After eighteen weeks, every team has now played each of their League opponents home and away. We’re nearly halfway through the season, into a new calendar year and we’ve got a new Cup winner too. Here’s a brief roundup of the results so far.
Premier League Review
Championship Review
League One Review
League Two Review
Premier League
Bigger than Brolin declared their intent straight from the start with a hard-fought 49-44 victory over last season’s table-toppers FC Santa Barbara in the first gameweek of the new season. FCSB had won their last two games over Big Brol (45-37 & 30-16), but a score of 44 wasn’t enough to make it three-in-a-row. Smash & Grab took second with a 48-24 win over The Money Team and Boss, ASG & Zoo also began the season with victories.
Gameweek 2 saw Big Brol and S&G both win again, with the latter scoring better and moving up into first. ASG was the first Premier League team to hit a 50+ and Mff beat Boss to move themselves up into the top half. Smash then won again in GW3 and remained the only PL team with an intact 100% record. Money and Tralfamadore Zoo drew 33-33, both collectinging two goals and two assists; Zoo’s three yellow cards (vs. 0 for Money) cost them the win but the draw was enough to move them up to second place.
Newly-promoted Tralfamadore Zoo met FC Santa Barbara in GW4 and the pair had the best scores of all forty teams that weekend (and still the highest two scores in the Premier League so far this season); FCSB won that barnburner 60-58. They moved upto fifth; Zoo dropped to fourth. ASG broke S&G’s unbeaten streak to claim third place and BtB took second, just one fantasy matchpoint behind S&G, going into the international break. AC Reykjavik Cobblehill got their first win of the season thanks mainly to 21 points from a Mr Jack Grealish with his two goals plus three assists against Liverpool.
Smash & Grab returned to winning ways after the break with a victory over Tralfamadore, but dropped to second because Big Brol outscored them in a 52-45 win over challengers ASG. The Money Team registered a second draw in three weeks, 32-all, away against Vanishing Spray and FCSB moved up to third.
After that, things got really good for The Money Team. They scored 51FPts in consecutive weeks and that was the start of a 13-game winning streak (currently 16 games unbeaten), scoring 501FPts in that period. Smash & Grab also continued to do good things, losing only once from GW’s 5 to 18 (that was 46-39 to Money in GW10). The two meet each other this week (GW19) as first and second in the Premier League, 15 and 11 League Points clear of Mighty fine feeling in Third Place.
Elsewhere, Tralfamadore Zoo won a 100-point game against Bigger than Brolin in GW7, 56-44. It was the third of three 100+Fpt games in the PL this season; all three have featured the Zoo (W2L1). In GW13 Tralfamadore Zoo got revenge on FCSB with their own two-point win, albeit in a much more subdued fashion, winning 24-22 and climbing a place to sixth. In the same week Mighty fine feeling got a return win from Big Brol, winning 40-24, a win that moved them up to third in the table, where they have remained since.
Bigger than Brolin drew 27-27 with Boss in GW9 and FC Santa Barbara drew 24-24 away at AC Reykjavik CobbleHill in GW17. Also in GW17, the first game of 2021, Smash & Grab stole a win from Mighty fine feeling by a single point, 42-41, and it was another loss that could be put down to too many yellow cards (3 vs. 0).
Gameweek 18 ended, as expected, as a very low-scoring round. The Burnley-Man United game was added from GW1, but with that there was still only six games in play. Mighty fine feeling topscored in GW18 (matched by Kloops and Robbers) with 39FPts, helped along by Pogba’s second goal of the season to stay third. Bigger than Brolin was second best with 34FPts, beating Boss to move up a place to fourth. Smash and Money continue to hold on to their monster win-streaks and “earned” victories against AC Rey and FCSB with scores of 18 & 21.
Championship
The Championship began with Banana Swans taking top spot with a 42-36 win over stilluvQPR. Closely behind them in second was Route 57 FC scoring just one fantasy point less in their 41-26 win at home against SB Town. And that was the last time that a team other than Route 57 were number one in the Championship. In the second gameweek, Route 57 scored a massive 83 FPts against fellow-promoted Hung Like a Bony and they’ve been top of the Championship ever since. On top of that, they have spent most of the season so far at the top of the Best-ish table too.
