Week 28 Results

Claymore hit the beach early. 

Athletico Phoenix 3 v 2 FCK2

Claymore Athletic FC 0 v 3 Cheese Makers

Mega Buck Bandits 1 v 3 The Fabulous Artisans

Nil Satis Nisi Optimum 0 v 0 Final Fantasy XI

Real Muppets 6 v 0 The Cow-Faced Juniors

San Dimas High School 1 v 1 The Wateringhole Society

Trusted By Millions 2 v 2 Fred West Landscape Gardening XI

YTFIB 1 v 5 Aardvark Abacus

	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	Diff	Pts
1	Claymore Athletic FC	28	18	6	4	91	46	45	60
2	Athletico Phoenix	28	15	6	7	65	52	13	51
3	Fred West Landscape Gardening XI	28	15	4	9	70	56	14	49
4	The Fabulous Artisans	28	14	5	9	70	38	32	47
5	The Cow-Faced Juniors	28	13	7	8	63	60	3	46
6	Aardvark Abacus	28	14	3	11	58	49	9	45
7	Cheese Makers	28	12	7	9	48	49	-1	43
8	San Dimas High School	28	11	9	8	64	52	12	42
9	FCK2	28	11	4	13	50	50	0	37
10	Trusted By Millions	28	10	7	11	35	46	-11	37
11	Real Muppets	28	11	1	16	55	61	-6	34
12	The Wateringhole Society	28	9	6	13	38	55	-17	33
13	Mega Buck Bandits	28	8	6	14	36	53	-17	30
14	Nil Satis Nisi Optimum	28	6	9	13	37	48	-11	27
15	Final Fantasy XI	28	6	7	15	37	64	-27	25
16	YTFIB	28	7	1	20	24	62	-38	22

Champions they may be but Claymore were well and truly turned over by Cheese Makers. Matthew’s team have all but secured a top half finish and become only the second team to shut Clive out. Shane Long poked in after 25 minutes and a late Troy Deeney double finished the job. Athletico have regained second place after edging FCK2 3-2. After goals were shared in the first ten minutes Harry Kane fired Kevin and Jon ahead ten minutes before the break. It looked like that would be the end of the scoring but cleans from Per Mertersacker and a first of the season for Paul Dummett gave Brian the points.

Fred lost ground with a 2-2 draw at Trusted. A late goal from Eden Hazard and a late, late penalty from Jermain Defoe swung the game in Fred’s favour after trailing to a Gary Cahill goal but Adrian’s clean got a point for Beef. The Artisans are finishing strongly and brushed the Bandits aside 3-1. Dave had been ahead through Wes Morgan’s header but a first of the season from Almen Abdi in first half injury time gave Ben a boost. Two goals in two second half minutes, from Leighton Baines and Christian Benteke, give the Artisans a fighting chance of top three spot.

The CFJs suffered a setback, and how!, after a recent good run. They were battered by the Muppets for who (or is it whom) Sadio Mane notched a hat-trick. Bet Ryan wishes the season was going on a while longer. Six of his league wins have come in the last ten games. The Aardvarks went to the in-form YTFIB and left them out of form. Son scored for Ady just before the break, Arnautovic for Julian just after and then it was al about the cleans. Montreal, Lascelles, Cech and Reid all on the scoresheet for Ady.

San Dimas and The Wateringhole Society played out an end-of-term 1-1 draw. Danny Welbeck got his first of the season for me on the hour but a Chancel Mbemba clean for Kiran tied things up. And in the Nil Satis/Final Fantasy basement battle nothing happened at all.

Week 27 Results

Claymore can finally uncork the reasonably-priced champagne.

Aardvark Abacus 0 v 1 Trusted By Millions

Athletico Phoenix 2 v 1 Real Muppets

Cheese Makers 3 v 1 Mega Buck Bandits

FCK2 0 v 2 The Fabulous Artisans

Final Fantasy XI 0 v 2 YTFIB

Fred West Landscape Gardening XI 7 v 3 San Dimas High School

The Cow-Faced Juniors 1 v 1 Nil Satis Nisi Optimum

The Wateringhole Society 0 v 3 Claymore Athletic FC

	Team	P	W	D	L	F	A	Diff	Pts
1	Claymore Athletic FC	27	18	6	3	91	43	48	60
2	Fred West Landscape Gardening XI	27	15	3	9	68	54	14	48
3	Athletico Phoenix	27	14	6	7	62	50	12	48
4	The Cow-Faced Juniors	27	13	7	7	63	54	9	46
5	The Fabulous Artisans	27	13	5	9	67	37	30	44
6	Aardvark Abacus	27	13	3	11	53	48	5	42
7	San Dimas High School	27	11	8	8	63	51	12	41
8	Cheese Makers	27	11	7	9	45	49	-4	40
9	FCK2	27	11	4	12	48	47	1	37
10	Trusted By Millions	27	10	6	11	33	44	-11	36
11	The Wateringhole Society	27	9	5	13	37	54	-17	32
12	Real Muppets	27	10	1	16	49	61	-12	31
13	Mega Buck Bandits	27	8	6	13	35	50	-15	30
14	Nil Satis Nisi Optimum	27	6	8	13	37	48	-11	26
15	Final Fantasy XI	27	6	6	15	37	64	-27	24
16	YTFIB	27	7	1	19	23	57	-34	22

For the second season running Claymore are our champions with three games to spare. It’s only the third occasion that the title has been retained, Clive has done it before and also the Aardvarks when they were good. Claymore got the win they needed with a comfortable win over the fading Wateringhole Society. No surprise that Sergio Aguero was on the scoresheet but that was bookended by a rarer Dusan Tadic brace.

