Something has crept up on us today, it’s the second anniversary of the first EVER night of Ballers games!

To celebrate, this is the quickest ever thrown together Ballers Blog to once again thank EVERYONE who’s been involved over these first two years. There’s plenty of stats out there in black and white to show how many new companies fail in their first couple of years, but we’re still standing! To those of you who were there at the start, regardless of whether you’re still with us, we wouldn’t be here without out you and the foundations you helped us put in place. If you were here at the start and are still with us, the level of appreciation is multiplied infinitely and hopefully we’ll come up with a suitable way to reward you! If you found us a little later down the line, at least you found us, and we thank you for it, and if you aren’t currently playing, hopefully we’ll see you back with us one day……

Heading into year 3 we are looking at our options for expansion, starting with the opportunity to get a 5-a-side league going at Cheadle Town FC on a Thursday evening (starting very soon!), and we’re looking forward to seeing where the partnership between the two of us can lead.

One thing that we are going to change, at least in the short term, is that we are going to do away with the weekly round up and replace it with a full monthly review. To sweeten the deal we will be throwing a little extra into these, including a review of the action from each division per month, a ‘Good Month / Bad Month’ section for each division, an overall Performance Of The Month, Player Of The Month and Team Of The Month (with photos!), and whatever else we can think of to cram in there. The aim is to have the monthly review and a monthly blog so there will still be fairly regular relevant content going onto the website. Unfortunately the weekly round up was just taking up a little too much time, and while we want to keep giving you guys what you want (if you ever read anything on here), we also want to be spending time on other things to try and improve the overall customer experience. Isn’t the phrase ‘overall customer experience’ horrifically cheesy……

The one other thing we were planning on throwing into a blog was the changing face of small sided football, but we’ll touch on that next month!

Unfortunately we aren’t going to be celebrating with a bumper Tuesday league night, thanks to United and City in the Champions League, but there’s always tomorrow…….

Maybe the summer isn’t quite over yet! Any non-Ballers might want to get signed up to try and get a last bit of sun on your skin before the darkness descends……

LEAGUE NEWS

ICYMI, we have a BRAND NEW THURSDAY 5-A-SIDE LEAGUE starting at Cheadle Town FC in the next few weeks. One off trial games are available over the next few weeks for any team who wants to come and have a look at the set up before deciding whether to commit to the new league.

The new Monday and Tuesday leagues both kick off in the next few weeks, and while spaces are minimal, there are still a couple to be had across the two nights.

We are still looking at the possibility of expanding the Sunday league with earlier kick off times, so if Sunday is the night for you, get onto us asap.

We currently have a Facebook competition on the go, giving everyone the chance to win a FREE MONTH OF FOOTBALL. Head to the Facebook page for details and get involved.

For more information on any of the above, fill in a Join A League form on the homepage.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

The Sunday Premiership still looks to be a division to watch, and returned to capacity after El Caliente rejoined us to replace Real Maskid, who went AWOL without playing a game this season. The good thing from their point of view is that it happened early enough for them to have the chance to catch up their missed games, starting with two this week while Duno had lads away. Their first was against unbeaten Wilmslow Whoppers, who are hoping to to turn recent draws into wins, and they started well with goals from Alex Jackson and Dan Exley in the opening 6 minutes. Danny King pulled one back inside the opening 10 minutes, but the Whoppers quickly restored their two goal lead with an Olly Ford goal a minute later. Liam Delaney scored two more to increase the Whoppers lead to 4, but Nathaniel Odysseus-Kingsley reduced the deficit just before the break. King got his second two minutes after the break to get Caliente within two, and it remained two when Fidelis Eberegbe scored after Exley had got his second for Whoppers. The Whoppers eased clear in the final 10 as Jackson and Ford got two more apiece, with just a Divine strike (someone called Divine, rather than God himself) in response for Caliente. A tough night for Caliente didn’t look like easing off as they had a second game against Bangers & Pash, who went into this week’s game top of the table. After a slow start things burst into life with 4 goals in 6 minutes approaching the break. Matt Sheehan and Rory Kelly scored either side of goals from Odysseues-Kinglsey and King to see us into the break at 2-2, and it was 3-3 with 20 minutes remaining as Chris Carroll and Ross Grealey scored within a minute of each other. King’s second and an own goal gave Caliente a two goal lead, but that was back to one with 7 minutes to play as Harry Kilmartin grabbed Bangers 4th. The final and decisive goal of the game secured a surprise win for Caliente as Grealey got his second in the final minute to incredibly leave Champions Duno as the only Premiership side without a win. Stockport Eagles looked to be the surprise package of the Premiership after picking up 4 points from their last two very tough games, but a third awaited them this week as Insole looked to make it two wins from their first two games. There was only one goal in the opening half an hour, and it was Jordan Cunningham who got it for Insole in the 9th minute. When Dylan Feast got their second with 18 minutes left the floodgates opened, and three goals from Kyle Clarke and another from Connor Harding saw them go 6 up with 10 to play. No more goals in those final 10 minutes mean that Insole pick up a surprisingly one sided win which could kick start a genuine title challenge.

The clash of the top two at the start of play didn’t take place, so the other 4 teams had the chance to close the gap. Beercalona and Sevilla Lacatalent were both looking for a second win of the season, and at half time Sevilla were the favourites as they recovered from Dave Watson’s early strike for Beercalona to lead 3-1 at the break as Jake Riley got two and Sam Melling the other. Tom Ratcliffe got one back for Beercalona early in the second half, but Sevilla restored their two goal lead with an own goal with 20 minutes left. Scott Williams and Jay Ratcliffe both scored to make things all square, and Williams second edged Beercalona in front as we headed towards the final 5 minutes. Jay Ratcliffe got the final goal as Beercalona completed their comeback to move up to third place in the table. Polish Army went into this week’s round of games as the only Championship team without a win, but each of their games up until now had been close. That didn’t look like being the case this week as they trailed 8-0 at half time against Kipsta Cobras, Connor Harding with three, Dylan Lowth two, James Bamgbose, Tom Leach and Warren Yeo one each. The second half wasn’t much better, but they only conceded 5 more to give Kipsta a resounding 13-0 win, Harding and Lowth with two more each and Yeo with his second. Not the best game to choose to film……

The leaders in League One also didn’t have a league game this week as Murder On Zidane’s Floor were let down by the withdrawal of Pat’s Giants (hopefully just for now…). The McMuffin Men could take top spot with a win over Nice Buns B, but that looked unlikely at the break as goals from Paul Cheetham, Charlie Williamson and Sean Cope gave Buns a 3-1 half time lead with Charley Eyre grabbing McMuffin’s only goal of the opening half. 3-1 became 4-1 when Jimmy Williamson scored with 17 minutes left, and Charlie ensured they restored their three goal lead with 10 to play after Mark Bailey had pulled one back for McMuffin. Calan Sherer and Bailey both scored to make it 5-4 with two minutes left, but Buns held on for a win that sends them third. Team Tom were planning their parade after they beat Inter Your Sister on night one with 5 men, but they’ve picked up no more points since then and needed a win over the same opposition to stay in contention at the top end. Jimmy Robinshaw put Inter ahead early, but Carl Carter and Aaron Crook ensured Team Tom lead inside the opening 10 minutes. Craig Johnson made it Desmond at the break, and Inter looked to have it won when they scored three without reply in the opening stages of the second half, two more from Robinshaw and one from Leigh Edwards. Phil Partakis gave the Tommers hope going into the final 5 minutes, and Carter got his second in the final minute, but it wasn’t enough to get anything out of the game for Team Tom as both League One games finished 5-4 (and would have been much better to film than our actual choice…..).

Another division, and another top of the table team not playing this week as Step Brothers were forced to cancel late on for family reasons. The Veterans could join them at the top of the table with a win over new boys Fat Boys Run Wild, and the result was all but determined by the break as three goals from Ben Mercer and one each from Ryan Prestwich, Dean Minshull and Sam Collicott saw them lead 6-2, with the replies coming from Matthew Kealy and Jimmy. Just Jimmy. The same Jimmy scored two in the opening 10 minutes of the second half to reduce the deficit to two goals, but the longer standing team finished much the stronger as Prestwich, Collicott and Adam Pinder all scored two each in the final 15 to give The Veterans as 12-4 win. FC AOTS and Deportivo Lack Of Talent were both looking to pick up a second win of the season as they faced off this week. It looked to be AOTS night as they lead 3-0 at the break with Eoghan Scott scoring two after Adam Duty had given them an early lead. Deportivo made a fight of it in the second half as Ben Proctor scored two in three minutes to make it 3-2 with 15 minutes left, but Duty grabbed a last gasp goal to ensure AOTS moved into third place.

Murder On Zidane’s Floor took on Wilmslow Whoppers in a friendly that turned into an absolute goal-fest. Olly Ford scored 5 and Alex Jackson 4 for Whoppers, with Dan Evans scoring 6 for Murder as the Whoppers won a 26 goal thriller 14-12.

THE SUNDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL BE WE REMAIN OPEN TO THE IDEA OF EXPANDING THE LEAGUE AS SOON AS WE CAN. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS 

MONDAY LEAGUE

The Monday Premiership continues to be a place where teams fear to tread. So much so that this was another week where there were no games played. Fortunately new teams are coming in to fill up the Monday league from the bottom, so by the time the new season starts next month we should hopefully be full of reliable teams….

A tough task faced new boys Garvins Ballers as they looked to become the first team to take points off Netsix & Chill this season. They struck first through Jahid Hussain’s opening minute goal, but the leaders took control as the half went on, with Jimmy Leeson scoring three in the next 9 minutes, and Thomas Leach adding two more before the break. They cruised to a comfortable victory as Leeson added two more, Aaron Campbell three and James Bamgbose the other, with Joshua Hargreaves and Jordan Cunningham scoring late on for Garvins. Phantom Brazilians look likely to finish second, and would take another step towards that if they could beat Nice Buns this week. It was Buns who edged the opening half though, as three Jay Berrisford goals saw them lead 3-2 at the break, with an own goal and a Andrew Shaw finish in response for Phantom. Paul Wilkinson quickly drew Phantom level at the start of the second half, and they took control from there as Matt Barton added two and Shaw his second to give them a hard fought win.The Monday Randommers were even more random than ever this week as only two players who’d actually played for them before turned out this week, but after a tough run of fixtures they went up against the still to be renamed CA FC in what was their first official league game. The Randoms lead 4-2 at the break as two goals from Lukas Voveris and one each for Shaun Mulverney and Harvey Marsh were enough to give them the edge with Josh Jones pulling two back for CA. Jones’ third made it 4-3 with 20 minutes left, but two more from Voveris eased Randoms clear again. Two more Mulverney goals in the final 5 minutes secured the win, with a consolation from Charlie Andrew all the new team could muster in the dying stages.

