Weekend roundup (30th-31st August)

Or: I love it when a plan comes together!

"I love it when a plan comes together."

So far I’ve had a fairly crapulent start to the season, but my collection of ill-chosen misfits all came good this weekend. Even my goalkeeper got an assist!

Arsenal 3-0 Newcastle

The crisis at Newcastle grows ever more serious – this week they were forced to field Shola Ameobi up front. It wasn’t all plain sailing for the gooners as Emmanuel Adebayor received a series of straight 6.0 scores from the judges for his impression of Shola Ameobi – frankly neither of them could hit a grain silo with a sitar. Toon chief bungler Kevin Keegan gave Ghengis Barton a quick run out before he starts his eighteen game ban, or whatever it is the FA hand down to him, and he was quickly into the action with a wretched lunge on Samir Nasri. Keegan was quick to imagine some retaliatory offence by Nasri on Barton which he then whinged about – check out the YouTube highlights while you still can. Goals came from Robin van Persie (don’t rush to get him in your team, he went off with an ankle injury moments after he should have scored a third) whilst Denilson got the other. Shola Adebayor chipped in with two assists and fell over a lot after running into trouble.

Barton on Nasri

Nasri – supposedly – on Barton

Arsenal: Almunia, Sagna, Toure, Gallas, Clichy, Eboue (Walcott 72), Fabregas, Denilson (Song Billong 69), Nasri, Adebayor, Van Persie (Vela 63).
Subs Not Used: Fabianski, Ramsey, Djourou, Bendtner.

Booked: Fabregas, Nasri.

Goals: Van Persie 18 pen, 41, Denilson 59.

Newcastle: Given, Coloccini, Jose Enrique (Bassong 44), Taylor, Gutierrez (Barton 89), Guthrie, Butt, Beye (Edgar 89), N’Zogbia, Owen, Ameobi.
Subs Not Used: Harper, Tozer, Donaldson, Ranger.

Booked: Coloccini, Given.

Aston Villa 0-0 Liverpool

I’ll be honest – I didn’t watch the game. We went to visit my folks, played with the neices and nephew for a while and then watched an episode of “Blake’s 7″:

The boys are back in... the eighties.

But it was a really good episode (“The Web”) from early in the first series. It’s only the second episode since Blake’s lot took control of the Liberator. Cally was telepathically taken over and took the Liberator to an uncharted planet where evil scientists from Cally’s people are performing genetic experiments. They entangle the Liberator in a giant space-web and Blake can only get it free with their help – but they want something from him first. They want some power packs so they can nuke the botched results of their experiments, who by this time have formed their own society and look suspiciously like kids with hedges on their heads. Blake gets away and the evil scientists get squished by the results of their own experiments. Anyway, there was apparently a game at Villa Park notable only for an injury to Fernando Torres. Liverpool had two others strikers on the pitch (Keane and Kuyt) playing out of position, and Ryan Babel on the bench. But instead Rafa Benitez brought on a 19 year old who couldn’t even get into Paris St. Germain’s first team last season. Lost the plot already, methinks.

Aston Villa: Friedel, Luke Young (Milner 64), Laursen, Davies, Shorey (Gardner 79), Reo-Coker, Petrov, Barry, Ashley Young, Carew, Agbonlahor.
Subs Not Used: Guzan, Harewood, Knight, Salifou, Routledge.

Liverpool: Reina, Arbeloa, Carragher, Skrtel, Dossena, Kuyt (Aurelio 70), Alonso, Mascherano, Leiva Lucas, Keane (Benayoun 79), Torres (Ngog 30).
Subs Not Used: Cavalieri, Agger, Babel, El Zhar.

Booked: Skrtel, Dossena.

