ACR rule in December which would have allowed more non-Christmas songs to remain in the chart in that month. They chose an alternative approach, resetting all songs that went on to ACR in December to the standard ratio in January. That seemed like a reasonable compromise. Applying the normal rules (only resetting songs that had significantly outperformed the market) would have meant that very few songs would be reset. Again, that would have deterred record companies from releasing songs for several weeks in the autumn. That long ramble explains why many songs that dropped out of the chart in December have returned to the top forty while songs that dropped out before then remain outside. Raye’s Where Is My Husband had dropped out of the top forty, to number 48 last week when the number of Christmas songs peaked. This week she rebounds all the way to number one to grab her second chart-topping single after Escapism almost exactly three years ago. The chart published immediately after Christmas did, as ever, include a handful of non-Christmas songs. Among them was Taylor Swift’s The Fate Of Ophelia which just about clung on at number 40. This week it climbs all the way back to number two. Taylor Swift almost set a record that can never be broken by getting the biggest rise within the top forty. However, there is still an opportunity to climb from the bottom position to the top. Maybe after next Christmas In 2011 Adele’s Someone Like You climbed back up to number one from number 47 after a stunning performance at the Brit Awards ceremony, a climb now beaten by Raye. Other songs have climbed from a lower position, but generally because copies were sold before the official release date. Dave and Tems climb to number three with Raindance. Sam Fender and Olivia Dean are at number five with Rein Me In. The song first entered the top ten in July 2025. Since then it has remained in the top forty, one of the few survivors of the Christmas onslaught. However, it has spent most of that time outside the top ten. This week is the seventh time the song has entered the top ten, a record for a song in a single chart run. Thanks to Jimwatts at Buzzjack for that information. Dean is on her own at number four with So Easy (To Fall In Love). As well as all the re-entries there are four new entries. Two of them are songs that were performing relatively strongly in December. For the last two weeks they have been two of the highest placed non-Christmas songs which hadn’t yet made the top forty. The first comes from South African singer-songwriter Tyla whose choice of song title, Chanel, may - or may not - be a desperate plea for some freebies. If so, she has raised her sights since her debut hit Water in 2023. Chanel is a new entry at number fifteen. Kato’s Turn The Lights Off came very close to being a new entry in the Christmas chart before falling back last week. This week, it climbs into the top forty at number 33. It marks a top forty debut for the Danish producer and for Jon, whoever he is. The song was originally released in 2010 when it failed to chart. While the concept of choosing a new track as a single from an already-released album is somewhat outdated in the streaming era, it can still do enough to promote a song sufficiently to get it into the chart. Such is the case with Sabrina Carpenter’s Such A Funny Way from her Man’s Best Friend album. This week it enters the chart for the first time at number 37. It is still behind her former number one Manchild which re-enters at number 36. After having a number two hit in 2022 with Boy’s A Liar, Pinkpantheress has struggled to achieve consistent success. She had two top forty hits last year, but neither of them advanced into the top twenty. She is now having another go with Stateside which is a new entry at number 40. Among the notable re-entries is Alex Warren’s Ordinary at number thirteen. It spent thirteen weeks at number one last year and was named as the biggest song of the year last week. It had a record run of 39 weeks in the top twenty before being forced out by festive songs. Because it went on to ACR many months before December, its streams are still being counted at the harsher conversion rate. Sonny Fodera, DOD and Poppy Baskcomb reached number 30 in November with Think About Us. Now that most of the Christmas songs are gone, it is back at number 24. EsDeeKid’s 4 Raws also hits a new peak by re-entering at number 23. The rather ludicrous rumours that the Liverpudlian rapper was actually American actor Timothee Chalamet should have been consigned to the bin this week with their apparent joint appearance to perform together. While debate continues over whether AI-generated songs should be allowed to qualify for the chart Haven and Kaitlin Aragon’s I Run enters the top ten for the first time at number ten. Four of the Christmas songs in last week’s chart have survived for another week. The highest placed is Wham’s last Christmas which topped the chart again last week. It is now down to number 21. And so to the exception to the three-year rule. While this was largely done to downplay the impact of Christmas songs (that worked well, didn’t it?), it could be seen as unfair to songs that saw an increase in streams for other reasons. The most glaring example, and the one that led the OCC to change their rules, was Kate Bush’s Running Up That Hill. The increase in streams for the song after it was used in Netflix drama Stranger Things would have been enough to see it go to number one in 2022. This was so obviously absurd that the OCC changed the rules so that older songs could be reset in certain circumstances. As a result, the song deservedly topped the chart the following week. The same rule change has allowed a reset for Tiffany’s I Think We’re Alone Now. The song spent three wells at number one in 1988. Almost four decades on, it is at number 29. Running Up That Hill returned to the chart last year when the final season of Stranger Things (or, rather, the first batch thereof) was released. It is back at number sixteen. I’ve never seen Stranger Things, but anything that gets Kate Bush back in the chart has at least something going for it. The turn of the year has always been a quiet period for album releases, and this year is no exception. The release schedule for the rest of the month is fairly thin. This means that new entries will be very limited for the next few weeks, and that the chart will often be topped by an album from last year. The first beneficiary is Olivia Dean, one of the biggest stars of 2025. At the beginning of the year, she had one hit single to her name, dating from 2021. She had a top five album in 2023 but it had no long-term impact on the chart. By the end of 2025, she had notched up a further four top forty singles, all of them reaching the top ten. One of them, Man I Need spent a week at number one. Therefore, by the time she released her second album, The Art Of Loving, in September expectations were high. It duly went to number one and spent the rest of the year in the top five, including a further week at the top in December. It is now back for a third week at the summit. Sabrina Carpenter’s Man’s Best Friend is at number two. Taylor Swift is still at number three with The Life Of A Showgirl. The top five is completed by two hits collections, from Fleetwood Mac at number four and The Weeknd at five. Michael Buble’s Christmas album is still in the top forty, at number 29. Over the festive period, Channel 5 showed a programme attempting to compare Abba and Queen. The concept was rather odd and the choice of criteria totally arbitrary, but it was still an entertaining programme. This week Abba Gold climbs to number twelve and Queen’s Greatest Hits is up to number 30.

Golden should have been left behind on the cutting room floor.

Burnley 1-2 Newcastle Chelsea 2-1 Bournemouth Nottingham Forest 1-1 Everton West Ham 1-2 Brighton Arsenal 2-2 Aston Villa Man Utd 3-1 Wolves Crystal Palace 1-2 Fulham Liverpool 3-1 Leeds Brentford 1-1 Tottenham Sunderland 0-2 Man City I haven't seen any of the scores for the 19:30 kick-offs (it's now just after 19:45), but disallow those predictions if you wish.

Best Associates - Party Fears Two Japan - Ghosts Pigbag - Papa's Got A Brand New Pigbag David Bowie - Baal's Hymn Visage - Damned Don't Cry Worst Goombay Dance Band - Seven Tears Imagination - Just An Illusion Leo Sayer - Have You Ever Been In Love

My RIP choice for Chris Rea would be Let's Dance. For Perry Bamonte of The Cure, it has to be Friday I'm In Love even if that is terribly predictable.

Thanks for all your hard work on this @JosephCarey , and for the huge amount you do throughout the year.

Without all these mind-numbingly tedious trailers they could have played another song. Mr Brightside, for example

This Lamar song is atrocious.

My point is that there is no excuse for them not using it.