We welcomed another new team this week in LoL FC, and they faced off against a hybrid of Diva Fever and Wellspring in a friendly on their first night. Costa got their first Ballers goal, and Chris Rhodes ensured they lead at the break after John Brookes had leveled things up. The new boys ran away with it in the second half though, as Costa and Aaron Derbyshire got two each and Gary Banks they other as they finished up 7-2 winners.

THERE’S ONE LAST SPACE AVAILABLE FOR ANY NEW TEAMS WANTING TO GET INVOLVED WITH THE NEW MONDAY LEAGUE DUE TO START IN OCTOBER 

TUESDAY LEAGUE

With the Tuesday Premiership all but sewn up and the Championship to be decided tonight, that means we’re just a couple of weeks away from the start of the NEW TUESDAY LEAGUE! First things first, and Gangs Of Dwight Yorke had to draw a line under their Premiership season by securing the title against Shaka. They were well on their way when Wayne Reeves opened the scoring and an own goal made it 2-0 within the opening 10 minutes. The goals flowed regularly throughout, as Reeves’ second was followed by goals two from Rob Brocklehurst and one from Wez Barker before the break. More of the same followed in the second period as Connor Harding got on the sheet, Callu Jones and Barker got two each, and Brocklehurst got his third, with the only blot on their night being a last minute Liam Paull goal to deny them a clean sheet. Second place was still to be played for, and Total Bala and Michu At De Gea Ba were two teams in contention for it. John Wood gave Bala the lead in the opening minutes, but Michu lead 3-1 at the break as Matt barton scored two and Michael Jennison got the other. It was 4-1 three minutes after the restart as Fidelis Eberegbe grabbed a goal, but Lee Manion reduced the arrears a minute later. Barton’s third with 18 minutes left looked to have put Michu in complete control, but Bala struck back with three in 4 minutes, two from Ethan Kaye and Manion with his second of the game. Both teams went for it in the final 10 minutes, but the game ended the way it started, with Wood’s late finish to give Bala the comeback win.

Wellspring knew what they had to do this week, and any kind of win over Bandit Athletic would be enough for them to claim the Championship title. They struck first through George Quayle’s 8th minute goal, but Bandit pressed hard to get back in it throughout an otherwise goalless first half. When Wellspring got their second through Carlton Cowley’s finish 7 minutes after the restart, they hit two more in quick succession to secure both the win and the title, Cowley with his second and Shane Bridges their 4th. Dylan Feast got a deserved goal back for Bandit with 6 minutes left, but Mike Devitt got the final goal to cap a fine season for Wellspring. The likes of Gangs await them in the Premiership next season…..

We welcomed a couple of new teams to the Tuesday league this week, with the hopefully soon to be renamed NT FC debuting against Show Me Da Mane. Lots of goals in this one, with Chris Murray getting 7 of Mane’s 16 as the new boys ran out of steam after being within two goals at the break. Nicky and Lewis Thirkill and Reds King all got two each for the new boys, who lost 16-7 in week one. FC AOTS also doubled up their Sunday night by joining Tuesday as well, and they faced familiar foes in Beercalona in a friendly this week. Three goals from Ste Whittle weren’t enough for them to get anything out of it though, as three from Tom Ratcliffe and two from namesake Jay gave Beercalona an 8-4 win.

THE NEW TUESDAY LEAGUE STARTS ON 9TH OCTOBER. WE CURRENTLY HAVE ONE SPACE AVAILABLE, BUT IT REALLY WON’T STICK AROUND LONG, SO GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS OR TO REGISTER

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

Polish Army were back in the Wednesday league this week, fresh off the back of their Sunday hammering, and their return was a tough looking encounter with the current champs Ajax Treesdown. They started really well though, going three up in the opening 12 minutes through goals from Julian, Slawek and debuting Norbert. They looked like they might hold onto that lead until the break, but two goals in the final 5 minutes of the half from Matt Taylor and Evan Farrell. Within 5 minutes of the restart the comeback was complete as Adam Taylor leveled up and an own goal put Ajax in front for the first time. The Army weren’t up for letting this go easily though, and Julian quickly got his second to make it 4-4. Adam Taylor’s second 11 minutes from time looked for a while like it could be the winner, but we weren’t expecting 4 goals in the final 4 minutes. Norbert’s second made it all square again, but Adam Taylor scored two, either side of Farrell’s second to give Ajax a really hard fought win. Unprotected Cesc’s Wednesday debut was a defeat to Exeter Gently, so it would be interesting to see how far they had come since that opening night. It didn’t start well as Kristian Igo gave Exeter a lead in the first minute, but Max Brookes quickly leveled things up. A close first half ended all square at 3-3 with an own goal and a Tom Harrison strike for Exeter being matched by goals from Jack McDonagh and Brookes. The second half was just as close, and it was 4-4 with 15 minutes remaining as another own goal put Exeter back in front before Jahed Hussain again drew Cesc level. Brookes third put Cesc in front half way through the period, but Wednesday was a night of late drama as we again had 4 late goals. Cesc went two up through McDonagh’s second, but Igo and Mo Torkian looked to have given Exeter a share of the spoils. There was a winner though, and it went to the Cescy boys as Si Robinshaw grabbed a last gasp goal to give them their first three points of the season.

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL. ANY OF THE OTHER NIGHTS SEEM TO BE YOUR BEST OPTION! 

Another week of picking up new teams as we look for a long and busy Autumn and Winter of Ballers action, just at the time the Champions League comes along to cause us a bit of grief. Ah well, what are you going to do? City might not be a problem for long anyway……. Oh, and we’ve got some BIG NEWS THIS WEEK!

LEAGUE NEWS

You may have already heard, but we’re starting a BRAND NEW THURSDAY 5-A-SIDE LEAGUE at a BRAND NEW VENUE, at Cheadle Town FC. This league can kick off as soon as we’ve got 8 teams to go. More details can be found elsewhere on the site or on our social media pages, but one off trial games are available from as soon as next week for any teams that want to give it a go.

The new Tuesday league kicks off on 9th October, and by our reckoning we’ve got ONE SPACE left to fill. We’re also finding the Monday league spaces are filling pretty quickly too, so to take what few spaces we’ve got left in those nights, get in touch.

We’re still looking to expand the Sunday league, while the Wednesday league is as full as full can be, so you know where to look if you’re wanting to get started.

We’ve also launched a competition to win a FREE MONTH OF FOOTBALL on our Facebook page this week, so have a look and get involved.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

This ‘ere Sunday league is really starting to fall together nicely, especially the top division, which has seen every team drop points in the opening three weeks (apart from Real Maskid, who it seems have left us without playing a game this season. Don’t panic, that space is already filled…..). Duno’s long unbeaten run ended last week, and a much changed team took on Bangers & Pash this week as they looked to get back to winning ways. We were halfway through the first half before we had the first goal and it came from Robbie Fallon of Bangers. Chris Carroll made it two before Jack Cope got Duno back in it soon after, but Bangers were in control at the break as Carroll and Harry Kilmartin struck in the final 5 minutes of the period. There was no way back for the champs as Kilmartin and Matt Toft added further goals without reply in the second half to see Bangers sit top of the early season league table. Wilmslow Whoppers and Stockport Eagles met this week, fresh off the back of their first Ballers Premiership wins last week, and goals from Ray Donnelly and Olly Ford in the opening 4 minutes got us off to a cracking start at 1-1 and the first half barely relented from here. Ford’s second put Whoppers in front on 11 minutes, but within two minutes Lee Clarke and Callum Jones had turned things in Eagles favour. Donnelly made it 4-2 for Eagles 8 minutes before the break, but two goals in a minute from Callum Hewitt and Ford had us level again. Jones second edged Eagles in front again, but Ford got his 4th of the period to send us into the break breathless at 5-5. The 4 second half goals were crammed into 8 second half minutes, as Eagles twice went in front again through another Donnelly brace, but each time Whoppers hit back to pick up their second draw of the season as Liam Delaney and Craig Plunkett scored to give us a final score of 7-7. This top division really is anyone’s at this stage.

Kinky Slipper have been used to being the team to catch over the past couple of years, and that’s where they will hope to stay as the Championship season takes shape. They would have expected three points this week against Polish Army, who were still looking for their first point since the big Ballers return, and after both teams exchanged goals in the opening two minutes, Johnny Dambrosio for Kinky and Pawel for the Army, it was a mostly Kinky half. A spell of 5 goals in a blistering 8 minute spell put them well in control, two from Rob Cresswell and one each from James Radcliffe, Joe Lailey and Dambrosio. Bania gave the Army a glimmer of hope with two in the latter stages of the half, and when he scored again 5 minutes from the end of a quieter second half there was only two goals in it. Radcliffe got his second to pretty much secure the win, with Bania grabbing his 4th as a consolation in the final few minutes. Whoever picked up the win between Ladzio and Sevilla Lacatalent this week would take up the position of nearest challengers to Kinky at the end of play this week, and the top two from last season’s League One couldn’t be separated at the break as Owen McNally scored two late goals to level things up after David Witter and Daniel McDonald had given Sevilla an early two goal lead. A desperately close second half saw Lewis Findlow give Lazdio the lead with just 4 minutes to play, and McNally’s third in the final minute looked to have this one won. They had to see it out after Sam Melling’s headed finish made it 4-3, but there was no time for Sevilla to claim anything from this one.