Also surprisingly rare this season have been Eden Hazard goals for Fred but he got two this week as did Leo Ulloa in a big win over San Dimas. This was 3-3 at the break but Fred ran away with it in the second half. Craig Dawson scoring at the right end to wipe out his first half go. That goal difference was enough to lift Fred to second above Athletico who got past the in-form Muppets. Riyad Mahrez latched on to a defensive error to open the scoring on ten minutes, Anthony Martial raced through to win it in injury time before said Mane replied for Ryan.

The CFJs second place chase stuttered with a draw against Nil Satis. Pedro opened the scoring early for the Salehs, Willian replied for the Howells. The Artisans are in reach of the honours board too after beating FCK2 2-0. Chris Smalling shanked into his own net 15 minutes from time to open the scoring and a Patrick van Aanholt clean clinched the points. The Aardvarks lost ground though. Amy’s team went down to Trusted, the only score being a Nicolas Otamendi clean.

Cheese Makers have given themselves a chance of a top half finish with victory over Mega Bucks. Long, Fellaini and Deeney were on target for Matthew, Dave’s sole reply coming from Tommy Elphick’s first of the season. Down at the bottom Julian is in his best run of form of the entire campaign. Final Fantasy were YTFIB’s victims this week, cleans from Kone and Fuchs mean there’s only two points separating these two teams at the foot of the table.

FA Cup Final Result

Claymore Athletic FC 3

Aguero 33, 54, 80p

v

Fred West Landscape Gardening XI 5

Defoe 53

Alli 67, 82

Mangala [c]

Rojo [c]

(one cancelled clean)

Claymore: Robles; Evans, Ivanovic, Clichy, Dann; Cabaye, Barkley, Wijnaldum, Payet; Rooney, Aguero          Subs: Howard; Britos; Hoolahan; Giroud

Fred: Lloris; Azpilicueta, Mangala, Rojo, Dawson; Chadli, Hazard, Lallana, Alli; Rondon, Solanke
Subs: Courtois; Rahman; Mikel; Defoe

Claymore might just about have the title in the bag but Fred has dominated the games between these sides over the past year. First there was the slightly controversial FA Cup win last season and then The Gardeners did the double over these opponents in this campaign.

The first half hour had the feel off two teams not wanting to give anything away. Eventually Sergio Aguero found a bit of room on the edge of the box and fired Claymore into a first half lead.

The second half exploded into a cup final classic. Dusan Tadic hit the bar six minutes into the half and almost straight away Fred was level, Jermain Defoe sliding in at the far post to convert a low cross. Parity lasted one minute. Aguero escaped the offside trap to finish calmly. 2-1 Clive. Dele Alli had a great chance to equalise almost straight away but blazed over but he did level the game on 67 minutes, calmly chipping the keeper when being given far too much room. He should have put Fred ahead two minutes later but hit the post after rounding the keeper and having the goal at his mercy.

With ten minutes left that miss was punished when Aguero completed his hat-trick from the spot to give his team for the third, and last, time. Alli made amends for his earlier miss two minutes later, volleying in to bring the scores level again. With the game heading towards a replay two of Fred’s much-maligned defenders, Eliaquim Mangala and Marcos Rojo, to get the cleans to keep the trophy in Toronto.

---

How they got there:

Semi-finals:

Claymore Athletic FC 3 v 1 Real Muppets
Fred West Landscape Gardening XI 3 v 1 Aardvark Abacus

Quarter-finals:

Aardvark Abacus 2 v 0 Nil Satis Nisi Optimum

Claymore Athletic FC 6 v 0 The Wateringhole Society

Real Muppets 2 v 1 Athletico Phoenix

Trusted By Millions 2 v 2 Fred West Landscape Gardening XI (Fred wins replay 2-0)

First Round:

Aardvark Abacus 4 v 1 Final Fantasy XI

Cheese Makers 1 v 4 Athletico Phoenix

FCK2 2 v 3 Claymore Athletic FC

Fred West Landscape Gardening XI 2 v 1 YTFIB

Mega Buck Bandits 1 v 2 Real Muppets

San Dimas High School 2 v 2 The Wateringhole Society (TWS win replay 3-1)

The Cow-Faced Juniors 0 v 3 Nil Satis Nisi Optimum

Trusted By Millions 3 v 2 The Fabulous Artisans