West Ham 4-1 Blackburn

The Upton Park fans were spoilt for choice; should they boo currrent boss Alan Curbishley, the players on show for Alan’s Average ‘Ammers, or former “player” Paul Ince. Ince has done well to change the team he inherited so fast – they’re already a lot easier to score against and a lot less comitted than under Mark Hughes. By the time the fourth goal went in Rovers were already walking about and didn’t look to be giving a toss. Callum Davenport – who is to defending what Fred West was to hitch-hiking – surprisingly opened the scoring before Jason Roberts equalised. Roberts then missed a penalty, and it’s fair to say that it was the worst penalty since John Terry’s in Moscow. In case you need to see Terry’s penalty miss again, here it is:

West Ham: Green, Behrami, Davenport, Upson, Neill, Faubert (McCartney 60), Parker, Noble (Mullins 81), Etherington, Cole, Ashton (Bellamy 69).
Subs Not Used: Lastuvka, Boa Morte, Reid, Sears.

Booked: Bellamy.

Goals: Davenport 12, Samba 20 og, Cole 90, Bellamy 90.

Blackburn: Robinson, Ooijer, Samba, Nelsen, Warnock, Emerton, Reid, Grella (Andrews 46), Pedersen (Treacy 66), Roque Santa Cruz (Derbyshire 29), Roberts.
Subs Not Used: Brown, Mokoena, Villanueva, Simpson.

Booked: Grella, Roberts, Ooijer, Emerton, Nelsen.

Goals: Roberts 22.

Bolton 0-0 West Brom

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Bolton: Jaaskelainen, Steinsson, Andrew O’Brien, Shittu, Samuel, Joey O’Brien (Riga 14), McCann, Muamba, Gardner, Nolan, Davies. Subs Not Used: Al Habsi, Hunt, Helguson, Vaz Te, Dzemaili, Fojut.

Booked: Nolan, McCann.

West Brom: Carson, Zuiverloon, Meite (Hoefkens 46), Barnett, Robinson, Borja Valero (Cech 58), Koren (MacDonald 70), Greening, Morrison, Kim, Miller. Subs Not Used: Kiely, Bednar, Brunt, Moore.

Booked: Robinson, MacDonald.

Chelsea 1-1 Spurs

The wheels are coming off the big Phill bandwagon. Yes, they were outstanding on the opening day against a spineless Portsmouth team; they were lucky against Wigan; today they were neither outstanding nor particularly lucky. Balletti scored a fluke opener after a miscued clearence by Darren “broken, not just” Bent, but Bent saved the day with a good finish through Petr Cech’s legs. On this showing, they really need a certain petulant Brazillian who can spit his dummy 400 yards.

Chelsea: Cech, Belletti (Kalou 75), Carvalho, Terry, Ashley Cole, Bosingwa, Essien, Lampard, Joe Cole (Malouda 65), Deco, Anelka (Di Santo 88).
Subs Not Used: Cudicini, Bridge, Ferreira, Alex.

Booked: Deco, Joe Cole, Bosingwa.

Goals: Belletti 28.

Tottenham: Gomes, Zokora, Woodgate, King, Gunter (Huddlestone 62), Bentley (O’Hara 72), Jenas, Modric, Bale, Giovani (Lennon 59), Bent.
Subs Not Used: Cesar, Gilberto, Dawson, Assou-Ekotto.

Goals: Bent 45.

Everton 0-3 Portsmouth

Everton’s world was rocked by a Portsmouth side who finally remembered what the purpose of a football team was. For Everton Phil Jagiellka started in midfield instead of defence, but they immediately wished he hadn’t as Jermain Defoe wriggled through relatively unhindered by defenders to score the first. Defoe then linked with Glen Johnson whole stole a toilet seat from B&Q – oh no, that was in January 2007. Defoe linked with Johnson to score the second, before chipping Tim Howard to score Pompey’s third. Yakubu took time off from standing still in an offside position to horribly miss a penalty. Time to get either Defoe or Crouch in before the price goes up too much, I reckon.

Everton: Howard, Neville, Yobo, Lescott, Baines, Arteta, Rodwell, Jagielka, Osman (Baxter 71), Yakubu, Vaughan (Anichebe 58).
Subs Not Used: Turner, Jacobsen, Nuno Valente, Kissock, Wallace.

Booked: Baines.

Portsmouth: James, Johnson, Kaboul, Campbell, Distin, Diop, Davis (Mvuemba 90), Diarra, Armand Traore (Hreidarsson 77), Crouch, Defoe (Utaka 76).
Subs Not Used: Ashdown, Lauren, Sahar, Djimi Traore.