SB Town came back from their first match defeat to climb from eighth to second place, bolstered along the way with a one-point win over SWP in GW3, a huge 68-34 win over perennial opponents GoFYS FC and a revenge win against Route 57 in GW10. Cornballers and Banana Swans both fell off the pace after starting well – Cornballers reached second place in GW5 before being crippled by an 11-losing streak, Swans started top but slid down to eighth, recovered to fourth, then stepped down to sixth. The pair drew 37-37 in the second week and later Banana Swans drew another game, 41-41 in GW41, at home to East Loop United. That tie came nine gameweeks after losing 35-34 in the away fixture.
East Loop also had another one-point win this season, 38-37 at home against stilluvQPR in Gameweek 8. Sporting Wicker Park were involved in a pair of one-point games, both finished 30-29; they lost the game to SB Town in Week Three but won the match against the Cornballers in Week Ten. Cornballers themselves enjoyed a one-point win, beating AFC Chester in GW7, 32-31.
In the second quarter of the season, Hung beat GoFYS 53-38 to steal a promotion place from them, but lost to the mighty R57 41-40 in the next game and dropped off the pace again. They did however win their Winter Cup Quarter-Final with those 40FPts. GoFYS regained third place that week with a narrow 43-41 victory over stilluvQPR (who also won their Cup QF despite losing in the League) and won the following two games too, lifting them to second place.
That short run of form was ended quite dramatically by the team below them, SB Town, when they doubled GoFYS’s total in a 102-point thriller. That 68-34 triumph pulled SB Town level with GoFYS on 30 League points. GoFYS kept second place by eight Fantasy Points, which went down to six the next week, and the week after that they finally had to give up second spot after they lost 41-38 to bottom side Sporting Wicker Park. SB Town scraped three points from a very low-scoring 19-14 win and moved up into second.
And there they remained, the top three teams six points above the rest. But watch out for AFC Chester, who have risen from the bottom to fourth and are currently on a five game winning streak, the last two wins coming in games against the top two, and below them are five more teams that are within a win of each other and one or two wins behind fourth place.
League One
There were a lot of changes to League One in the Summer. We said goodbye to Bacuna Matata after just one season, Cabezazo Increíble FC after four and K.H. Granitza Sting who had been in the BFFA since the start. Four teams – Cornballers, Hung, R57 and stilluvQPR – were promoted to fill gaps left by the upper two divisions and the seven empty spaces were filled by the seven remaining sides that made up League Two in 2019/20.
It was Gloopy Yarbles who took the League by the reins early on. They put up 66 against Harambe Hotspur in the first match of the new season and scored 55+FPts in four of their first five games. They held on to a promotion place until GW12 but unfortunately they suffered a string of four defeats in a row that dropped them down to fourth place and they’ve been playing catch up since. However, they are the top pointscoring team in the League and fourth overall, so remain a threat to the top three.
The bottom two sides at the end of last season, Relic & Web City, were matched against each other in Week One. Having faced each other in the League in all the five seasons that they have been in the BFFA, the matchup is becoming one of the most-played fixtures in the League. Web City won the game 38-31, and then Relic reacted and went on a 8-game winning streak, taking top spot from Gloopy in Week Six and taking three points from them two weeks later in a 54-46 thriller (the only 100-point game in League One so far). Aston Villa’s unexpected 3-0 win over Arsenal gave Mings and Grealish six points each and won Relic the game in the final 15 minutes of the weekend.
Unfortunately for Relic, that win streak ended when they faced Web City again, losing by just three points away, but retaining the #1 spot with a comfortable cushion. That win for City levelled their all-time record against Relic, W8D1L8 (albeit Relic have scored four more fantasy points across those fifteen games). Since then, Relic won another seven consecutive games, stopped only by Harambe in a fixture-crippled GW18 where they were only able to field eleven players between them.
Going back to the first gameweek, it also produced another draw between Chicken & Bacon Sane and Sugar Daddies, 26-all. It was the third tied game between them in thirteen matchups; they had drawn last season, 24-24, and towards the end of Season Four, 32-32. On top of that, SugaDad also tied two more games this season – against BattleVAR Galáctico in GW11 and against Wijnaldum Leviosa a week later.
