chickendinner loves a British success story as much as anyone but we weren’t looking forward to the prospect of Jenson Button winning nearly every race with Schumacher style dominance. Sadly for the Brit, his worst result of the season was saved for Silverstone (sixth) and while he is still 25 points ahead of winner Sebastian Vettel, the German is a strong favourite to win on home soil this weekend. Here are five stats about the first German Grand Prix to be held at the Nurburgring (the European and, slightly more dubiously, the Luxembourg Grands Prix have been held there since though) since 1985:

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1. Four of the last seven German Grands Prix have been one by German drivers, as have five of the last eight races at the Nurburgring.

2. On the last three occasions that a British or German driver has triumphed at Silverstone - Michael Schumacher in 2002 and 2004 and Lewis Hamilton in 2008 - they have gone on to win the German Grand Prix.

3. However, over the last six years just seven drivers have recorded victories in successive races: Schumacher, Rubens Barrichello, Kimi Raikkonen, Fernando Alonso, Hamilton, Felipe Massa and Button.

4. The winner at the Nurburgring has gone on the be crowned Drivers’ Champion just twice in the last six years that the race has been held.

5a. The polesitter has won just two of the last 11 races at the Nurburgring (Schumacher in 2001 and 2004) whereas the driver starting second has triumphed in four, including both of the last two.

5b. Barrichello is the only driver to have qualified second twice so far this season. Jarno Trulli,  Alonso, Timo Glock, Vettel, Raikkonen and Button have all done so once.

chickendinner aren’t stupid enough to say that Man City have no chance of a top-five finish - after all they could have Robinho, Samuel Eto’o and Carlos Tevez up-front. They should have challenged for fifth last year though but ended up closer to West Brom than Arsenal, so the odds of 5/4 with Bet365 on them being best of the rest this season seem far too short. Here’s why we think you’d be better off backing Everton or maybe even Spurs:

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1. Manchester City are still yet to finish any higher than eighth in the Premier League, a feat they achieved under Stuart Pearce in 2004-05.

2. Since Blackburn’s title win in 1994-95, just four sides have ended the season as the best of the rest: Newcastle, Leeds, Tottenham and Everton. Spurs and Everton are the only two to have done it in the last five years.

3. While having money helps, outspending your rivals doesn’t guarantee success. Manchester City’s net spend was over 31 times as much as Everton’s last season and yet they finished 13 points behind them.

4. Spurs are best-placed to derail the Toffees. Over the last 16 games of the season they took 30 points which was just one less than Arsenal, three more than Everton, eight more than City and 12 more than Aston Villa.

5. There have been six occasions where Harry Redknapp has completed a Premier League season with one club while Manchester City have also been in the division and on each occasion his team have finished higher.

An e-mail from Sky Bet dropped into the chickendinner inbox this morning revealing that Gianluca Vialli has emerged from nowhere to become the 3/1 second favourite to be appointed Newcastle’s new manager.

The former Chelsea boss hasn’t coached for seven years since an unsuccessful stint at Watford but long absences didn’t stop the Magpies from appointing Kevin Keegan and Joe Kinnear.

Reports in this morning’s papers suggested the Italian was being earmarked by potential owners to work as director of football in a “dream team” with director-of-football despiser Alan Shearer - who is still the 4/11 favourite.

However, perhaps sensing that Shearer wouldn’t be too happy about having someone operating above him, punters have backed Vialli for the main job.

chickendinner were pretty shocked to find Paddy Power offering odds of just 20/1 that Angelina Jolie becoming US President before she dies. That means that the Irish bookies believe there is more chance of that happening than:

» Padraig Harrington retaining the USPGA Championship (28/1)

» Portsmouth finishing bottom of the Premier League (22/1)

» Bayern Munich or Juventus winning the Champions League (22/1)

» Robin van Persie or Carlos Tevez winning the PFA Player of the Year (22/1, 25/1)

» Madonna adopting her next child from England (33/1)

With very little football taking place right now, chickendinner have been sniffing around the bookmakers looking for interesting specials to bet on.

Paddy Power have opened a market on who will win Newcastle’s player of the year award next season with Joey Barton a distant 16/1 outsider, an even longer price than 14/1 Xisco.

The three joint-favourites at 8/1 are Obafemi Martins, Kevin Nolan and Steven Taylor - the latter two mainly because they look likely to stay - with Ryan Taylor and Nicky Butt both 9/1 for similar reasons. Sadly there are no joke options, unless you consider Mark Viduka being only 10/1 funny.

Elsewhere, Andrey Arshavin is 11/4 to win the Arsenal award, Marouane Fellaini 9/4 to win Everton’s and Steven Gerrard 11/4 to win Liverpool’s.

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1. Between them, Pete Sampras and Roger Federer have won 13 of the last 17 men’s singles titles at Wimbledon.

2. Andy Roddick becomes the second American man to lose three finals, following in the footsteps of former coach Jimmy Connors, who lost four.