The rotating door continued to rotate for Inter Your Sister this week, as their much changed team took on The McMuffin Men, who are always the model of consistency. That consistency showed in the first half as they went into the break 6-0up , with Charley Eyre’s opener being followed by doubles from Sam Delgado and Logan Sherer, and a Mark Bailey strike to finish the first half scoring. Matt Kealy got Inter off the mark three minutes into the second period, but only after Eyre had added McMuffin’s 7th, and there were more McMuffin goals from Delgado and Bailey before Kane Malone got Inter’s second. Three more McMuffin goals followed to complete a more than comfortable victory, Delgado with two and Eyre with another. Nice Buns Sunday opener ended in defeat to Inter last week, while Team Tom’s solitary win from the opening two games had come against the same opposition when they only had 5 players, so a comfortable victory should have been in store for them this week. This League One seems to be a funny one though, and Jimmy Williamson scored two to put Buns in front by the 20 minute mark. Carl Carter pulled one back for the Tommers, but Williamson added two more before the break to give Buns a comfortable half time lead. Carter got another for Tom early in the second half, but Charlie Williamson got in on the act before Jimmy added his 5th with 15 to play. Phil Partakis gave Team Tom a hint of a chance with a goal two minutes later, but Charlie grabbed the final goal of the game in the final few moments to ease Buns to a first Sunday win. Under Rated continued to ease themselves back into Sunday action  with an interesting looking game against Murder On Zidane’s Floor. Chris Leah gave Under Rated the lead on 5 minutes, but Dan Evans scored three to put Murder in charge at the break. Leah grabbed two in three minutes early in the second half to bring the scores level again, but goals from Jake Barnes and Karl Mason inside the final 10 minutes secured a win for Murder, with Jimmy Nation grabbing a reply for Under Rated with the final kick of the game.

Step Brothers have found that a settled team has helped them early on this season, and their promotion push saw them take on a Stront Bakken team this week who will also be hoping to have a bash at getting back into League One next time around. Chris Moore scored the only goal of the opening period to send Step Brothers into the break in front, and after Tom Cioffi had doubled that lead 5 minutes into the second period they took a firm grip on proceedings. An own goal and Moore’s magical second pretty much secured a third straight win for the Brotherhood, with Chris Sinclair adding a 5th as Step Brothers ensured they maintined their 100% record after three games. The Veterans and FC AOTS both look capable of putting together a promotion push this season, but only one of these teams lived up to that in the first half. Two goals from Simon Grainger, an own goal and one each from Adam Pinder and Dean Minshull meant that AOTS winning record with their new shirts was in danger with only Eoghan Scott getting on the score sheet for them in the opening period. His second after the break reduced the deficit to three, and after Pinder got his second for The Vets, AOTS threatened a comeback as Steve Whittle and Adam Duty got two with one Paul Atherton goal sandwiched in between for The Vets to leave them just 7-6 in front. Grainger got his third with 5 minutes to play to give ease The Vets to a narrow win, and they go second. Deportivo Lack Of Talent and SK Six were both pointless going into this week’s game, and 7 Deportivo first half goals meant it looked like being their night. Rhys Moult got the opener, Brad Peet and Rob Parker grabbed two apiece, with Josh Jackson and Alex Babcock scoring the others while Steve Blunsten replied with two and Henry Cooke another for SK. The second half goals came late, too late for SK to claim anything as Parker got three more, while Cooke, Brad Bent and Max Blunsten Shepherd got the goals for SK in a more even second period.

THE 4 SUNDAY DIVISIONS REMAIN FULL. SPACES CAN BE CREATED FOR A DIVISION 5 TO START ON 7TH OCTOBER WITH FRIENDLIES AVAILABLE FOR ANY NEW OR RETURNING TEAMS IN THE MEANTIME. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

MONDAY LEAGUE

There are tentative signs of the green shoots of recovery after a tricky summer for the Monday league, with two more new teams playing their first games this week, and another lined up for a Ballers debut next week. We’ll be turning teams away before we know it….. As is fairly standard, there was only one game in the top division as Kroos Control looked to continue their quest for a debut Monday crown against J Stands Barmy Army. It was the Army that took the lead on 5 minute through Reece Nuttall’s goal, but Kroos were in control before the break as Calvin Alexander got two, Ray Donnelly and Liam Watson the others. Watson’s 4th two minutes into the second half put Kroos 4 clear, and in a second half where J Stands applied plenty of pressure to try and get themselves back into this one, Kroos picked them off in the final 10 minutes as Donnelly and Watson grabbed two more each and Stevie Whetham got the other as Kroos ran out 10-1 winners in a surprisingly one sided game.

The Monday Randommers (potential new name ‘Insert Joe Kinnear’) made their Ballers debut a few weeks ago with a victory over Phantom Brazilians, but both teams were much changed when they went up against each other again this week, and two players who didn’t play last time put Phantom in early control as Matt Holbrook and Paul Wilkinson gave them an early two goal lead. Ryan Clayton made it a three goal cushion at the break, and a pretty comfortable win for the Brazilians was complete when Daniel Clayton and Wilkinson scored in the final 10 minutes. The potentially soon to be renamed Garvins Ballers made their debut against Monday mainstayers Nice Buns this week, and the difference in the style of football they had been previously playing was there to be seen in the early stages as Buns went two up through goals from the Williamson boys, Charlie and Jimmy. Josh Welsh got the Ballers first Ballers goal, but Jimmy restored the two goal lead before the break. He got another along with a goal from Tom Hall in the first 5 minutes of the second half to move Buns 4 clear, but Welsh got his second to keep the new team in touch. Christoper Wellings pulled two back for Ballers in the final 10 minutes, but Jimmy got his 4th, while Paul Cheetham and Tom Dempsey also added to the Buns total, with a mystery goalscorer getting on the board for Garvins, who lost 8-5 on their first night. There’s always next week!

Another new team, currently known as CA FC, made their first Ballers appearance as well this week, and at half time it looked fairly ominous as they trailed 3-0 to FC AOTS. THey shook off the first half rust to put up a decent fight to give them some hope in the second half, with John Roberts scoring two of their goals, but three from Adam Atherton and two from Eoghan Scott ensured AOTS held on for a 7-4 win. A mish-mash friendly between Netsix & Chill and Wellspring ended up being a tight affair with the Monday regulars running out 4-2 winners after a goal-less second half, Aaron Campbell scoring two of their goals.

WE CAN STILL FIND SPACES FOR NEW TEAMS IN OUR MONDAY LEAGUE, SO GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS. THE NEW SEASON STARTS AT THE END OF OCTOBER.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

The Tuesday review won’t take long this week, as it seems that more teams were interested in watching Liverpool than they were United or City on the Wednesday! Beercalona needed a win, and probably a big one if they were to hold out much hope of overtaking Wellspring at the top of the Tuesday Championship in this week’s only league game. Show Me Da Mane had a few different faces in from the last time these two teams met, and one of those new faces, Mark Carruthers, gave them the lead after 5 minutes. Beercalona hit back to lead at the break as Scott Williams and Tom Ratcliffe replied for them, but Mane started the second half very strongly to race into a 4-2 lead with 15 minutes to go, Carruthers second followed by two from Nathaniel Odysseus-Kingsley. With Beercalona’s hopes of overturning Wellspring’s goal difference advantage well and truly done, all they could do was to try and win the game to at least make Wellspring play for it next week, and even if they don’t end up being champions at the end of this, they showed the stuff of champions as Ratcliffe’s second was followed by two more from Williams as they fought back to nick this one 5-4.

In friendly action, a patched up Premiership Total Bala faced a patched up Championship Bandit Athletic. In horrific conditions, 4 goals from Rick Kelly were the difference as the top division team beat the newcomers 7-3.

THE NEW TUESDAY LEAGUE STARTS ON 9TH OCTOBER, AND BY OUR CALCULATIONS WE CURRENTLY HAVE SPACE FOR ONE MORE NEW OR RETURNING TEAM. FOR MORE DETAILS OR TO REGISTER, GET IN TOUCH

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

They might not both have been league games, but the fact that we were able to get two games on on the same night as United and City’s opening Champions League games is a very good sign! The one league game that took place was between last season’s runners up Stockport Eagles and new boys CSKA Cheadle, with both sides looking to make it two wins from two to start the season. We were even after 10 minutes as Ben Waugh drew Eagles level after Tom Weaver had grabbed an early goal for CSKA, but the new team lead at the break as Chris Kennedy and Andy Whitelegg got on the score sheet. It looked a long way back for Eagles when Karim Slouti scored with 15 minutes to go, and they quickly restored their three goal lead when Whitelegg got his second a couple of minutes after Ray Donnelly had pulled one back for the Eagles. It was game on with 6 minutes to go as a ‘controversial’ Donnelly goal, 4 minutes after Paul Waugh’s finish meant it was 5-4, but Whitelegg quickly got his third to end any hopes of an Eagles comeback, and gave Cheadle a second straight win to start their Ballers life.

In friendly action, the 5 men of Wellspring fell to a respectable 8-4 defeat to Unprotected Cesc, with debutant Will Hartley scoring 5 of their goals.

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL. THE OTHER LEAGUES ARE YOUR BEST BET FOR AN IMMEDIATE START.

It’s amazing the difference as we step into September, and this review contains a lot more words than any from the previous couple of months, which is a good thing. Hopefully the good start we’ve had to September will continue as we head towards our two year anniversary!

LEAGUE NEWS

The BRAND NEW TUESDAY LEAGUE kicks off on 9th October, and we currently have a couple of spaces to fill

Two days before that, we’re going for it….. We currently have 4 teams on standby for the SUNDAY LEAGUE, so on the 7th October we will be adding in the 5TH DIVISION we’ve been talking about for ages! Two spaces, who wants them?

The MONDAY LEAGUE is slowly picking up, with a couple more spaces filled this week, but we can still find room for ONE MORE team in the top division if anyone fancies their chances.