Goals: Defoe 12, Johnson 40, Defoe 69.

Hull 0-5 Wigan

In the day’s big rugby match Bernard Cribbins’ side coasted to an easy victory. All eleven Wigan warriors had a good game, whilst Hull… will be glad to get the game out of the way. Zaki scored twice, Valencia and Email Heskey scored once with Hull adding an own goal. Even Chris Kirkland got an assist, although it doesn’t look like it’s been credited to him.

Hull: Myhill, Ricketts, Brown, Turner, Dawson (Mendy 71), Fagan, Ashbee, Marney, Garcia (Barmby 60), Geovanni (Windass 56), Folan.
Subs Not Used: Duke, Hughes, Halmosi, Cooper.

Booked: Ashbee.

Wigan: Kirkland, Melchiot, Boyce, Bramble, Figueroa, Valencia, Palacios, Cattermole (Kapo 79), Kilbane (Brown 56), Heskey (Camara 85), Zaki.

Subs Not Used: Pollitt, Koumas, De Ridder, Kupisz.

Goals: Ricketts 5 og, Valencia 13, Zaki 63, Heskey 68, Zaki 81.

Middlesbrough 2-1 Stoke

In the end, Boro should have had this game wrapped up much earlier. Penalty-miss king Gareth Southgate is quietly building a young and effective outfit, and if Alves, Tuncay, Downing and Aliadiere were slightly less profligate, Stoke would have been buried by half-time.

Middlesbrough: Turnbull, Hoyte (Taylor 72), Wheater, Huth, Pogatetz, Aliadiere, Shawky (Digard 61), O’Neil, Downing, Alves (Mido 76), Sanli
Subs not used: Steele, Riggott, Emnes, Adam Johnson

Booked: O’Neil, Huth

Goals: Alves 37, Sanli 85

Stoke: Sorensen, Griffin, Cort, Abdoulaye Faye, Dickinson (Wilkinson 67), Lawrence, Olofinjana, Amdy Faye, Delap, Kitson (Cresswell 83), Fuller (Sidibe 74).
Subs Not Used: Simonsen, Whelan, Diao, Buxton.

Sent Off: Amdy Faye (36).

Booked: Griffin, Fuller, Lawrence, Wilkinson.

Goal: Hoyte 71 og.

Weekend roundup (17th-18th August)

Happiest this weekend will be the two people who thought to put Gabriel Agbonlahor in their team; unhappiest will be the chumps whose teams included defenders from Manchester City and Portsmouth – that’ll be me then – who both conceded four goals. Also beaming from ear to ear will be Fabio Capello, for not including Peter Crouch in the England squad. Crouch was so anonymous in the game against Chelsea that for an hour I assumed he was stil sat on Liverpool’s bench. Let’s take a look at the winners and losers from this weekend.

Aston Villa's Gabriel Agbonlahor gets himself all excited over his 7-minute hat trick against City.

Arsenal 1-0 West Brom

An impressive opening for new-boy Samir Nasri with a goal for the baby-faced schemer, delighting the four teams who picked him, and an assist for Denilson. Somehow West Brom conspired to gift Arsenal a clean sheet despite the best intentions of both sides, with Arsene Wenger prefering Johann Djourou’s comedy stylings in central defence to Philip Sendoros’ one-man impression of Titus Bramble.

Aston Villa 4-2 Man City

Mark Hughes’ was as stunned as everyone else when Villa speed merchant Gabriel Agbonlahor scored a hat-trick. Manchester City, who lost Valeri Bojinov in the warm-up to another long-term injury, have now conceded twelve goals in the last two league games – no mean feat when you consider eight of them were to Middlesbrough. Gareth Barry chipped in with a couple of assists and John Carew scored Villa’s other, whilst Elano’s penalty and Corluka’s tap-in were the consolations for City.

