It’s here! The Champions League of the Community Tournament has arrived with plenty of fanfare. The organising committee couldn’t quite afford the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra to play the spine-tingling theme tune but Boris has got his trumpet out (it’s a nasty habit), Toberlone52 is on the fiddle and FPL Kaka is banging away with enthusiasm on the cymbals.
Yes, we have reached the knockout stages of the competition, after last week’s coronation of Shot to the Hart and Yorke to Blame as league champions. They did a Man City 2012 and won it on the last day of the campaign – you could almost hear Martin Tyler scream AutoSelectoooooooooo!
However, there are still trophies to be won with the big cup going to the eventual winner, a commiseration prize to the team that wins the runner up competition of the You’re Ropey League of Shame plus someone will end up holding the wooden spoon and a nice pink sash.
THE RESULTS ARE IN …
So, who won, who lost and who threw their toys out of the pram after this weekend’s matches? Spoiler alert the last one was me.
CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
Defoe King Unbelievables 3 – 1 Shot to the Hart and Yorke to Blame
We start with a shock result as the League Champions, Shot to the Hart fall at the first hurdle to last year’s tournament champions Defoe King Unbelievable. Pirlo’s Pen was busy concocting a tactical masterplan while AutoSelect and the team were celebrating and in Mourinho fashion outsmarted them in this match.
He stuck veteran Hasselbaink Forever upfront who headed in a couple of goals before the rest of the squad added another, FPLKiwi was able to grab a consolation goal for the shell-shocked Shots but the end result was indeed unbelievable! Surely Pirlo’s Pen regal shockers can’t win the tournament again, can they?
Son of a Gunn 9 – 0 Hwang King in a Wood
Emotions were high in the Gunn dressing room after they missed out on the League on goals scored with FPL Richie giving the hair dryer treatment to his team, only PEP_Talk was immune due to his follicly challenged bonce.
Whatever happened behind closed doors it worked as they came out flying with a 9-0 thrashing, some relative unknown called Mark Sutherns was stuck in as striker and he scored 5 goals before the rest of the team joined in the fun!
Catch me if U Kane 6 – 1 Hanging by a Fred
Pete Richards and his clinger-ons have had a strong season but showed their lack of Champions League experience as the KIRAFPL and his elusive squad did in fact runaway with this match. BrendanBone was the star man with a hat-trick and the Freds now find themselves with nothing but avoiding the wooden spoon left to play for – fate can be a cruel mistress.
Free Britney’s Areola 4 – 1 The Rooney Tunes
The battle of two form teams was up next, the Tunes had been playing all the right notes and in the right order in the last few weeks with an unbeaten run stretching back seven weeks but oops, the Britney’s did it again with a 4-1 victory.
Speedy picked a top striker in Zygaenid but he came up against the immovable object in Recoba who made save after save. Although he did eventually concede one it was not enough as the Britney’s displayed their greatest hits
TFF aka BigMan Bakar took time away from promoting his Instagram account to give a strong performance while Darth_Krid looked on from the sidelines, why he felt the need to dress up in the Britney schoolgirl outfit is anyone’s guess?
Toxic Seaman 2 – 5 Jimmy Floyd Hamsterbaink
This is painful. My noxious navy was cast adrift this week as we fell victim to a bunch of rampaging rodents. Some greying old wizard scored a couple, our keeper Chaballer was heroic, and Gilles Wanlin was perfect, but nobody could’ve predicted the onslaught we received at the hands of the furry fudgers.
I will of course give grudging praise to Boris Bodega himself who scored 79, I know this because he called and messaged me several times to remind me. Others contributed as well with Zan Kerowski and Costa also scoring in the seventies
The Hamsters scurry onto the quarter finals, whilst I will mop up my Seaman and have them motivated and ready to explode in the now very important premier knockout cup the You’re Ropey League of Shame.
Fantastic Mr Fox 2 – 1 Hey MaccaReina!
This was a tight affair, but the cunning Foxes proved again to be fantastic with a win for the veterans against the FF Scout dancing troop, Paul Parak. FPL NormalOne and Jonny HOWSON? dominated proceedings in the middle of the park.
TedTalks scored a goal in return (shocking I know that he made himself striker again) but it was not enough. I suspect Ted may have his eyes on the golden boot and perhaps he needs reminding there is no “I” in “TEAM” although he would no doubt counter that there is in Striker.
No Fuchs Given 3 – 1 The Nameless Ones
Plenty of niggle in this one as the two teams who dominated the first half of the league collided in the playoffs, FPL Mihir openly taunting Linn and her anonymous assassins and he was able to celebrate a fine victory here.