We also have the Players Pool group that we’ve set up on Facebook to help teams find players, players find teams, line up last minute friendlies and put teams together, so feel free to add yourself to it. Here’s the link: https://www.facebook.com/groups/441897286297839/

SUNDAY LEAGUE

BOOM! Week 2 of the Sunday league saw just two out of the 24 teams unable to field a side, and the return of Under Rated to fill in for a friendly in one of those spaces. Wilmslow Whoppers were denied an opening night win last week by a last ditch Insole goal, while Bangers & Pash were comfortable winners over Premiership debutants Stockport Eagles. Whoppers struck first through Olly Ford’s 8th minute goal, but when Callum Delaney doubled their lead 10 minutes before the break the game exploded into life. Chris Carroll got Bangers on the board, but that was the first of 8 goals in 8 minutes as Ford grabbed another three and Liam Delaney another for Whoppers, as they lead 6-4 at the break, with Alex Fowell getting two and Robbie Fallon the other for Bangers. Goals in the first 6 minutes of the second period from Ford, and Callum’s Delaney and Hewitt moved Whoppers into a 5 goal lead, but Fowell and Rory Kelly kept Bangers in touch heading towards the final 10 minutes. Three more from Callum Delaney and a 6th of the game from Ford eased Whoppers to their first win, with Carroll’s second of the game all that Bangers could muster in the final stages. Champions Duno opened their defence of the title with a game against Stockport Eagles, who were looking for their first Ballers top flight point. Duno went through the whole of last season unbeaten, so not many of us were giving Eagles much of a chance of ending that run, but they did score first through Ray Donnelly’s 5th minute opener. Jack Cope leveled up for Duno two minutes later, but Donnelly got his second to restore the Eagles lead half way through the period. Liam Watson made it 2-2, and Duno lead for the first time when Cope got his second three minutes from the break. Brandon Byers-Wilkes drew Eagles leve again almost immediately, but Duno responded in kind to lead 4-3 at the break through Cope’s third. Duno lead by two for the first time when Luke Newsham scored 5 minutes into the second half, but as we thought they might run away with it from here, Eagles hit back again as Lee Clarke and Callum Davies scored to make it 5-5 inside the final 10 minutes. With both teams going for the win it was Donnelly who grabbed the final goal in the final minute to give Eagles the shock win, as the Sunday Premiership looks like being one to watch this season.

Kinky Slipper were narrow winners in week one, but remain hot favourites for a swift return to the Premiership, and were even hotter favourites to win this week’s game with Beercalona after two Wes Harney goals and one from Tommy Schofield in the opening 11 minutes put them three up. Anthony Corns pulled one back for Beercalona, but Harney quickly restored the three goal lead with 9 minutes remaining in the half. Beercalona roared back with three goals in two minutes fro Jay Ratcliffe, Corns and Chris Murray, and though James Ratcliffe put Kinky back ahead soon after, we were level after an own goal made it 5-5 at the break. A tighter second period saw Harney score again to put Kinky back in front, and an own goal 9 minutes from time looked like it might be enough to secure the win. We were set for a big finish when Tom Ratcliffe made it 7-6 three minutes from time, but Rob Cresswell scored in the dying stages to ease Kinky to another hard fought win. Polish Army are still easing their way back into things as it stands, but they started well this week against Ladzio, Pawel and Bania turning things in their favour in the opening 10 minutes after Lewis Findlow had given Ladzio an early lead. Ladzio quickly regained control, and two goals from Owen McNally and one from Lewis Findlow saw them take a two goal lead into the break, and the only goal of the second period came from Rory McKenna as Ladzio secured their first Championship points of the season.

Team Tom had picked up an impressive win with 5 men against Inter Your Sister on the opening night, while Murder On Zidane’s Floor took a point from their first game of the season last week. It took 15 minutes for the deadlock to be broken here, as Tommy Schofield gave Murder the lead, but they quickly added three more through Dan Evans, Karl Mason and an own goal to lead 4-0 at the break. The mysterious John (just John) made it 5 early in the second half, and by the time he scored again 10 minutes later it was 8-0 as Danny Derbyshire and Evans had added goals in between. Rob Jordan ensured there would be no place on the golden gloved board for Murder ‘keeper Matt Barker, and with the result already well decided, Derbyshire got his second before Adam Priest had the final word for Team Tom on a night to forget for them. The McMuffin Men were here for the first time this season, but they were two down early on as Matt Sands scored two for Pat’s Giants in the opening 9 minutes. Sam Delgado got McMuffin’s first goal of the season, and Mark Bailey drew them level 6 minutes before the break. Joe Marsland edged the Giants ahead again, but it was 3-3 at half time as Delgado got his second a minute before the whistle. An unfortunate injury to Sands meant that Pat’s were effectively playing most of the second half with 5 men, and the McMuffins took advantage as Logan Sherer put them in front 4 minutes in before Calan Sherer added two more to give them a three goal lead with 9 minutes left. Rick Nuttall did pull one back, but two more from Charley Eyre and another from Bailey meant that McMuffins ran out 9-4 winners.  Nice Buns doubled up and joined the Sunday league as well this week, and they were given a helping hand against Inter Your Sister who had to start the game with 5 players with three players running (very) late. Tom Hall, Jimmy Williamson and Dale Kirkham scored first half goals to have them looking comfortable, but when restored to 6 players Inter hit back with two Craig Johnson goals before the break. Brandon Byers-Wilkes drew them level with 16 minutes left on the clock, and the same player scored the winner 5 minutes from time to complete the Inter comeback.

Step Brothers are at the bottom of the mountain again looking up as the former Premiership side look to escape from the Sunday basement at the first attempt. They would go in as favourites against SK Six who continue their search for a first Ballers win, but they went behind to Chris Sinclair’s 3rd minute goal. They ran Stront Bakken close last week, and drew level here when Steve Blunsten scored halfway through the opening period, but they couldn’t hang on til the break as Sinclair got his second just before the half time whistle. They needed to pull a rabbit out of a hat when Chris Moore extended the Brothers lead with 13 to play, and an own goal 5 minutes from time and Tom Cioffi’s last minute goal sealed the second win for them at the start of a season that’s seen them field a side all by themselves for two weeks in a row! Stront Bakken got off to a winning start as they looked to put themselves amongst the promotion party on their return to League Two, but FC AOTS will also fancy a promotion push this season after improving as the previous season went on. The Bucket Boys went in front on 4 minutes as Declan Matthews scored the opener, but that lead lasted just a minute as Eoghan Scott quickly leveled things up for AOTS in their first league game in their spanking new kit. They took control as Zac Jamieson and Adam Duty scored at the mid point of the opening period, and in an otherwise tight game they scored the only other goal 8 minutes from time, Scott with his second to give AOTS their first win from their first league game of the season. Deportivo Lack Of Talent were back in action after missing their first league game in an age last week, while The Veterans were looking for their first points after an opening day defeat to Step Brothers. There were 4 goals in the opening period, all in a 5 minute spell just after the 10 minute mark. Adam Pinder’s opener for The Vets was quickly matched by Brad Peet’s finish, before Rinder and Ryan Prestwich put The Vets in control at the break. Simon Grainger scored three in the opening 6 minutes of the half to tighten the Vets grip, with just a Rob Parker reply for Deportivo wedged in between them. Parker added two more to reduce the deficit to two with 13 minutes left, but The Veterans ended the stronger with Pinder grabbing another two and Andy Carrington getting the other as The Vets get off the mark with a 9-4 win.

Under Rated are wanting to get back into it after a bit of a break, and they gave Kipsta Cobras a highly competitive friendly, leading 3-1 just after the restart as Chris Leah, James McIver and Colin Stelfox scored after Connor Harding had given Kipsta an early lead. Kipsta ran out narrow 4-2 winners as Harding grabbed two more and James Bamgbose the winner as Under Rated showed the level we can expect them to be at when we find them a space!

THE SUNDAY LEAGUE IS FULL. A 5TH DIVISION IS A POSSIBILITY, AS IS ADDING TEAMS TO THE EXISTING LEAGUES, SO GET IN TOUCH TO JOIN OUR BIGGEST LEAGUE NIGHT! 

MONDAY LEAGUE

While we can’t fit enough teams into our Sunday league at the minute, we have issues with a number of Monday teams being able to field a side. It’s mostly Premiership teams who are finding the struggle real, and we only had one game take place this week. It was a proper game though, as Kroos Control had the narrowest lead at the break against Ruud van Nipplerooy thanks to Ray Donnelly’s 12th minute goal. The Nips were level early in the second half through Jordan Hutchinson’s finish, and they lead with 9 minutes to go as Hutchinson got his second. They looked to be seeing it out for the win, but Cam (just Cam) popped up with a leveler with just two minutes remaining. As we looked set for a draw, Liam Watson took advantage of a mix up to give Kroos Control a last gasp win to make it three from three for them as the top division plays catch up.

Netsix & Chill look set to join the top flight next season, so it was a little mean of us to put them up against the newly formed Monday Randommers (better name to come). James Bamgbose struck early for the leaders, and they lead by 4 at the break as Mike Pinder added three more throughout the half. Warren Yeo made it 5 early in the second period, but Shaun Mulverney ensured there was no clean sheet for Netsix this week with probably the goal of the game. It didn’t lead to an unexpected comeback, as Netsix ran out 8-1 winners with further goals from Aaron Campbell and two more from Yeo. Phantom Brazilians have had injury and holiday issues in recent weeks, and while it hasn’t stopped them fielding a side, it has meant that side has dropped away in the race for the title. With a relatively full squad they were hoping to get back to winning ways against Pathetico Madrid, another side who’ve found the last few weeks a struggle, and they started well with Daniel Clayton’s first minute goal. Pathetico lead at the break as Nathan Wilkinson drew them level and Ethan Kaye put them in front, and it was 3-1 4 minutes after the restart as Kaye got his second. Paul Wilkinson scored in the 31st and 43rd minute to bring Phantom level with 7 to play, and Clayton’s second put them in front three minutes later. A frantic final couple of minutes saw Phantom nick a 6-5 win as Clayton and Wilkinson’s goals saw off the two goals from Pathetico’s Wilkinson to get them back to winning ways.

FC AOTS popped down for a game on Monday against Nice Buns, but we’ll have to see if it becomes a permanent thing as Buns ran out comfortable 7-2 winners, Dale Kirkham and Jimmy Williamson with three apiece and Tom Hall with the other as Andy Callahan and Zac Jamieson grabbed the consolation goals for the on tour Sunday team.

THE MONDAY LEAGUE IS SLOWLY PICKING UP AFTER A TRICKY SUMMER, BUT WE CAN FIND SPACE FOR A COUPLE MORE TEAMS. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

If Michu At De Gea Ba were to hold out any hope of catching Gangs Of Dwight Yorke, they would need to beat them this week, and probably by a pretty decent margin. It became quickly apparent that this wasn’t going to happen as goals from Callum Jones, two each from Connor Harding and Chris Singleton and another from Josh Morrissey saw them lead 6-1 at the break, with just a Pete Lennon goal in reply for Michu. Two more from Jones and one from Warren Yeo ruled out any hope of a Michu second half comeback, and though Fidelis Eberegbe pulled one back 10 minutes from time, Morrissey added another three in the final stages to give Gangs another comfortable victory. Championship winners Stroke Titty have had a mixed season, while Shaka have had a different team out every week and have struggled to click as a result. They did lead 4-3 at the break as Mark Brookes helped himself to three and Liam Paull the other, with Jimmy Leeson, Jay Willingham and Mike (just Mike) replying for Stroke. Leeson added a couple more after the break, alongside another goal from the mysterious Mike and a missing scorer, to give them a 7-6 win with Paull and Jack Roberts getting the second half goals for Shaka, who will now finish up back in the Championship next season. Stroke were looking forward to relegation last week, they now sit third!