Everton 2-3 Blackburn

I predict a long, difficult season if David Moyes persists with the experiment of playing without a central midfield. Yakubu’s particular brand of running down blind alleys and standing in offside positions brought him a goal, whilst Mikel Arteta scored what would have been described as a sublime free-kick against any other team, but against Paul Robinson it’s simply put down to a goalkeeping error by the pie-loving Blackburn custodian. Scoring for the Guv’nor’s team were perma-crocked midfielder Clive Dunn, Rocky Santa Claus (who was surprisingly overlooked by many managers, making it into only one starting team) and aging Dutch centre-back Andre Oohyeah. The game was notable for a first public sighting of new Everton wonderkid Jose Baxter, who at 7 years and 128 days old broke James Vaughan’s record of being the youngest player to play for Everton. Doubtless Baxter will want to follow in the footsteps of other Everton wonderkids and really make a mark on the big time, like Francis Jeffers and Paul Rideout before him.

Bolton 3-1 Stoke

New £10m signing Johan Elmander looked worth every penny against Stoke City; in fact, Stoke managed to make every single Bolton player look like a £10m player as they capitulated to a 3-1 defeat, being 3-0 down by half-time. Stoke should be praised for attempting something that no other premier league team has managed, namely having a decent season with Thomas Sorenson in the nets. Steinnson’s agricultural hoof and Kevin ‘razor-elbows’ Davis scored the others, with Ricardo Fuller replying for the Harry Potters. Richard Cresswell failed to bother the scorers, disappointing the four managers who mysteriously picked him for their teams – what do you know that we don’t?

Chelsea Pensioners 4-0 Portsmouth

At Stamford Bridge Portsmouth’s collection of has-beens and never-weres were soundly thrashed by the only team in the league with a higher average age than theirs. Yes, the Chelsea Pensioners looked good; in particular, Ashley Cole took a day off from cheating on his wife to put in a good stint at outside-left, although so slight was the resistance put up by Glen Johnson that he would have made Prince Phillip look like Lionel Messi. Useless Kaboul made his debut in midfield for Pompey, whilst Papa Wop Bop A Loo Bop stood on the right-wing watching Ashley Cole run past him. Fears that Portsmouth would turn into a long ball team were well-founded as they relied on Plan A – hoofing it to Mr Abbey Clancy without ever offering him support. At the back they were similarly abject, with Herman Munster at left-back looking less at home in a premier league game than he would look on-stage playing guitar for Slipknot. During the post-match review on Sky Jamie Redknapp read out an interesting comment from his autocue – if Gareth Barry is worth £18m, what is Deco actually worth? The little Portugese Brazillian was terrific, being involved in everything as well as scoring the final goal. Joe “not Ashley or Andrew or Carlton” Cole, Frank Lumplard and Nic Anelka – another one, like Didier Drogba, who failed to make it into a single team – also worried the scoreboard operators.

Hull City 2-1 Fulham

Hull City surprised everyone this weekend by sticking with their awful orange and black strip: what’s up with that, lads? Slightly less surprising was their coming from 0-1 down to win as Fulham get caught out playing away from home more often than Ashley Cole. Silky Oon scored for the Cottagers with a terrific assist from Jummy Bullard, whose hair is so big it now has its own biometric passport. Hull’s equaliser came from Edward Woodward – no, not really. Brazillian Geovanni, who once cost Barcelona £18m, scored a terrific goal and no doubt delighted the one manager who picked him, not only because he scored but because he’s down as a midfielder rather than a forward which makes each of his goals even more valuable. Of course, Geovanni made a bright start to last season, scoring the winner in the Manchester derby, but by the end of the season he couldn’t even get into a team thrashed 8-1 by Boro, so we’ll see how that goes. Ex-Spireite Caleb Folan’s winner came after Paul “Cinderella” Konchesky ran away from the ball, leaving Craig Fagan to pick his pocket and square the ball to Folan. Those who like their fancy pieces on the mature side will have been disappointed not to see Dean Sizeableass make an appearance from the bench, although it did mean that the Sky blimp remained the largest pale round thing on view.

Sunderland 0-1 Liverpool

Liverpool’s new away strip harked back to the glory years of Graeme Souness and brought back poignant memories of Glenn Hysen, Barry Vension and Istvan Kozma. Like Pele Sunderland were very proficient up until the business end of the pitch, then they went all limp and floppy and unable to perform. The home side’s form was generally enough to suggest boring mid-table mediocrity is well within their reach this season (Steed “The New Zidane” Malbaranque looking very effective until being withdrawn). New £20m Sunderland defender Robbie Keane had an excellent game, notably stopping Fernando “difficult second season” Torres from rolling the ball into an empty net on one occasion. Torres eventually broke free from Keane’s shackles to hit a scorching low shot into the corner of Craig “Flash” Gordon’s net.

