With the semi-finals now completed we look back on two hotly contested, albeit low scoring, ties as well as ahead to this weekend’s final and third place play off matches.
The Semi-Finals
Argentina v Bosnia and Herzegovina
The Argentinian hit squad came into the tie undefeated in their last eight games and fittingly started their semi final on minus eight points yet again to take their fielded hit count to a staggering -76 for the tournament. While Bosnia, who struggled to get through a tough qualifying pool and World Cup group, unsatisfied with the highest score of the quarter finals took a hit too to start of the match up on -4 points.
The tie itself was a very low scoring affair separated by the odd Costa goal and Sanchez assist as Bosnia did enough to book a place in the final with just 176 points across their five players. Argentina highly homogenised attacks failed in unison as their five Agueros, five Kanes and five Vardys all fired blanks and they could only limp along to 156 points for the gameweek.
Zambia v Cuba
Coming into the game Los Cubanos appeared slight favourites after qualifying for a high scoring group and the knocking out the Djiboutian machine in the last 16 before beating a noisy Belgian ensemble in at the quarters. Zambia on the other hand qualified from their group still playing in first gear as the Argentinian hit machine took the plaudits in group E before they edged past a nervy Jamaican side with the aid of a bench boost in week 26 and the Iceland Icebergs at the quarter final stage.
There was some cage rattling from the Cubans before the game started as Reedy played his triple captain on Riyad Mahrez as he backed the Algerian Maestro to do some long range damage against a Tony Pulis side set to be too concerned with crowding out Jamie Vardy’s penalty box. On the day though it wasn’t enough as Zambia took the lead with a small contingent of Charlie Daniels clean sheets. Throughout the second matchday Cuba pushed and pushed but Zambia held onto it by the slimmest of margins with a goalkeeper bonus point for Jack Butland proving the difference as they went on to win the match 193 -192.
Weekly Awards
Team of the Week – Zambia scoring 193 points.
Player of the Week – JohnnyLeeds of Zambia, who scored 45 points.
Unluckiest Team – Cuba, the second highest score of the round and they played the bench well but just lost to an even better Zambia side.
Worst benching decision – Bosnia & Herzegovina left a potential “Player of the Week” on their bench as Labud Ostojic racked up 47 points and will be screaming at his manager for inclusion this week.
Best Presser – Costa (Belgium) for his parting song as his side crashed out of the quarter finals.
The Finals
Bosnia and Herzegovina face Zambia in the inaugural FIFFSA 5-A-Side World Cup final while the Argentinian hit squad play Los Cubanos in one last match in a the play-off for 3rd place.
Remember, please keep up the pressers! It was great to see some new posters last week. We are down to the last four teams now so if you are still in, you have a great chance of winning this tournament. Let yourselves be heard and let the passion flow.
The Golden Boot
For this award, we are taking points from the whole campaign, beginning with the continental qualifiers back in week 13 and scoring points on the bench does not count towards your tally. So as it stands this is our top 5 going into the final two games of the tournament.
1) Zolakumara (BIH) 742 points from 12 appearances
2) 42Towels (ZAM) 739 points from 13 appearances
3) Lucy (CUB) 705 points from 12 appearances
4) Giggs Boson (ARG) 682 points from 12 appearances
5) Roscola (ARG) 652 points from 12 appearances
Further Information
A quick reminder of the format. Each Gameweek, teams will pick a team of five players to go head to head with their opposite nation. The match will then be decided by the aggregate score of each team’s gameweek scores after hits have been accounted for.
As we are now in the knockout rounds, if there is a tie captains’ scores shall determine the winner, unless the captain is on the bench in which case it goes to 2nd on the teamsheet. If it is still a tie, the match shall be taken to standard FPL H2H tiebreakers.
Captains are required to submit their team sheets to fiffsa.exec@gmail.com by 2300 (GMT) on Friday March 4th, otherwise their sixth player will be automatically benched.
Live scorecards will be up shortly before the first kick-off on Saturday at the above spreadsheet.
Please see our Tournament Spreadsheet. All scores, player, fixture and tables information can be found here.
If you have any further queries, feel free to ask below in the comments or email us at:
fiffsa.exec@gmail.com
Enjoy the tournament; this is the FIFFSA 5-A-Side World Cup. Accept no imitations.
As a final request, please do try and keep FIFFSA 5-A-Side chat to the comment sections of our articles.
The FIFFSA Executive Committee – President Sepp Balders, VP BabyB, VP Jaffalicious!, VP Diva, VPBlue Lion and Secretary General Jerome Cheeseoid.