In the Championship, we had the potential title decider between Beercalona and Wellspring, with Wellspring knowing anything other than a defeat would leave them in pole position as a result of making the most of their earlier games with Europeans before they dropped out, but they set about taking any doubts away in the opening half as George Quayle and Shane Bridges scored two apiece against a changed Beercalona to lead 4-1 at the break, with a Tom Ratcliffe penalty the only reply for them. Ratcliffe got a second three minutes after the break, but Bridges quickly got his third to keep them three clear, but goals from Ratcliffe and Ste Bowler meant it was 5-4 with 10 minutes to play. An injury to Bowler in the final few minutes nearly ended the game early, but he dragged himself off the pitch to allow Martin Bell to fire home a leveler with two minutes remaining. There wasn’t enough time for a winner though, and the draw does a lot more for Wellspring than it does Beercalona. Bandit Athletic made their Tuesday bow against the rapidly settling Show Me Da Mane (I’ll be able to take the stabilizers off soon and let them go it alone). A very tight first half saw goals from Connor Atkinson and Chris Sinclair at either end of the half give Bandit a two goal half time lead. Tom Kessi made it three early in the second period, but Paul Swanson got Mane off the mark with 20 still to play. Kyle Clarke and Swanson exchanged goals to make it 4-2, and Clarke scored again after Andy Carrington had briefly reduced the deficit to one. It was back to one at 5-4 when Carrington scored again with 9 left, and in a frantic final couple of minutes Bailey Carroll looked to have clinched it for Bandit, only for Nathaniel Odysseus-Kingsley to make them sweat again, beofre Clarke finally finished this one off.

We had a bit of a glamour friendly this week as the highly experienced Total Bala (formerly Total Ballet, formerly Total Football, occasionally The Loveable Geeks) took on most of Sunday Premiership multiple winners Insole. The experienced guys started the better and lead 3-0 at the break with goals from John Wood, Lee Manion and Ethan Kaye. Wood made it 4 just after the restart, and though Jordan Cunningham scored 4 of his own in the second half, it was in vain as Manion and Kaye secured the win for Bala.

WE HAVE TWO SPACES IN OUR TUESDAY LEAGUE WITH THE NEW SEASON SET TO START ON 9TH OCTOBER. FRIENDLIES CAN BE ARRANGED FOR ANY NEW OR RETURNING TEAMS IN THE MEANTIME. WE’LL BE FLEXIBLE ON CHAMPIONS LEAGUE NIGHTS…..

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

The first night of the extended 7 team Wednesday league took place this week with three very close games, one brand new team, and Unprotected Cesc starting their first full season. The champs got off to a flying start as Ajax Treesdown flew into a 5 goal lead against Exeter Gently in the opening 11 minutes, Daniel Kitchingham with the first two, followed by further goals from Adam Taylor Josh Batch and Matt Taylor. The game looked in the bag when Matt Taylor got his second 4 minutes after the break, but they weren’t going to keep a clean sheet as Kristian Igo finally got Exeter on the board with 15 minutes remaining. When he got his second, 4 minutes later, it was after Tom Berry and Mehrad Torkian had also scored, and all of a sudden there was only two goals in it. Ajax showed the stuff of champions, and got a couple of late goals to seal the win, Jordan Hardman and Evan Farrell with the decisive goals. Last season’s runners up Stockport Eagles would have been expected to get off to a winning start against Magpie, but the Mags can be a funny team and they took the lead through Mariusz Kozsla’s 5th minute goal. The Eagles turned it around late on in the half as Ray Donnelly scored twice and Liam Watson grabbed their third to put them 3-1 up three minutes from the break, but Karol reduced the deficit just before the half time whistle. We were level at 3-3 with 18 to play when Dawid got on the score sheet, but Eagles nicked it through Stevie Whetham’s goal 12 minutes from time. We welcomed CSKA Cheadle to Ballers this week, and they faced a much changed Unprotected Cesc, missing every single one of their regular lads this week. The first half was a goal fest as Callum Clarke opened the scoring for Cesc in the opening minute before Andy Whitelegg got CSKA’s first Ballers goal a minute later. They were never behind again throughout the half as Sam Casey gave them the lead, then added two more to go alongside another from Whitelegg, while Josh Armitage, Wez Hodkinson and Jack Phillips replied for Cesc to leave us at 5-4 at the break. Cheadle seemed to have it in the bag with two more in the first three minutes of the second half from Mark Carruthers and Whitelegg, but two goals in a minute half way through the period from Armitage and George Quayle meant there was one goal in it again with 13 to play. Casey edged CSKA two clear again, but they had to hold on when Phillips got his second two minutes from time. They held on for the win on their opening night, which is always handy in ensuring a new team come back for their second week……

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE IS NOW FULL. LOOK AT THE MONDAY OR TUESDAY LEAGUE FOR AN IMMEDIATE START 

Fresh as a daisy from our summer break, we’re back and ready for a long autumn and winter of Ballers action. Hopefully all of our teams will be in the same boat and raring to get back to it.

LEAGUE NEWS

With the summer a dim and distant memory (it was a good one though), we hope everyone is ready for the Autumn season. Here’s our current league standings:

SUNDAY LEAGUE: Currently FULL, but with a few other teams milling around we do have the option of adding a mini league in in the next few weeks

MONDAY LEAGUE: SPACES AVAILABLE. We are looking at having a little re-jig of the Monday league as a number of teams have struggled through the summer months. This means we can accommodate new teams for an immediate start

TUESDAY LEAGUE: ONE SPACE AVAILABLE in the Premiership. As it’s near the end of the season any new team that comes in will have the option of dropping into the Championship when the new season starts.

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE: New season starts NEXT WEEK, but it’s FULL, so look elsewhere!

We have our Players Pool group on Facebook for anyone who might be looking for a team, or any teams who might be looking for players, click the link and request to join to get involved https://www.facebook.com/groups/441897286297839/

We’ve got our Goal Of The Month competition running on the social media pages, and will be running a Facebook competition over the coming weeks to celebrate our 2 YEAR ANNIVERSARY! Keep an eye out and get involved.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

The brand new Sunday league flew out of the blocks after the summer break with 9 league games played and a friendly on the opening week. We welcomed Wilmslow Whoppers to the top division as they finally followed up their threats to join us that seems to have gone on for most of the past couple of years, and their opening game with former champions Insole always had the look of one that would be tough to call. A tight first half saw Whoppers recover from going behind to Wayne Reeves third minute opener for Insole, to lead 2-1 at the break as Dan Exley and Liam Delaney scored for them. Exley and Olly Ford scored early in the second half to seemingly put them in control, before Insole showed their fighting qualities to score 6 unanswered goals in 10 minutes to go 7-4 up half way through the second period. Delaney and Ford got their second to reduce the deficit to just one, and they looked to have nicked it with two more late goals from Ford. A final twist saw Jack Atkinson score with the final kick of the game to give Insole a point from a breathless 8-8 draw. If only we’d filmed it…… Stockport Eagles have gone from the bottom division to the top flight in no time having spent most of their early Ballers days in the lower divisions, and their first top division game was against Bangers & Pash. They took the lead through a Ryan McAndrew goal in the 12th minute, but trailed at the break as Chris Carroll scored two and Harry Kilmartin the other, while McAndrew kept Eagles in it with his second of the half. Three goals in a 6 minute spell in the second period from Callum Campbell, Rory Kelly and MAtt Sheehan put the game to bed, with Campbell’s second of the game a minute from time securing a 7-2 opening night win for Bangers.

Last season’s Championship was mostly made up of previously reliable teams who struggled through the difficult summer months, but we start the season with a 100% turnout this week and three very close games which bodes well for a good season. The standout tie of the opening week was the clash between former Premiership champions Kinky Slipper, and another former Premiership team in Kipsta Cobras. An own goal gave Kipsta the lead, and Connor Harding doulbed that lead 7 minutes before the break. Kinky are in this division as they missed most of last season, but they were back level before the break as Dale Roberts grabbed a debut Ballers goal and Wesley Harney got the leveler two minutes from the half time whistle. The second half was equally as tight, and it was a late double from Roberts that made the difference between the two sides as Kinky start what should be a promotion campaign with a win. Would have been a good game to film…… Another interesting opening day game was the winners of League Two versus the winners of League One as Beercalona skipped League One and took a spot in the Championship to face Ladzio. A wide open first half saw the teams share 8 goals to go in level at 4-4 at the break, with Ladzio never leading the way. Jay Ratcliffe got three and Tom Ratcliffe the other for Beercalona, with George Cox grabbing two, Sam Findlow and Owen McNally the others for Ladzio. Martin Bell eased Beercalona two ahead with 12 minutes to play, but a frantic last 5 minutes started with Lewis Findlow reducing that deficit to one again. Dave Watson and Jay Ratcliffe looked to have clinched the win for Beercalona, but Sam Findlow scored one and Kai Lawless two in the final couple of minutes to leave Beercalona hanging on for 9-8 win. How good would a 9-8 game have looked on camera? Polish Army were back from their summer break, and took on League One runners up Sevilla Lacatalent on their big return. We were level at 1-1 at the break as Bania scored for the Poles a minute after Daniel McDonald had given Sevilla a 17th minute lead. We went into the final 10 minutes still level, but at 2-2 as Bania got his second to level up again after Jake Riley had restored the Sevilla lead. It was natural that after their break the Polish would be running on fumes near the end, and it was Riley’s second that decided this one 6 minutes from time. Another close game that we’re sure would have looked great on camera…….