Manchester United 1-1 Newcastle

Manchester United were missing Cristiano Ronaldo, Nani, Anderson, Louis Saha, Owen Hargreaves and any sort of imagination as they laboured to a 1-1 draw against Keegan’s relegation contenders. Matters were not improved when Michael Carrick limped off and United faced the hinderance of playing with John O’Shea in midfield, rather than tough it out with only ten men. Obafembi (if that’s your real name) Martins and Darren Fletcher provided the noteworthy statistics. United were abject, turning in a performance devoid of any imagination, craft or guile, whilst Manchester were little better. Such was the lack of depth at United’s disposal that they ended the game playing with six defenders and three midfielders. The game will probably only be remembered for the first public sightings of two of United’s teenage Brazillian wunderkind: Sideshow Bob Possebon, a central midfielder in the Bryan Robson mould; and Rafael da Silva, an attacking right-back in the early Arsenal Ashley Cole style. His twin brother Fabio, a left-back, should also shortly be introduced to the public. I suppose the only plus about this is that last year we started with a charity shield winn on penalties followed by an abject home draw, and last season didn’t end up too bad for us.

Middlesbrough 2-1 Spurs

Spurs’ opening day travails in the north-east continued as they were easily beaten by a Boro team that rarely looked like breaking sweat. David Bentley, the league’s most popular player with eleven picks, continued the fine tradition of recent Spurs sides by being a right-sided player employed on the left-wing. Many of us were seduced by Darren Bent’s pre-season form when we should have paid more attention to last season’s competitve form. He was the joint second most popular striker, appearing in seven teams – more than Drogba, Anelka, Rooney, Tevez, Owen, Santa Claus, Walcott and Heskey put together. Desperate Dan-chinned centre-back David Wheaterbix should have scored the opener, but the goal was ruled out for a foul on him by Michael “WWF Royal Rumble” Dawson. I’m still trying to find that one in the FA rule book. Wheaterbix was on the spot to score the opener, whilst podgy cake-lover Ahmed Mido couldn’t get out of the way of a Didier Degard shot and deflected it into the Spurs net. Robert Huth provided Spurs’ consolation. Spurs manager Father Damian Karras left Dimitar Berbatov on the bench until the 65th minute when he replaced teenage Mexican stropper Geovanni Dos Santos.

West Ham 2-1 Wigan

Two early goals from bottle blonde Dean Ashton gave West Ham the points as Wigan struggled to raise their game. The away side were no doubt induced into a light yet soothing coma by Alan Curbishley’s oral banalities, which the Hammers were surprisingly able to take advantage of. Despite their new away strip resembling a flourescent marker pen, Wigan provided only one highlight with a debut goal from Amr Zaki. Zaki’s strike was well taken and provided a tantaslising glimpse of why, on current FIFA statistics, the Egyptians is currently the deadliest striker in world football. Unfortunately, a couple of missed sitters should also go some way towards securing a tag of “the new Emile Heskey”. In his post match interview, Alan Curbishley said zzzz ….

Player statistics

I thought it might be fun (in a geeky sort of way) to analyse the statistics regarding player picks in the grumpyoldfootballers league. There are some very interesting statistics:

Goalkeepers

1. Petr Cech (picked in 10 out of 26 teams)

Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech impresses the ladies.

2. Mark Schwarzer (8 )

3. David James (4)

=4. Ali Al-Habsi (3)

=4. Edwin van der Sar (3)

=4. Brad Freidel (3)

=4. Tim Howard (3)

Defenders

1. Rio Ferdinand (8 )

Rio Ferdinand mocks John Terry for only being picked in 2 teams.

=2. Ricardo Carvalho (6)

=2. Abdoulaye Meite (6)

=2. Joleon Lescott (6)

=5. Martin Laursen (5)

=5. Glen Johnson (5)

=5. Luke Young (5)

Midfielders

1. David Bentley (11)

David Bentley with Spurs manager Father Damian Karras.

