First Round Draw

Chicken and Bacon San ^#39 -v- Cedar Creek FC ^#40
The first match here puts the bottom two ranked teams together. One will inevitably go out, one will go through to the Second Round. Both teams are rooted to the bottom of their leagues, C&BS have lost the last three; Cedar Creek have not won since Gameweek 10. But the First Round of the Cup marks a point in the season where teams have been known to become unexpectedly stronger, re-engaged, re-invigorated and climb the ladder. It may be because of new transfers, maybe stronger teams, stronger players are wearing down, suffering from fatigue and fixture congestion. This is often where the sleepers step in, step up and shake things up. We could see some of that happen right here.

FC Santa Barbara ^#27 -v- Barons ^#25
FCSB and Barons exchanged places in the Premier League and the Championship last summer, and it’s working out well for the latter. The highest-scoring team in the First Round (albeit 25th overall) are neck-and-neck at the top of the Premier League, level with three(!) others on 38 points and poised to take top spot with a win against third-placed Smash & Grab this weekend. Not bad for a team that were once rock bottom of League Two.

Despite both playing in the last seven seasons, the pair have only met once – in Barons first season (then playing under the colours of RelicFC) they met in the BFFA Cup Second Round. Relic beat FCSB 40-15, but were knocked out two weeks later by stillluvQPR. Since then they have visited the Quarter-Finals twice, but have never made the Final Four. FCSB, on the other hand, have made the Cup Semi-Finals, twice, but again have not yet been able to take that next step. If either are going to make their debut appearance in the Final this year, they will have to do it from Square One.

GoFys FC ^#32 -v- Webuiltthis City ^#38
Right from the get-go we have a League-and-Cup double-header! Two struggling Championship teams will be playing not only for league survival, but looking to spark a Cup run that may light a way out of the bleak season that it has been so far. Each team has won a game against the other so far (Web City won 35-28 in GW4 and GoFys won 39-15 in GW13). Unfortunately the match won’t feature the two players traded in October, Vardy and Jota, but we might see an appearance for Cody Gakpo, picked up on waivers by GoFys ahead of Web City (I’m not bitter). Also two Newcastle centre-forwards (Wilson and Isak) and two City defenders (Laporte and Ake) playing for opposing teams. This could be a very close game.

Orewa Ostriches ^#28 -v- Jaysokker ^#35
Here we have two teams that have both struggled for wins in the last three months. That said, Orewa have won two of their last three games and have some momentum coming into the final third of the season. The rookies have hit 50+ in four of their last eight gameweeks and this included a win over then-top CG XI. But this weekend they go up against last season’s Cup Runners-Up, and last season Jaysokker reached the Final after starting in the First Round. And if patterns are to be followed…Jaysokker have scored 50FPts in GW4, in GW13,…

StillluvQPR ^#28 -v- Wijnaldum Leviosa ^#31
In the BFFA there are teams that make their name by flying up the leagues, there are teams that flirt with Champions League and IML success. StillluvQPR and Wijnaldum Leviosa are “Cup Teams”. Whilst only having moderate league success, they are both regular features in the Cup Third Round and beyond. Wijnaldum Leviosa made it to the Final in 2019, where they became the highest-scoring Runners-Up of all-time (losing 59-79). StilluvQPR went one better after the CoVid break, winning the BFFA Winter Cup in 2020.
However, if you were to look at how their previous encounters have gone then you might see that they have played each other thirteen times in the League, most recently in the Championship last season. Of those thirteen games, Leviosa have won eleven and only lost two – a 38-32 loss in 2018 and a 31-30 nailbiter last year. If anyone has a bogey team, it probably looks something like that.

Sugar Daddies ^#37 -v- TMT ^#36
Another two of the bottom-five ranked teams are meeting for the first time this weekend. Both currently occupy ninth place in their leagues, but both are still competing for an escape. And although neither have been past the Quarter-Finals in the Cup, yet, both are very capable of building a strong Cup side and both have already shown that this season they can string a run of wins together; the Daddies went five unbeaten recently and TMT put five consecutive wins together around the Week 7 pause.

Vanishing Spray FC ^#34 -v- BattleVAR Galatico ^#33
All knockout tournaments look better with a derby game on the fixture list, and readers will know that I enjoy seeing two teams meet for the first time. In 2020, BattleVAR Galatico reached the Last Eight before the tournament was abandoned. Who knows, they could’ve gone all the way. They repeated this feat a year later by making the Quarters of the 2021 Spring Cup. There, they went out against league rivals Gloopy Yarbles, whom they would have beaten if the tie was played just the week before, or the week before that. And had they won that QF, they would have met and beat Vanishing Spray in the Semis and who knows then, they could’ve gone all the way.

Vanishing Spray have taken their fans to the last eight in each of the last three seasons, winning nine and drawing two games along the way, beating the likes of Route 57 FC who won the Championship that year by ten clear points as well as previous league champions and Cup runners-up. Despite a recent drop in form, and League position, a return to Premier League action might see a return to form for the former Premier League Champions.

Whiskey de Bruyne ^#26 -v- ROK F.C. ^#30
Another pair of league rivals face-off in the first round. WdB and ROK have met twice this season and, as with Gloopy & Web City, they have both taken three points off each other. Whiskey struck first, a three-point win in GW5 moved them up to fourth and dropped ROK down to last. Nine gameweeks later, ROK won by eleven in a hundred-point thriller, moving them back up a place and dropping de Bruyne down to fifth. Today, they are still fifth and ninth, and are riding similar waves in form – alternating wins and losses over the last twelve weeks. This weekend they meet in the Cup for a shot at putting their name back in the hat; next week they play again in the league and resume their attempts to rise up.