It’s been a tough few seasons for Team Tom, who struggled to field a side throughout much of last season despite having been small sided football regulars for most of this millennium. Having finally been given a break and dropped down to the 3rd tier of the Sunday league, it looked a tough ask again as they could only field 5 players for their first game against Inter Your Sister, the first time these two teams have met in a long while. The lack of players didn’t seem to affect them that badly as they lead 3-1 at the break as Rob Jordan, Tom Hornsby and Adam Priest got their goals, with Dave Smythe replying for Inter. They remained on top in the second half, as Jordan added two more, Priest and an own goal the others as they ran out 7-2 winners with Curtis Rothwell scoring the only other Inter goal on a bad night for them. Team Tom will obviously be fancying a run at some trophies this season….. Murder On Zidane’s Floor started their first full season with an interesting looking game against Pat’s Giants, another team who struggled through most of last season in the Championship. This was the actual game we picked to film, so it must have been an absolute doozy, right? It was a tight game from the off, with Dan Evans early goal for Murder the only goal until Danny Brookes and Matt Sands turned things in Giants favour in the latter stages of the half. Carl Harratt made it 3-1 early in the second half, but we were back level with 15 to play as Evans and Tommy Schofield got themselves on the score sheet. Both teams went for it in the final stages but there were no more goals, so both teams get off the mark for the season.

How the mighty have fallen. In the blink of an eye, Step Brothers have gone from Premiership to League Two as they look to rebuild after several seasons of struggle. The Veterans are also in the basement for another season having been close to reaching the Premiership just a few seasons ago, but they were well behind at the break in this one as every Step Brothers outfield player got their names on the score sheet in the opening period. Chris Moore produced a couple of magic finishes to go along with goals from Chris Sinclair, Rob Sheldon, Tom and Dom Cioffi, with just a solitary Paul Atherton goal in response for The Vets in the first half. The result was in the bag when Sinclair, Dom and Tom Cioffi added further goals in the opening 10 minutes of the second period to make it 9-1. The game wasn’t as one sided as the score suggested, with The Brothers ‘keeper Gaz Fay claiming the man of the match award, but he was beaten by two more goals from Atherton and one each from Simon Grainger and Adam Pinder to give the final scoreline a more favourable look. SK Six are determined to pick up a genuine, bonafide victory of their own this season, but faced a tough opening game against FC Stront Bakken who were back in the bottom division after a season in the third tier. They started off well with Brad Bent giving them an early lead, but they didn’t hold onto it for long as Declan Matthews quickly drew the Bucket Boys level. Danny Robinshaw put Bakken in front and Matthews added his second before the break to put them in control, and Patrick Mitchell looked to have put them out of sight with their 4th three minutes after the restart. SK hit back, and Harry Bridge struck an 8 minute hat trick to make it 4-4 with 13 minutes left on the clock, but Stront Bakken responded with two more goals from Lukas Voveris inside the final 10 minutes. Bridge got another three minutes from time, but there was no sharing of the spoils as Stront Bakken held on for the win.

FC AOTS were rocking their new shirts this week, but only in friendly action as the recently withdrawn Wellspring dragged the lads back down for a Sunday game. The new shirts are off to a winning start as 4 goals from Zac Jamieson, and two each from Adam Duty, Charley Hutchinson and Eoghan Scott were more than enough to secure a comfortable 11-3 victory.

THE SUNDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL AT 4 DIVISIONS, BUT WE SEE THE CHANCES FOR ADDING TO THIS LEAGUE IN THE VERY NEAR FUTURE AS ENQUIRIES CONTINUE TO COME IN. DON’T BE AFRAID TO ASK….. 

MONDAY LEAGUE

The Monday league as at the other end of the spectrum to the Sunday league at the minute, with a number of teams struggling which is making us consider a change of format at this stage of the season. Only two games were played this week, both in the Championship, and one consisting of one of our new Random teams. Firstly, Netsix & Chill were looking to maintain their promotion push against a Nice Buns team who were still looking for their first point of the season. They did strike first through a 9th minute own goal (naming no names…..), but Netsix hit back with three quick goals from Mike Pinder, Matty Aked and James Bamgbose to lead 3-1 with 10 minutes of the first half remaining. Buns looked like they fancied this one though, and they were quickly level again as Jimmy Williamson and Dale Kirkham made it 3-3, three minute before the break. Netsix lead at the break as Aaron Campbell made the most of a mix up at the back for Buns, and the leaders ran away with it as Buns ran out of steam in the second half. Bamgbose got two more, Warren Yeo bagged a couple and Pinder got his second ease Netsix to another win. Phantom Brazilians took on the new team, looking to keep in touch with Netsix at the top, but they fell behind to Shaun Mulverney’s 6th minute opener for the new team. Daniel Clayton leveled up for Phantom 5 minutes before the break, but a Wez Hodkinson penalty put the new boys 2-1 up at half time. Andy Ingleson made it 3-1 two minutes into the season half, but Connor Harding quickly responded for Phantom, who went on to spend most of the second half peppering the Randommers goal. Random keeper Danny Robinshaw held them at bay though, and the new team were able to clinch the win with a couple of late goals, one each for Mulverney and John Brookes.

SPACES ARE AVAILABLE FOR AN IMMEDIATE START IN THE MONDAY LEAGUE. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

Gangs Of Dwight Yorke don’t look like being stopped this season and after a comfortable win over Stroke Titty first time around there would have been quite long odds on their run ending this week. The first half was far more even than the half time scoreline of 6-0 in Gangs favour suggested, with the main difference being the quality of the finishing at either end, Wez Barker and Callum Jones grabbed three apiece to all but end the game by the break. Joe Lailey finally took one of the many Stroke chances just after the break, and while he added two more throughout the half, Gangs had a firm grip on the result by this point and scored 7 more in the second period, Jones with another three, Barker and Josh Morrissey with two each. A win for much changed Total Bala over a much changed Shaka would see the Bala boys go clear in second place, and after a pretty tight first half they lead 3-2 at the break . Lee Manion had opened the scoring for Bala before Shaka drew level through Dan Kitchener’s goal. Ethan Kaye restored the Total lead but Jake Tyler struck again for Shaka before Manion’s second on the stroke of half time sent them into the break ahead. Manion’s third opened up a two goal lead for the first time with 15 minutes left, and two goals from Paul Thornton quickly followed to secure the result, which was finished off with two more from Kaye in the final couple of minutes.

The renamed collection of randommers, henceforth known as Show Me Da Mane, faced another uphill challenge this week as they took on league leaders Beercalona with another couple of new players on board. There was only one goal in it at the break though, as Jay Ratcliffe and Martin Bell ensured the leaders went in 2-1 up, with Chris Murray pulling one back for Mane. Craig Scanlon and Tom Ratcliffe scored to put Beercalona three up, and though Mane pulled one back to stay in contention, goals in the final 10 minutes from Scott Williams, Scanlon, and the pair of Ratcliffe’s ave them an 8-4 win, with Murray grabbing a couple in response for Mane.

In friendly action, possibly the game of the night saw Championship side  Wellspring head towards the break in their game against top flight side Michu At De Gea Ba with a 3-0 lead given to them by Jack Philliips, Lewis Arden and Jamie Berrisford. Paul Mazzitelli grabbed one back for Michu just before the whistle, and we headed towards the final 10 minutes level at 3-3 as ‘un-named man’ and Fidelis Eberegbe scored in the first 10 minutes of the second period. The top division team edged it as Alex Brady and Eberegbe scored late on.

WE HAVE ONE SPACE FOR ANY TEAM WHO FANCY THEIR CHANCES IN THE TOP FLIGHT, BUT AS WE’RE HEADING TOWARDS THE END OF THE SEASON THERE’S A CHANCE FOR THAT TEAM TO DROP INTO THE CHAMPIONSHIP AT THE END OF THE SEASON. GET IN TOUCH

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

The Wednesday league drew to it’s conclusion with one league game and a couple of friendlies, and with the title already decided it was all about third place and preparations for the new season which starts next week. Magpie could have nicked third place with a big win over Exeter Gently, and they struck first through Stanislaw Cierpiatka’s 8th minute goal. Exeter leveled up through Kristian Igo’s goal two minutes before the break, and they looked to have third place secured when Tom Harrison scored in the first minute of the second half. Magpie needed a 9 goal win to claim third, which was extremely unlikely, but they did level up again through Mariusz Koszla’s goal 4 minutes later, but a slightly controversial Igo goal 15 minutes from time gave Exeter a final day win .

Champions Ajax Treesdown (trophies next week!) ran out comfortable winners against the newly named Unprotected Cesc, who are trying to nail down a settled squad ahead of the new campaign. Jordan Hardman and Evan Farrell scored three each in a 9-2 win, with both of Cesc’s goals coming from Scott Norris. A very hastily thrown together random team came in to give Stockport Eagles a game this week, and it was a comfortable night’s work for them as Ray Donnelly scored 6 and Paul Waugh 4 as they ran out 15-3 winners.

THE NEW WEDNESDAY LEAGUE START NEXT WEEK, BUT THERE’S NO SPACE FOR NEW TEAMS AS THINGS STAND! HAVE A LOOK AT MONDAY AND TUESDAY FOR CURRENT SPACES FOR AN IMMEDIATE START

Player power. It’s something that’s been taking over at the top end of the football spectrum for years, with ‘super’ agents like Milo Riola able to make millions and millions of pounds by finding a way to shift his players about clubs as often as possible. Could he have tried any harder to drive a wedge between Pogba and his current club in recent weeks? The prime example from the recent transfer window was the rumour that Diego Godin’s agent had contacted Manchester United about a potential move, to have his player sign a new and massively improved contract within 48 hours.

Even at our level, player power is a highly significant thing. Every single current Ballers player has the ability to negatively affect the reputation of the Ballers leagues, which could affect our ability to attract new teams, or cause current teams to decide to look elsewhere to fulfill their footballing needs.

Reputations are important, and whichever way you look at it, they are something that are given to you by other people by what they might have to say or write about you, and are not something you can really dictate apart from by doing your best to promote the good things that you do while trying to minimise any damage that negative things might cause. All it takes is a few people to take to their social media pages to write something derogatory about your business, and people reading it will form their opinion based on those words.

Worth noting at this point that the obvious exception to all of this is Paul Ince, who gave himself the nickname of the Guv’nor and just expected everyone to go with it.

We are rapidly approaching the 2 year anniversary of Ballers, and we’re now very much at a point where all of the initial good feeling and positivity that you just naturally receive as a new business trying to give it a go in the big wide world is replaced by an expectation that you can at the very least maintain the high standards you have set, if not continue to exceed them. We are now just like any other business that has been around for a while, and certain people will just naturally look for signs that things are on the decline, whether that being in the quality of communication being received from us, or the number of times their game goes down due to a lack of teams.