2. Cesc Fabregas (9)

=3. Ashley Young (6)

=3. Nigel Reo-Coker (6)

5. Hayden Mullins (5)

=6. Mikel Arteta (4)

=6. Samir Nasri (4)

=6. Paul Scholes (4)

Attackers

1. Emanuel Adebayor (10)

"Where's the ball?" Bet Adebayor wishes he'd gone to Specsavers.

=2. Darren Bent (7)

=2. Fernando Torres (7)

4. Dean Ashton (6)

5. Dimitar Berbatov (5)

=6. Yakubu (4)

=6. Richard Cresswell (4)

=6. Peter Crouch (4)

So, a lot of interesting picks and some big names missing from the most picked lists.Let’s analyse some of the statistics this exercise has thrown up:

• More people picked Bolton’s reserve goalkeeper Ali Al-Habsi than Liverpool’s first choice Jose Reina
• As many people picked Pedro Mendes (2), who has signed for Rangers, as picked Ashley Cole
• John Terry has been picked in the same number of teams (2) as Desperate Dan-chinned Boro centre-back David Wheaterbix
• One person picked Paul Konchesky
• Frank Lumplard has been picked in less teams (2) than Didi Hamann (4), Simon Davies (3)Nigel Reo-Coker (6), Hayden Mullins (5) and Javier Macherano (3) – that’s despite Mascherano not even being able to play due to being away at the Olympics
• Two teams have picked Cristiano Ronaldo from the start
• David Bentley was the league’s most popular player, picked in eleven teams
• One person backed Rolando Bianchi to score more points now that he’s back playing in Italy this season than when he “played” for Man City last season
• Wayne Rooney was picked in only one team – the same number as Nicholas Bendnter, Marlon Harewood, Afonso Alves, Alan Smith, Caleb Folan, Craig Beattie and Rolando Bianchi

To play in the grumpyoldfootballers fantasy league, all you need to do is head over to http://fantasy.premierleague.com/ and select your team. When you’ve picked it, click on the Leagues link and enter the code 210826-49183.That’s it – that’s all you need to do!

Fantasy League Invitation

This is just a reminder to everyone at their that they are welcome to join the first annual GrumpyOldFootballers fantasy league. We play the fantasy league game hosted by the premier league themselves, which involves picking a squad of fifteen players worth £100m pounds. The game is open to everyone – not just friends, relatives and work-based acquaintances – so if you just happen to stop by this site, please feel free to join. If you’re already a member of the premier league game then you can still enter out league – any team in the game can be entered in up to 10 private leagues.

To play, all you need to do is head over to http://fantasy.premierleague.com/ and select your team. When you’ve picked it, click on the Leagues link and enter the code 210826-49183.That’s it – that’s all you need to do!

Instructions on joining the GOF fantasy league

For all those people sitting in the cheap seats, this is what you need to do to join the GrumpyOldFootballers fantasy league this year:

1. Start up Firefox, Internet Explorer, Safari or – ahem – Netscape, or whatever you like to use to browse the internet.
2. Go to this website: http://fantasy.premierleague.com/
3. On the right is a box marked ‘Play Fantasy’, and in that box is a link that says Not registered? Sign up>> – click on this link.
4. You’ll go to a new page. Enter a username in the box provided – only letters, numbers, underscore and space may be used.
5. Enter the password that you would like to use for this website. It must be different from your username, at least six characters long, minimum two letters and two numbers
6. Enter it again to make sure you didn’t arse it up the first time.
7. Enter your email address.
8. Enter your email address a second time as an anti-arsing-up measure.
9. Enter the rest of your personal details at the bottom of the page, and select CONTINUE.
10. On the new page, select your favourite club (not Chelsea) from the drop-down list.
11. Tick the boxes for whatever marketing spam you wish to receive.
12. Select the COMPLETE REGISTRATION button.
13. Agree to the terms and conditions.
14. Select a team name – twenty characters only.
15. Choose a strip for your team. It makes no actual difference to anything what you do with the strip, so don’t sweat it.
16. Choose whatever type of email you want to receive.
17. Click on Select Team.
18. Now you’re through to the business part of the website. Choose your squad of players, costing a maximum of £100,000,000. You must choose the players as indicated – so two goalkeepers, five defenders, five midfielders, three forwards with no more than three players from any one real life team. Click on the player name to select them, and if you want to get rid of one, click on the yellow arrow next to his name when he’s on the pitch. Alternatively, you could click on auto-complete to have the game pick a squad for you – you can always change as many players as you want up to the start of the real football season. When you’ve successfully picked a team, click on the enter team button.
19. Now, on the right side of the screen, you’ll see a section that says ‘Leagues’. Click on ‘here’.
20. In the space provided, enter the code 210826-49183 and click on Join League.