It could be said that Wijnaldum Leviosa have been the unluckiest side in the first half of the 2020/21 season. They lost by a single point to Harambe in GW6, when they were second-best scoring team in the League that week, and have also lost by just two points three times (GW’s 1, 9 & 13), plus their 34-34 draw in GW12 against SugaDad. No other team has lost by such a narrow margin more than twice in these first eighteen games.
So, all three League One sides that were spared from relegation last season have turned their fortunes around from occupying the relegation zone to filling out the promotion places. At this stage, there is a six-point gap between the top three and fourth place, and another six points back to fifth, but with Gloopy and Wij scoring so well, there are always threats lurking beneath the promotion line.
League Two
League Two is a bit of an unknown quantity this season. Five teams moved up from the old Nashunal Leeg and were joined by five newcomers. The two most successful teams from the fifth tier last season were Housewives’ Favourite and Cumberland FC. Wives Fave, who were top of the League at the conclusion of the season, actually lost all three games to their rivals but finished seven points above the Northerners. But despite the success of yesterseason, both teams struggled against rookie teams in the first gameweek. Cumberland lost to Atletico Topo Chico in a close opener, 33-30, and Wives Fave went down to the early League leaders Sorry not so sorry 56-28.
Jaysokker started the 2020/2021 season with gusto; looking to prove themselves worthy after a disappointing campaign in their rookie year they started this one with five wins on the trot, the longest opening streak of the forty. The first was against last season’s competitors Ole’s at the Wheel, then a win against League leaders SNSS and victory over the Cup Runners-Up-to-be Fossvogur lifted them up to first place.
Elsewhere in Gameweek Two, Klopps and Robbers & The El Dude Brothers both hit 70+ FPts and unsurprisingly moved up into first and second place that week. Bros may have been shocked by their 77-24 win over Atletico Topo Chico (the biggest winning margin in all four leagues, at time of writing). They scored seven goals; ATC scored none and also picked up a red card. K&R too may have been surprised to have such a comfortable win, 70-33, given that their opponents Cumberland FC played Calvert-Lewin with a hat-trick and Sadio Mane with a brace too. K&R scored less goals, but did have six assists (4 from Harry Kane); Cumberland had none.
Cumberland FC came back from that heavy defeat to go on a six-game run of wins, moving them from ninth to second. Similarly, Housewives’ Favourite went on from GW2 to have ten wins from eleven and climb from eighth place to first. The only game they lost was in GW5 to their nemesis Cumberland (35-27), making it four wins from four in the matchup. Nine gameweeks later Cumberland did it again, 51-45, in a week where the pair were the best two-scoring teams in the League.
Wives Fave have been involved in three such matches this season where the top-scoring teams in a gameweek have been playing each other (side note – there have only been three other matches across all four divisions). The first one they won, 54-42 against ninth-placed Fossvogur FC, the second was the game against Cumberland mentioned above and the third was away against newcomers Bielsaball, who were also ninth place when they met. Bielsa beat the League leaders 40-39 that week with ten men against eight. Blame the auto-subs issue. Both teams scored one goal and both goals were gamewinners in the EPL – Ben Mee for Wives Fave in Burnley’s 1-0 win away at The Blades and Lacazette for Bielsa as it finished 1-0 to the Arsenal against Brighton.
Despite the mixed fortunes of Wives Fave in those three games, they remained top of the League and have been since they beat Bielsaball 57-17 in Gameweek Seven. Jaysokker and SNSS have been fighting over second and third since GW9, drawing with each other in GW11, 30-30, and they are closely followed by Ole’s at the Wheel and The El Dude Bros, just one point behind. Gameweek 19 could shake things up with the top two playing again (having a win apiece between them) and third are playing fourth (also W1L1 this season).
Gameweek 19 sees the wheel return to the top with first set of fixtures and, coincidentally, every League has the top two playing each other this week. It’s a long week too, fifteen games spread out over eight long days. Double gameweeks and the following matches are a real test for Fantasy managers and could have a huge impact on the final tables.
Not only that, this season Gameweek 19 is the final match before the Spring Cup draw, so the top twenty-four teams after this week will be rewarded with a bye; the lower sixteen will have to suffer the ordeal of a First Round tie before they join the rest.
I hope you’re all enjoying the season so far, wherever you are in your League. We’re only just coming up to the halfway point now so there’s still a long way to go. Good luck in the remainder of the season! Peace!
Great write up Jon, love these summaries