There have been mercifully few major issues over these past couple of years, but that doesn’t mean that everything has been perfect. As this is my own business, that I’ve been trying to build up from scratch, every little incident hits home, and there have been the odd occasion where I have considered packing it all in and going getting a cushy 9-5 office job. I quite often have to set myself short term targets to get through difficult times, which due to the World Cup, the weather, holidays and 11-a-side pre-season’s has been most of the past couple of months. I set Ballers up because I wanted to do things my way, be my own boss, dictate my own budgets based on what money was coming in and wanted it to be a place and a business with a good reputation where groups of friends get together and come and have a weekly game.

It is a league though, so games will be competitive and things might get said in the heat of the moment every now and again, but when anything goes beyond what is acceptable, and when people see things like that they can quickly ruin any good reputation we’ve worked nearly 2 years to build up. It’s been two years pretty much none stop, and though on the face of it we just run 4 night’s of leagues, there’s more to it than a lot of people would imagine. The real pressure is on not wanting to let down teams who want games, or the referees that have shown the faith in us over these couple of years when they could easily be refereeing somewhere else. Right from the outset we worked from the idea that if we ran everything well, the money side of things would take care of itself, so we don’t get too hung up on the financial aspects as we still believe that to be the case.

When we talk about things that can get out of hand on the football pitch, and reputations, it could only take the actions of one player on a particular team to gain that entire team a reputation that affects their ability to continue in our leagues. There are players when I’m watching games who I feel need to watch themselves with how they speak to the referees and the opposition players. The referees are only human and will make mistakes, it’s nothing personal. The other team aren’t the enemy, they are just another group of lads who want a game of football, and they might mistime a challenge every now and again, it doesn’t mean they are going out to cause any of you harm. The absolute last thing any of us want or need is for any team to decide they don’t want to play against a particular team because of a level of intimidation or for fear of what might happen, because that would put us in a really difficult situation, and a situation where it might be a case of having to lose one team so we don’t lose 2 or 3 others. All things being well, all of the teams currently in our leagues will continue to play each other for a long time to come if those teams stick around, so all games need to be played in the right spirit, with no issues that could get carried into the next game. I might be being unrealistic here, but I like the idea of having a community of teams playing at Ballers who can all get along and have a laugh before and after the game, but have a good competitive game for those 50 minutes.

Most of the other small sided football operators out there that run on the same model as us in terms of hiring facilities run their leagues from a head office and through their website, and rely on their refs to collect money and report everything back to them, so they don’t build a relationship with their customers. In certain matters this way of working can be an advantage, as decisions on incidents can be made based solely on their merits, but because we would prefer to have that personal touch with our customers and know how different some of them are off the pitch compared to how some of them can be on it, it makes it more difficult for us to just deal with a situation, because we don’t really want to be telling anyone that they aren’t welcome to play anymore. Now that we’ve said that, anyone reading this should know that if we get to that point, you know we’ve not made that decision lightly……

All teams who are currently in the leagues remain in control of whether they continue to play at Ballers for however long they want to at the moment. These leagues really aren’t that important, and in years to come, the younger teams in our league might all be married with kids, a mortgage and bills to pay, and at that point they should only remember how you used to have a good game of football with their mates, and it’s highly doubtful those SK Ballers trophies will be taking any pride of place on the mantlepiece. The only trophy I have on display at my house from my small sided football years is used as a door stop on my kitchen floor…….

So the break is over, the Sunday league returns this weekend, and heading into September we only have 4 league spaces to fill across our 4 league nights and we’ll be full again! Despite a testing summer that’s still a fairly strong position for us to be in, we just now need to start making sure all of those teams play as many games as possible so we can build up a pot of money to allow us to think of rewarding those teams who’ve been with us for TWO YEARS by the time October comes around. Two years, where has the time gone……..?

You remember how when you got into the final few weeks of school before the summer holidays, and you basically switched off? Seems like quite a few of our teams took that approach to the upcoming Ballers holiday this week……

LEAGUE NEWS

There are NO GAMES NEXT WEEK as we take an end of summer break before we go again at the start of September. When we’re back, here’s where we’re up to:

The NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE STARTS ON 2ND SEPTEMBER. At this point, as we haven’t yet finalised the format for the new season, we can still find space for any new teams who want to get involved.

We currently have a space in each division of our MONDAY and TUESDAY leagues, so if you’re up for the challenge of going straight into a top division, or fancy a slightly easier start in the Championship, we can accommodate you.

We’ve set up an SK Ballers Player Pool group on Facebook to help teams look for players and players look for teams. We’ll also be posting about upcoming leagues, spaces, and using the group to put teams together made up of players who can’t get the numbers to form their own team. So head to https://www.facebook.com/groups/441897286297839 and request to join!

SUNDAY LEAGUE

The final night of the Sunday league saw only a handful of games played, as a number of teams struggled with holidays or took the opportunity to have an extra week off rather than play a friendly. The only thing that was yet to be determined in the top flight was the runners up spot, which either Bangers & Pash or Insole could wrap up with a win when they played each other. Insole had two games this week, so they would have a second chance to play for it if this game finished as a draw, but they looked to make it theirs as they edged into a two goal lead at half time, Brad Street and Wayne Reeves with the goals. Half way through the second period Rory Kelly pulled one back for Bangers, and when Alex Fowell drew them level with 5 minutes left they had a chance to nick that runners up spot. Neither team could find a winner though, so it went down to Insole’s second game against Real Maskid. Sam Green gave Maskid the lead in the second minute, but any hopes of them pulling off the result Bangers needed looked over when Aaron Campbell scored 4, Kyle Clarke, Wayne Reeves and Mike Pinder one each before the half time break. Kurtes Curran extended the lead 4 minutes after the restart, but in a more even second period Phil Carratt and Jack Wilson scored for Maskid either side of Clarke’s second. Clarke’s third was quickly followed by a couple more for Maskid from Andy Smith and Carratt, before Pinder completed the scoring with 6 minutes left to play.

No Championship or League One action this week, so it’s straight into League Two, with a couple of games played to finish off the season. Beercalona will jump a division and head straight for the Championship in the new season, and they might have showed why as they comfortably dispatched of SK Six, who will be happy not to play them again next season! Jay and Tom Ratcliffe both scored in the opening minute, and though Steve Blunsten and and own goal saw SK Six back in it early doors, it was 5-1 at the break as Martin Bell and both Ratcliffe’s got on the score sheet. It was an almost entirely one sided second half, as Bell got two, Jay three, Dave Watson two, Tom one and an own goal finished it off. The Veterans and FC AOTS was always likely to be a close one to call given both teams recent form, and they couldn’t be split at the break as two goals from Adam Duty were matched by goals from Ryan Prestwich and Simon Grainger. The Veterans looked to have it won when Grainger added a couple more early in the second period, but AOTS hit back in the final 10 as Eoghan Scott grabbed a couple either side of Duty’s third to give AOTS a win at the end of a season that finished a lot better than it started.

SK Dons were back for a final friendly before the real thing starts in a couple of weeks, and they had a good game with League Two runners up (who don’t want to go up….) Deportivo Lack Of Talent. The Dons lead 3-0 at the break as Kyle Norris scored two and Matt Richardson the other, but three goals from Brad Peet and two from Rob Parker helped Deportivo to a comeback victory as they won 8-4.

THE SUNDAY LEAGUE IS OVER! IT RESTARTS ON 2ND SEPTEMBER AFTER THE BALLERS BREAK, AND WE CAN STILL FIND SPACE FOR NEW OR RETURNING TEAMS. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

MONDAY LEAGUE

Oh boy, it would seem that this Ballers break can’t come soon enough for some of the Monday teams, with Diva Fever, AC Milmanchester, Pathetico Madrid, and even Nice Buns unable to put a team out this week. Having told Kroos Control we couldn’t get them a game after juggling things around, J Stands Barmy Army failed to show for their game with Ruud van Nipplerooy, meaning another game that could have gone ahead didn’t. Can’t wait for this break……

So, we had ONE GAME this Monday, and on paper it was a top of the table Championship clash between Netsix & Chill and Phantom Brazilians. When we say on paper, it was the two teams at the top of the league, who played out a 0-0 draw on the opening night of the season, but Phantom were missing several regular starts this week, and it showed as they went into the break 7-0 down, Warren Yeo and Mike Pinder with two, Aaron Campbell, Wayne Reeves and an own goal the other scorers. Pinder made it 8 before Daniel Clayton got Phantom on the board, but shockingly there was no comeback as James Bamgbose, Campbell and Matty Aked added further goals, with Clayton’s second in the final few minutes nothing more than a consolation.

WE HAVE A SPACE IN BOTH DIVISIONS OF THE MONDAY LEAGUE, AND ANY TEAMS WANTING TO START HAVE A WEEK AND A HALF TO GET THEIR SQUADS SORTED. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

Fortunately not as many teams were in holiday mode in the Tuesday league, and we were able to get 4 games on this week. Only one of them was in the Premiership though, and it saw Michu At De Gea Ba looking to bounce back from last week’s shock defeat to Stroke Titty as they looked to cling onto Gangs Of Dwight Yorke’s coat tails in the race for the Premiership title. Their race looked run int the first half as two goals from Ryan Green and another from James Holden gave a Shaka team, without a point this season, a 3-0 half time lead. Any thoughts of a second half comeback were dealt a blow when Jonny McAuley tapped in a 4th two minutes after the break, and the game was well and truly over when Tom Hannan and Green added two more half way through the period. The only thing worthy of note from the final 10 minutes was whether Will Hudson could rack up his 6th Ballers clean sheet, which he did on a night to forget for Michu.

Wellspring are making a real effort to put themselves in a position to claim a Premiership place this season, and went up against the still new Team Randommer (join the new SK Ballers Player Pool group on Facebook to vote for a better name…..). Things looked relatively promising for the Random lads in the early stages as they trailed 3-2 half way through the opening period as Chris Murray scored twice to keep them in it after goals from George Quayle and two from Jack Hartley. The leaders ran away with it towards the end of the half as Steven Whetham, Quayle and Lewis Arden scored to add to an own goal to make it 7-2 at the break. It didn’t get much better in the second half as Quayle added three more, Arden and Jack Phillips two, Whetham and Hartley one each, with Fidelis Eberegbe, Andy Carrington and Chris Murray replying for the soon to be renamed Randommers (assuming they still want to come back after this…..). Wellspring have benefited from playing teams at the ‘right’ time this season, so they lead the table on goal difference from Beercalona before the games kicked off tonight, and it was unlikely that they would make any headway into that goal difference from their game with Black Jack this week. They did lead 3-0 at the break as Jay Ratcliffe grabbed a first half hat trick to put them in control, but Black Jack fought their way back into it in the second half as Jack Roberts and Ryan Alderson scored in the opening 4 minutes of the period. Roberts got a second 12 minutes from time and the game as anyone’s, but within 9 minutes it was Beercalona’s again as Ratcliffe got his 4th before Martin Bell added two more in the final 5 minutes to ease them to a 6-3 win.