Let the (word) games begin …

Congratulations to Daniel Lowry on taking up the challenge and joining the Grumpy Old Footballers fantasy league. Not content with taking on the business world as a recent graduate from university (remember to smile when you greet customers Daniel, and always ask if they would like to supersize their meal) he’s taking on his elders, betters and fatters not only at fantasy football but verbal sparring:

“He doesn’t even spell his name with capital letters. You’ve got to get the basics right in a game like this, and to be frank, sloppy mistakes like that can cost you big time. You can only put that down to inexperience.”

I like your style, Daniel – you like to get your verbal barbs in early doors and you’re not afraid to pack your comments with clichés. Just remember not to pack too many fries in those happy meals.

In other news, Grumpy Old Footballers now has one of those RSS feed thingys to allow you to follow the exciting, if irregular, entries on this blog. Look for the heading on the side that says ‘RSS Feed Thingy’ and click on the text; then follow the instructions to subscribe to this blog in your favourite RSS reader (like Google Reader). It’s that simple!

The curse strikes early this season …

The curse has struck even earlier than normal this season with the news that Steven “calm down” Gerrard has picked up an injury, just mere days after being selected for the Grumpy Old Footballers First XI. From the Sky Sports website:

“Liverpool have confirmed captain Steven Gerrard has returned home for treatment on a groin injury.” You can read the rest of the report here.

Tune in tomorrow when we’ll have news of injuries befalling the entire Portsmouth first team as they crane their necks skywards to welcome new oldboy Peter Crouch.

Don’t forget that entries are welcome from everyone except Ashley Cole for this seasonn’s fantasy league competition: click here for full instructions.

Grumpy Old Footballers: “more teams than George Bush has friends”

In an unprecedented surge that made the iPhone queues look like the dash to purchase signed copies of Ashley Cole’s autobiography, membership of the first annual Grumpy Old Footballers fantasy league surged to four teams. “That’s more than George Bush has friends”, quipped a fictional Barack Obama aide.

George Bush and his brother Jeb think about bananas, and who to invade to get one.

Warm welcomes are extended to Mark Appleton, Paul Lowry and Drew Wright. The mickey-taking starts next week.

Membership is still open to anyone who walks in and sees anything worth doing, so feel free to invite friends and relatives, loved ones (spouses are also included under that heading), siblings and casual acquaintances through Facebook – spread the word! (Remember, Ashley Cole is not allowed). For full instructions, click here.

Thanks again to everyone who has joined. We look forward to Daniel Lowry taking up the challenge, should he prove up to it.

Infrequently Asked Questions – Part I

In life, there are two types of people. The first type gets their new DVD player, or iPhone, or Intercontinental Ballistic missile and they just want to get the thing out of the box and play with it. Only much later, when the thing won’t play DVDs / make phone calls / rain down fiery death on surprised infidels do they bother to read the instructions.

The second type of person is the cautious type. They read the instructions thoroughly, or they won’t buy something til the price has come down just a little more. They insist on scrutinising every single variable, and every possible outcome until their friends feel like screaming, “Oh my God, it’s just a bag of cotton wool, will you just buy the thing and get on with it!”

If you’re the first sort of person, you’ve already stopped reading and gone to pick your team. If you’re the second type, you’ll still be thinking about your team and you’ll want to know the answers to these – the Grumpy Old Footballers Infrequently Asked Questions – Part I.

Q: If I make a change 11.29 on Saturday 16 August it covers matches played 16-22 August; if I make a change 11.31 Saturday 16 August, it covers matches played 23-29 August – is this correct?

