Week 26 Results - All to play for at the top

Week 25 Rearranged games

Cheese Makers 1 v 2 Stanley Athletic FC

Nil Satis Nisi Optimum 0 v 6 San Dimas High School

Trusted by Millions 4 v 2 The Wateringhole Society

Trusted kept their title fight alive with a 4-2 win over leaders The Wateringhole. Gabriel Jesus got all four (his first WSFFL hat-trick) for Beef. If my records are correct it's the first hat-trick Kiran’s team have conceded. Stanley followed up their Cup win with a hard-fought 2-1 win at Cheese Makers, James Ward-Prowse getting both goals. San Dimas put six past Nil Satis, Joelinton getting two of my goals.

League Week 26 

Claymore Athletic FC 1 v 3 Cheese Makers

Fred West Landscape Gdg XI 1 v 2 Mega Buck Bandits

Real Muppets 1 v 1 The Fabulous Artisans

San Dimas High School 4 v 4 Trusted by Millions

Stanley Athletic FC 6 v 0 Nil Satis Nisi Optimum

The Cow-Faced Juniors 1 v 0 Aardvark Abacus

The Wateringhole Society 1 v 1 Wheel Madrid

YTFIB 2 v 1 Markian United

	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	Diff	Pts
1	The Wateringhole Society	26	14	7	5	65	44	21	49
2	The Cow-Faced Juniors	26	15	3	8	55	38	17	48
3	Claymore Athletic FC	26	15	2	9	63	41	22	47
4	Trusted By Millions	26	14	4	8	63	47	16	46
5	The Fabulous Artisans	26	13	4	9	54	48	6	43
6	Cheese Makers	26	11	7	8	39	37	2	40
7	Real Muppets	26	12	4	10	54	53	1	40
8	Stanley Athletic FC	26	12	4	10	47	46	1	40
9	San Dimas High School	26	10	9	7	48	38	10	39
10	Aardvark Abacus	26	12	1	13	56	42	14	37
11	Nil Satis Nisi Optimum	26	9	6	11	31	51	-20	33
12	Mega Buck Bandits	26	9	4	13	39	48	-9	31
13	Fred West Landscape Gardening XI	26	8	6	12	41	50	-9	30
14	Markian United	26	6	5	15	27	48	-21	23
15	Wheel Madrid	26	5	6	15	31	49	-18	21
16	YTFIB	26	7	0	19	25	58	-33	21

The Wateringhole’s wobble has continued and they’re now four league games without a win after being held 1-1 by Wheel Madrid. Bukayo Saka scored Kiran’s goal, a first-half penalty, but they couldn’t finish of the Wheelmen and Paul’s team snatched a point with a Joel Matip clean. It’s a result that keeps them off the bottom of the table. The CFJs are on a charge and are now just a point off the summit. The Cows saw off the Aardvarks 1-0 this week, Danny Welbeck poked in after two minutes and that’s the way it stayed.

Claymore are third but suffered a defeat to follow up their FA Cup Final loss. Clive’s team took the lead against Cheese Makers through Cristiano Ronaldo on 24 minutes but Andy Robertson headed Mathew level just after the hour. The game came down to clean sheets and Cheese took it with counters from Eric Dier and Matt Targett. Trusted are fourth, three points off the top. Gabriel Jesus scored all four for Beef (again!) but his side were held to a 4-4 draw by San Dimas. My team were 3-2 ahead at half-time, Nuno Tavares opened the scoring but after Jesus had turned the game in Beef’s favour Joelinton scored two put me back in the lead. Two more Jesus goals early in the second half gave Trusted the advantage before Dan Burn’s clean sheet equaliser was the final score of the game.

Two straight draws for Ben have surely finally knocked him out of the title picture. He finished with a 1-1 draw with the Muppets this week. Mohammed Salisu’s attempted interception a minute before the break ended in his own net to give Ryan’s team the lead and it took a Marc Guehi clean sheet to get the Artisans back on terms. Stanley Athletic’s good week continued with a 6-0 thrashing of Nil Satis. James Ward-Prowse scored twice and Aaron’s team also bagged cleans from Virgil van Dijk, Connor Roberts, Joachim Andersen and Pontus Jansson to move into the top half.

Divock Origi’s late header looked to have given Fred victory over Mega Bucks but Dave’s team hit back to win with cleans from Nathan Ake and Luke Ayling. YTFIB beat Markian 2-1 to ensure a three-way battle for bottom spot. A stunning half-volley from Rodri put Ian ahead but Julian got the win with cleans from Nathan Collins and Charlie Taylor.

FA Cup Final - Stanley claim first trophy

Claymore Athletic FC 1

Ronaldo 34

v

Stanley Athletic FC 4

Ward-Prowse 45+4, 54

Andersen [c]

van Dijk [c]

(2 cancelled cleans)

At Wembley, Att: 90,000

Teams

Claymore - Dubravka; Veltman, Saiss, Boly, Zanka; Doucoure, Tielemans, Normann, Dewsbury-Hall; Weghorst, Ronaldo Subs - Darlow; Cash; Da Silva; Pukki

Stanley - Krul; van Dijk, Roberts, Andersen, Jansson; Loftus-Cheek, Ward-Prowse, Havertz, Rashica, Armstrong; Werner Subs - McCarthy; Maguire; Fred; Pedro

Report

There was interesting team news from both Athletics before the start. For Claymore it was Wout Weghorst getting the nod up front over Teemu Pukki while Stanley went with a 4-5-1 and under-fire Harry Maguire could only make the bench.

