FA Cup 1st Round Results - Holders go out

Aardvark Abacus 2 v 2 Trusted By Millions

Cheese Makers 1 v 0 Mega Buck Bandits

Claymore Athletic FC 1 v 3 The Fabulous Artisans

Nil Satis Nisi Optimum 0 v 5 The Wateringhole Society

Real Muppets 3 v 2 Fred West Landscape Gardening XI

San Dimas High School 6 v 2 YTFIB

Stanley Athletic FC 3 v 1 The Cow-Faced Juniors

Wheel Madrid 2 v 1 Markian United

Replay

Trusted By Millions 2 v 1 Aardvark Abacus

Report

It’s not been a good few weeks for Claymore. Bottom of the league, their defence of the PCMT ended at the semi-final stage and now their attempts to hold on to the FA Cup dashed at the first hurdle. Cenk Tosun got the opener for Clive inside ten minutes but Mason Mount soon levelled for Ben, Gini Wijnaldum put the Artisans in front on the hour and former Swordsman Jonny Evans knifed his old club with a clean to make it 3-1. Last year’s beaten finalists are out too - the CFJs falling by the same 3-1 scoreline to Stanley Athletic. Timo Werner put Aaron ahead a minute before the break and the game was settled in the last ten minutes with goals from Craig Dawson and Kai Havertz before Vladimir Coufal hit a consolation clean for the Cows.

One way this season is unusual is that our first two finals haven’t been played yet. Three of the four teams involved in those games progressed in the FA Cup too, the exception being Mega Bucks who went down 1-0 to Cheese Makers with Yerry Mina’s clean the game’s only score. Dave’s opponents in the PCMT Final, the Muppets, won a five-goal thriller against Fred. Sadio Mane’s early opener was equalised by Lucas Moura’s superb free-kick on 32 minutes but Phil Foden restored Ryan’s lead straight away. Sadio Mane’s second on 63 minutes made it 3-1 and though Mo Salah hit back for the Gardeners they couldn’t find the goal to force a replay.

The two Charity Shield Finalists were the biggest winners of the week The Wateringhole Society ran out 5-0 winners over Nil Satis. All the scoring came in the second half. Callum Hudson-Odoi with the first four minutes after the break them Mateusz Pereira from the spot and Harvey Barnes in the last ten minutes. Reguilon and Semedo added cleans to give the score a very one-sided look. San Dimas’ 6-2 win against YTFIB was mostly thanks to a first half hat-trick by Carlos Vinicius. Not sure there are many players who opened their WSFFL account with a treble (and I’m not going to check!) 4-1 at half-time, my team eased further away in the second with goals from Semi Ajayi and Ayoze Perez.

Wheel Madrid needed a couple of clean sheets to knock Markian out. Ian’s team had hopes of ending their dreadful run thanks to an Oli Burke goal but Paul W turned the game in his favour with cleans from Joe Hart and David Luiz. Still one tie to settle, the Aardvarks against Trusted which finished 2-2. Two Bernardo Silva goals in the first quarter of an hour had Beef in control but Adam Webster’s injury time own goal gave Ady hope and he snatched a draw with Kieran Tierney’s clean sheet.

In the replay - We were heading towards a second replay after Serge Aurier’s early goal was equalised by Tanguy Ndombele but the tie was settled in Beef’s favour with a a Trent Alexander-Arnold clean.