It was that man Zophar who was Linn’s downfall with his second hat-trick of the season against the Nameless One, he did the same in the equivalent league game. FPL Rockstar and FrankieWalsh82 did their best to make it competitive but it’s FPL Mihir and his gang who couldn’t care less and march on.
Shearer’s Bunch of Flowers 6 – 5 Krul Intentions
No doubt the game of the round and what a bloomer it turned out to be for Danelius as he led his horticultural heroes to a thrilling win.
The Flowers squad put together a huge score led by Mreidfelt and A.J and at six goals to the good they probably thought they were safe, but one man had different ideas as Suvansh scored 5 as striker for the Intentions meaning they just missed out by one goal.
It was a great and good performance which sees Suvansh up to 34th in the world overall and I suspect he will celebrating his personal success but probably not at the local garden centre. The Geordie Bloomers will be a difficult team to beat!
YOU’RE ROPEY LEAGUE OF SHAME
Too Krul for Siu 7 – 0 Flying without Ings
The Flyers had their w-INGS clipped yet again as Too Krul for Siu roared back from the disappointment of missing out on the Champions League by a single point. Simon March was clearly fired up and scored a mean 5 goals, this coupled with an FPL Mode clean sheet meant the results was never in doubt.
Lloris the Hounds 0 – 3 Ayew Lonesome Tonight
The dogs were left whimpering as the Narcos and his Elvis impersonators dominated here, the captain himself scored a double and he could even afford to leave Joe Lepper’s 69 points on the bench. Will the lonesome ones keep singing and winning?
Carroll’s Christmas Islanders 4 – 3 The Hairy Henry
The islanders left the Hairies stranded and coughing up furballs as FPL Hints won this game on his H2H decisions, while the squad struggled, he took on goalkeeping duty and handed his star striker Tanveer Singh freedom to roam in the opposition box – 4 goals and a win was the result.
Footstock Alumni 6 – 0 Bachmann and Robben
The network was too much for our bunch of superheroes as the Footstock cohort of chaos outmatched them in the overall squad score, Wally Banter did his best to talk his way out of trouble with 78 but it was a Dark Knight for the caped crusaders who now face their ultimate supervillain – the wooden spoon!
If you want to delve deeper into the results, then you can find all details here:-
SKLW – Live scores & League tables – Google Sheets
THE RACE FOR THE GOLDEN BOOT AND GLOVE AND PLAYER OF THE WEEK
TedTalks continue to be the Salah of the tournament and there appears to be Mo limit to his ambition to put his foot in the golden boot, but he best beware sharpshooter Narcos and the deadly striking duo from Krul Intentions with both Suvansh and Az on double digits.
The quest for the golden glove has become slightly become interesting FPLRichie has had to take time out of the nets to marshal his troops allowing FPL Haul (RWD90), Hayden Owens and Camzay to join him at the top. Let’s hope we don’t have a four way tie as I am not sure how to split a glove, maybe a finger each?
Moving back to recent events, the player of the week was a difficult decision with Mr Sutherns, Simon March both scoring 5 goals, Tanveer Singh hitting four and I am even contractually obliged to mention Boris scored 79 points this week however, the winner for me at least is Suvansh who scored 88 points and 5 goals.
COMING UP NEXT
Some cracking matches coming up this week and we will no doubt see some big scores with the double Gameweek looming, more out of hope than expectation for some of us.
The former champs Defoe King Unbelievables against the Flowers has already prompted the captain WhatsApp message group to explode with notifications, the Gunns will be hoping to outshoot No Fuchs, the Foxes are no doubt looking forward to getting their hands on Catch me if u Kane and can the Hamsters do the double over the Britney based teams.
Moving onto the You’re Ropey League of Shame, which due to the presence of my Toxic Seaman has been given extra prestige will see my seafarers against Too Krul for Siu, it’s a bit of Hwang King for the Lonesome ones, the MaccaReina have a festive jig planned and the ominous Nameless Ones will want to make Footstock Alumni ex-competitors.
Perhaps the most nervous of the teams are those battling out to avoid the dreaded spoon, I think we are all hoping that Az or Gianni will end up wearing the pink sash and tiara.
FINAL THOUGHTS
That’s all from me now, Boris will be on next week, please don’t ask him how many points he got this week and beware he does inexplicably shout 5-2 at every opportunity. You can catch more in-depth analysis or just some light ribbing as we return to our podcast in which Pirlo’s Pen joins us and reveals his evil masterplan, cue maniacal laugh.
1 year, 11 months agoI've definitely lost track of how this knockout stage is formatted but enjoying it nonetheless 😆 Cheers Greyhead!