A: Yes. You made your changes too late for them to count in the round of games that’s about to commence, but they will be reflected in the round that follows.

Q: If my first team player doesn’t play Saturday, my reserve player comes in. However, if my original first team player has a game midweek (and plays) any points scored by my reserve Saturday don’t count?

A: That’s correct. Only one player can score points for you in any week. If your substitute scores a hattrick on Saturday, but the player he replaced gets sent of on Wednesday, you’ll suffer the points loss for the red card. The points scored by your first choice lpayer take precedence.

Q: If a player’s value increases whilst he’s in my team, and I choose to sell him, do I get 100% of the profit?

A: No, you only get half the profit if you sell a player who’s value has gone up. If you purchase him for £5.0m, and his value rises to £6.0m when you sell him, you receive £5.5m.

Q: After a couple of weeks my initial 15 players could be worth, in theory, £105m (i.e. £5m over the 100m I originally had to spend). If I have a player bought for £10m and his value doesn’t change so I sell him for £10m, do I have to buy a player at £5m to keep in the initial £100m budget?

A: No. If you sell a player at £10m, you still have £10m to replace him with. If you sell a player at £10m and you already had £0.5m in the bank, you can still spend £10.5m If you spend £10.5m on Ashley Cole, you’re an eejit.

Thanks to Paul Lowry for the first batch of IAQ.

Invitation to the GrumpyOldFootballers fantasy league!

I would like to invite anyone reading my blog to play in the first GrumpyOldFootballers Fantasy Premier League. It’s absolutely free, no-one makes any money out of it, I just thought it would be fun to have our own little fantasy league competition. Every week, I’ll update the world via this blog on how the teams are doing.

To play you need to register at http://fantasy.premierleague.com and choose your team as per the instructions. You’ll choose a squad of players, and you can swap them about each week (like Rafael Benitez), or keep the same eleven all season (like Martin O’Neill).

Once you have logged in and entered your team, click on the ‘Leagues’
link you can find on the the right of the page. Enter the code 210826-49183 to join the GrumpyOldFootballers Fantasy Football league.

In this game, there are no secrets. Anyone can see anyone else’s team just by clicking on it, so in the spirit of starting as we mean to go on, here’s my team, GrumpyOldFootballers FC:

Grumpy Old Footballers FC

Now, I’ll be honest, I thought I would just be able to make up a league and register my team later, but it turns out that I can’t, so I had to make up my team now. Transfers are free, so I can change my teams as I go along. One of the things I like about this game is that player values change as the performance does. So, in past seasons like Fabrice Fernandes and Louis Saha have cost next to nothing and every team ends up having them. With this game, those managers who have faith to pick a player when they cost £4m get rewarded when their value goes up to £7m – they can sell them and make a profit. It’s worth keeping an eye on injured players – their value goes down while they’re not playing, and you can snaffle up a bargain by putting them in earlier than anyone else.

So, let’s discuss some of the more esoteric picks in GrumpyOldFootballers first XI:

Philip Deggen, Liverpool

Using my extensive knowledge of world football based on playing Football Manager since Kevin Tom’s first discovered the ZX Spectrum, I knew that Degen was an attacking international full-back (on either side) who had spent the few previous seasons playing in Germany. Playing for Liverpool, you would expect a few clean sheets, and hopefully most folk won’t know who he is.

Maynor Figueroa, Wigan

Figueroa is an attacking full-back whose long throws have been banned in seventeen countries by the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks. He only joined Wigan towards the end of last season, about the time Steve “Bernard Cribbins” Bruce tightened up the Wigan defence. He won’t be a first choice either for Wigan or me, but he’s cheap, and again I hope very few other teams will have him.

Glen Little, Portsmouth

Didn’t play many games for Reading last season, so didn’t score many points. Has only one pace – glacially slow. Can’t beat a man for pace, or at tiddley-winks. But he’s one of the most underrated crossers of a ball in the premier league. Now if only he had the human equivalent of a telegraph pole to cross the ball to…

Okay, that’s enough for now.  Hope to see you in the GrumpyOldFootballers Fantasy League very soon!

Good luck!