3. Bad news for Andy Murray - not since Sampras’ first triumph in 1993 has a losing semi-finalist won the following year. Surprisingly, three of the last five first-time winners at SW19 went out in the first round 12 months earlier (Krajicek, Ivanisevic and Federer).

4. Serena Williams has won on six of the last seven occasions she has faced sister Venus in a Grand Slam final.

5. The two losing ladies’ semi-finalists - Dinara Safina and Elena Dementieva - are both still looking for their first major win despite frequenting the latter stages. Dementieva has reached the last four at four of the last five slams while world number one Safina has done it at five of the last six.

The first ever Ashes test to be held in Wales kicks off on Wednesday at Cardiff’s SWALEC Stadium but it’s hard to tell who - besides Glamorgan chairman Paul Russell - is happy about it. Andrew Strauss says his men will be walking into the unknown, Ricky Ponting thinks England have “got a bigger advantage there than anywhere else in the country” while Shane Warne thinks playing the first test there is “a disgrace”. Here are five stats to help you bet on this unpopular opener:

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1. Australia tend to kick off Test series spectacularly. They have won the opener in 29 of their last 34 series, drawing four and losing just one.

2. England also get off to spectacular starts in Test series, although more of than not they are spectacularly bad. Over the last four years, Andy Flower’s men have contested 15 series, winning the opener in just one.

3. Australia have won the opening Test in eight of the last ten Ashes series, whereas England have won it just once in that time.

4. On nine of the last 11 occasions that a team have won the first Test of the Ashes, they have gone on to win the series.

5. But England shouldn’t be too scared because they have only lost three of their last 20 home Tests while Australia have won none of their last four Tests in the UK.

Photo Credit: Carl Court, PA Wire

Sky Bet have priced Manchester City at 5/2 to sign John Terry this summer despite Carlo Ancelotti’s claim this morning that he will be at Chelsea forever.

The online bookmakers are still fairly sure that the England captain will stay at Stamford Bridge though and have priced that possibility at 1/5. One player who seems certain to choose City over the Blues however is Carlos Tevez, who is 1/7 to move to Eastlands and 4/1 to join Chelsea.

The most open transfer special available on Sky Bet surrounds versatile Turkish forward Tuncay. The Middlesbrough man is 5/1 to stay at Riverside and is the same price to join Chelsea, Liverpool or City. As if it wasn’t already close, Sunderland are right behind at 6/1, with Spurs 7/1 and Aston Villa 9/1.

UPDATE: The Chelsea captain has now been cut to 2/1 to join City and is 4/11 to stay put

Photo Credit: Owen Humphreys/PA Wire

Americans aren’t supposed to play the role of gracious runners-up at sporting events but for the third time in six years, Andy Roddick was left congratulating Roger Federer on Centre Court at Wimbledon.

chickendinner tipped A-Rod to reach the final, which if you bet with Paddy Power as we advised would have earned you a £50 return on a £5 E/W stake, although it could have been £145 if he hadn’t tired at the end.

It was impossible not to feel sorry for the lovable sixth seed after he went over four hours without having his serve broken (37 games) against the new world number one and 15 time Grand Slam champion, only for defeats in tiebreaks - in which he is usually so strong - to cost him dearly.

Roddick can take heart from the fact the last two losing finalists triumphed a year later but he becomes only the second man in the Open Era - and seventh of all time - to lose his first three Wimbledon finals. While Goran Ivanisevic eventually won the title at the fourth attempt, four of the last five men never got the title they deserved, with three never reaching the final again.

Despite being whitewashed in Australia, England are just 3.35 on Betfair to regain the Ashes. The reason for the rather short price, beyond patriotic punting, is that Australia have lost some big names while Andrew Strauss’ men are much harder to beat at home. Here are five reasons to be optimistic:

1. Since Australia last won the Ashes away from home in 2001, England have contested 15 home series. Of those they have won ten, drawn three and lost just two, boasting an aggregate test score of 30-8.

2. That contrasts with England’s poor form prior to Australia’s last win here in 2001. Ahead of that, England had won just six of the last 15 series they had hosted and had a negative aggregate test score of 18-20.

3. Prior to the last six Ashes series, Australia had won at least four of their previous five test series. This year they arrive in nowhere near as convincing form, having lost two of their last four - against India and South Africa.

4. The decision to replace Michael Vaughan, first with Kevin Pietersen and now Strauss, could prove shrewd. England have won successive home Ashes series three times since 1945 and two of those came after switching captains.

5. Australia have lost Shane Warne (and reserve spin bowler Stuart MacGill), Justin Langer, Damien Martyn and Glenn McGrath to retirement while coach John Buchanan has stepped down. In England four years ago, Warne took 40 wickets, twice as many as their second-most successful bowler Brett Lee and 16 more than Andrew Flintoff, the winners’ top wicket taker.