It was a cagey start to the game with the best chance in the first half-hour falling to Claymore’s Abdoulaye Doucoure who dragged his shot across goal. Eventually it was Clive’s team who made the breakthrough on 34 minutes. Top scorer Cristiano Ronaldo was too strong for his markers at the back post to steer his team in front. (It’s Ronaldo’s second FA Cup final goal, his first coming in 2007 for previous team the Muppets.)

Claymore almost made it to half-time ahead but conceded an injury-time free-kick in ‘James Ward-Prowse’ territory. The Stanley midfielder shot low rather than his usual top corner attempts and it went in off the post to send the teams in level. Ward-Prowse almost moved to Claymore a couple of years ago as part of a swap deal for Sergio Aguero and he again showed what Clive had missed out on nine minutes after the break.

This time it was a goal from open play. A short pass was rolled into Ward-Prowse’s path and he smashed in from the edge of the D. Both teams restricted the goalmouth action after this and it was left to Stanley’s Joachim Andersen and influential captain Virgil van Dijk to finish the scoring with clean sheets leaving Aaron needing to build a trophy cabinet at Girdlestone Park.

---

How they got there:

Semi-finals:

Cheese Makers 0 v 4 Claymore Athletic FC

The Wateringhole Society 0 v 2 Stanley Athletic FC (after 3-3 draw)

Quarter-finals:

Cheese Makers 2 v 0 Wheel Madrid

Claymore Athletic FC 2 v 0 Markian United

Real Muppets 1 v Stanley Athletic FC 4 (after 4-4 draw)

The Wateringhole Society 5 v 0 The Cow-Faced Juniors

First Round:

Aardvark Abacus 0 v 3 The Wateringhole Society

Cheese Makers 3 v 0 San Dimas High School

Claymore Athletic FC 5 v 3 The Fabulous Artisans 

Markian United 4 v 2 Nil Satis Nisi Optimum

The Cow-Faced Juniors 3 v 0 Mega Buck Bandits 

Trusted by Millions 2 v 3 Stanley Athletic FC

Wheel Madrid 4 v 1 Fred West Landscape Gdg XI

YTFIB 1 v 4 Real Muppets

Week 25 Results - Claymore keep up the pressure

Aardvark Abacus 0 v 2 Real Muppets

Cheese Makers P v P Stanley Athletic FC

Markian United 0 v 4 Claymore Athletic FC

Mega Buck Bandits 1 v 0 YTFIB

Nil Satis Nisi Optimum P v P San Dimas High School

The Fabulous Artisans 1 v 1 Fred West Landscape Gdg XI

Trusted by Millions P v P The Wateringhole Society

Wheel Madrid 0 v 4 The Cow-Faced Juniors

	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	Diff	Pts
1	The Wateringhole Society	24	14	6	4	62	39	23	48
2	Claymore Athletic FC	25	15	2	8	62	38	24	47
3	The Cow-Faced Juniors	25	14	3	8	54	38	16	45
4	Trusted By Millions	24	13	3	8	55	41	14	42
5	The Fabulous Artisans	25	13	3	9	53	47	6	42
6	Real Muppets	25	12	3	10	53	52	1	39
7	Aardvark Abacus	25	12	1	12	56	41	15	37
8	Cheese Makers	24	10	7	7	35	34	1	37
9	San Dimas High School	24	9	8	7	38	34	4	35
10	Stanley Athletic FC	24	10	4	10	39	45	-6	34
11	Nil Satis Nisi Optimum	24	9	6	9	31	39	-8	33
12	Fred West Landscape Gardening XI	25	8	6	11	40	48	-8	30
13	Mega Buck Bandits	25	8	4	13	37	47	-10	28
14	Markian United	25	6	5	14	26	46	-20	23
15	Wheel Madrid	25	5	5	15	30	48	-18	20
16	YTFIB	25	6	0	19	23	57	-34	18

With three games off this week due to (make something up) the attention was on Claymore to see if they could close in on the absent leaders.. Clive’s team made no mistake with his strikers having a field day at Markian. Cristiano Ronaldo scored his second hat-trick in a month and Teemu Pukki added the other, firing in off the post seven minutes after the break. The CFJs also won 4-0 to stay at the sharp end of the table. Wheel Madrid were the victims, Paul’s team only have one goal in their last seven games and haven’t scored more than one in a league game since December. Jan Bednarek put the Cows in front a minute before half-time, Tomas Soucek added the second on 74 minutes and cleans from Edouard Mendy and Bednarek completed the Cows’ victory.

The Artisans missed a chance to gain ground after being held 1-1 by Fred. The Gardeners took a ninth minute lad when Ibrahima Konate headed in and Ben had to wait until the 76th minute for an equaliser, Mason Mount sliding in from inside the box. The Muppets 2-0 win at the Aardvarks jumped them over those opponents and into sixth place. Sadio Mane got both goals in the first half, taking advantage of a dozing Abacus keeper for their first and slamming in at the near post for the second. The other game saw Mega Bucks beat YTFIB 1-0 courtesy of a 62-minute Matt Lowton clean sheet.