The ever reliable Stockport Eagles came in to give the now runaway leaders Gangs Of Dwight Yorke a game this week, and after remaining in touch at 4-2 at the break, three goals each from Josh Morrissey and Matty German were enough to give Gangs an 11-4 victory.

WE CURRENTLY HAVE A SPACE IN BOTH DIVISIONS OF OUR TUESDAY LEAGUE. FOR MORE INFORMATION OR TO SIGN UP, GET IN TOUCH

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

The title was up for grabs this week as Stockport Eagles needed to avoid defeat against Ajax Treesdown to take the title race down to the last couple of games. The leaders got off to a flyer with two goals in the first three minutes from Josh Batch and Evan Farrell, but the Eagles hit back with three goals of their own in 4 minutes, two from Callum Davies, the other from Ray Donnelly. They couldn’t hold on til the break, as Batch got his second on the stroke of half time to take us into the break all square at 3-3. The second half started in the same manor as the first, with a freak goal from Ajax ‘keeper Will Hudson and another from Daniel Kitchingham putting Ajax two up in the opening three minutes again, before Eagles hit back again with two of their own from Ryan McAndrew and Michael Winn. It was the leaders and now champions who struck the final blow as Farrell got his second of the game 10 minutes from time to give Ajax the narrow win and the title. Random Ballers were here for a second week with a couple of changes from the teams who were beaten last time out. One of the new recruits, Scott Norris, scored three in the opening 10 minutes to go alongside a Kyle Norris (no relation, as far as I know) goal to give them an early 4-0 lead against Magpie. Magpie were back in it before the break as Pawel Klimczak and Dawid scored before the break, and they were really back in it when Klimczak and Milosz Zawila scored in the second period to make it 4-4. The Randoms got themselves a first Ballers win as late goals from Scott Norris and Christos Christofidis finished off a cracking game.

New team Bandit Athletic were here for a game against Exeter Gently while they wait for a space to come up, and two goals from Kyle Clarke wasn’t enough to give them anything from this one as a double from Tom Harrison helped them to a 4-2 win.

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE HAS GONE FROM HAVING A COUPLE OF VACANCIES TO HAVING TOO MANY TEAMS! MONDAY AND TUESDAY ARE THE BEST MIDWEEK NIGHTS FOR IMMEDIATE AVAILABILITY

One week to go until the first Ballers week off in nearly two years, but once we’ve had that week we’ll be roaring back as we head into September, with the holiday season over and the darker nights creeping in, there’s not a lot else to do in an evening but to get yourselves out under the lights at Ballers…..

LEAGUE NEWS

No messing about, here’s where we have spaces for an immediate start for any new or returning teams:

MONDAY PREMIERSHIP – ONE SPACE

MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP – ONE SPACE

TUESDAY PREMIERSHIP – ONE SPACE

The BRAND NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE kicks off on 2nd September, the first day back after our break, and we are currently looking to pick up teams before we decide what the actual format is going to be. So if you’re thinking of getting involved, make your intentions known so we can include you when we’re getting things set up.

We have a couple of teams who may be looking to shift from the WEDNESDAY LEAGUE to other night’s in the coming weeks, so if Wednesday was your preferred choice, get in touch and let us know.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

The penultimate week of the Sunday league could see the Premiership title decided if Duno could beat the only team capable of catching them at the start of play, Insole. That win looked on the cards early as Liam Watson scored twice in the opening 4 minutes, but Kyle Clarke closed that gap within a minute. Jack Cope restored the Duno two goal lead 7 minutes before the break, but we looked like going into the interval with just the one goal in it as Jack Atkinson scored a minute before the break. The final act of the first half was an own goal that gave Duno a 4-2 lead when the whistle went, and Debutant Jack Hartley made it 5-2 three minutes into the second period. With the title slipping away, the former champs responded with three goals in 4 minutes to draw themselves level, Clarke, Atkinson and Aaron Campbell with the goals, but the current champs also reacted like champions do and Calvin Alexander scored two to put them 7-5 in front. Tom Ciessi scored a debut goal for Insole with three minutes left to give us a big finish, but they couldn’t find even one of the two goals they needed to take the title race to the final week, so Duno retain their Premiership title for a second straight season.

When we set up the league for the new season, Kipsta Cobras will be one of those teams on the border of going up to the Premiership and staying in the Championship, as the Championship season this season has been badly affected by struggling teams. One of those was Pat’s Giants, who got a team out this week and will hopefully be ok going into the new season. We found ourselves level at 2-2 at the break in this one as Paddy Bannister and Matt Sands replied to Kipsta goals from Wayne Reeves. Kipsta eased away in the second half as Reeves added three more, Warren Yeo, James Bamgbose and Aaron Campbell the others, with Joe Marsland and Danny Brookes providing the replies for the Giants. Having promised Team Tom a relegation for next season to allow them to rebuild after a season of struggle, they have put out a team that has been extremely competitive at this level in recent weeks, and their game with Wellspring this week was certainly competitive. Mike Devitt gave Wellspring the lead in the 13th minute, but we were level at the break as Phil Partakis scored 6 minutes later. this remained the score going into the final 10 minutes, before The Tommers went in front through Rob Jordan’s goal 6 minutes from time, They sealed the win with two late goals from Scott Doherty and Carl Carter, to make it three straight wins. They now sit third in the table, having been promised relegation a few weeks ago, that’s just being awkward……

Ladzio’s highly successful first Ballers season has ended with them being crowned League Two champions, but they could still impact on who joins them as they played second placed Sevilla Lacatalent this week. A minute into the second half it looked like Sevilla might be confirming their status as runners up for the season as Jake Riley’s third gave them a 3-2 lead, with Jack Shepherd and George Cox grabbing Ladzio’s first half goals. The champs fought back in the final 10 thoug, and once Sam Findlow had leveled things up, Lewis Findlow added two, Shepherd his second and Sam finished it off with their 7th to give them what looks like a fairly comfortable win. Inter Your Sister needed to pick up a win to overtake Sevilla into second spot and make them play for it, but bizarrely their opposition, The McMuffin Men, could still take second place despite starting the night second from bottom. Sam Delgado gave McMuffin’s a two goal lead, but a rare appearance from Inter ‘skipper’ Steve Johnson saw an even rarer goal from him to pull them back into it 8 minutes from the break. It was 3-1 at the interval as Mark Bailey scored just before the half time whistle, and they confirmed the win with goals from Calan Sherer, Charley Eyre, Delgado and Bailey, with a late brace from Brandon Byers-Wilks providing a little consolation for Inter as their season ends with them taking one of the mid table positions.

There were no games in League Two this week, but there were a handful of friendlies as teams kept active towards the season’s end. 4 goals from Chris Carroll helped Bangers & Pash to an 8-6 win over Stockport Eagles, with Ryan McAndrew scoring three in reply for them. Murder On Ziadne’s Floor were back for a second game ahead of joining the league for the new season, but having struggled to put a team out on the pitch, they lost 7-3 to League Two winners Beercalona, with Jay Ratcliffe scoring 4 of the Beercalona goals. League One FC Stront Bakken won a decent game against League Two FC AOTS 7-5, Declan Matthews scoring 4 and Chris Sinclair three, with Adam’s Duty and Atherton scoring a double each for AOTS. SK Dons are another team who are primed and ready to go for the new season, and they were the victim of a one man show as Paul Atherton scored 8 of The Veterans 12 goals as they ran out 12-7 winners, with Kyle Norris scoring three in reply for the Dons.

THE NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE SEASON STARTS ON 2ND SEPTEMBER. WE’LL CRAM IN AS MANY TEAMS AS WE CAN FIT, SO IF YOU WANT TO GET INVOLVED, GET IN TOUCH!

MONDAY LEAGUE

It was a fairly quiet Monday of Ballers action with a number of teams struggling to field a side this week. Just the one top division game this week, but what a game it was as a struggling Diva Fever just about got 6 players on the pitch for their game with J Stands Barmy Army. An even first half saw the game swing one way then the other before we went into the break at 3-3. Bevan Southward’s opening goal started things off, Scott Stokes and Jay Willingham replied for J Stands, before John Brookes and Callum Jones responded for Diva, with Stokes scoring the final goal of the half. Southward and Nicky Edwards scored early second half goals to keep us level at 4-4, but the goals really started flowing in the final 11 minutes. Willingham twice put J Stands back in front with Jones responding in between, Brookes leveled again for Diva before Stokes scored the 5th goal in 6 minutes to edge J Stands back in front with 6 to play. Jones grabbed another leveler, but Edwards quickly restored the J Stands lead yet again, before Brookes goal in the final minute ended a breathless game with each team taking a point from an 8-8 draw.

Netsix and Phantom couldn’t be split going into this week’s games at the top of the Championship, and Netsix took an early two goal lead against Nice Buns through goals from Mike Pinder and Wayne Reeves. They held that lead at the break, and in a game of symmetry they repeated the dose in the second period as an own goal and Pinder’s second of the game rounded off a 4-0 win that leaves Nice Buns still looking for their first points of the season. Netsix have conceded just one goal in three games so far! So a win by 4 or more goals would send Phantom top, but Pathetico started well and Liam Needham gave them the lead in the second minute. Phantom leveled up through a Daniel Clayton penalty, and they took the lead when the same player scored 4 minutes before the break. They looked to have it won with three goal in the opening 8 minutes of the second half, Paul Wilkinson with two and Clayton with the other, but Pathetico rallied and Nathan Thomson and Needham quickly pulled two back. Phantom took the points when Alex Brady scored their 6th and final goal two minutes from time, but it wasn’t enough to take them top.

WE NOW HAVE ONE SPACE IN BOTH DIVISIONS OF THE MONDAY LEAGUE AS WE APPROACH THE END OF THE HOLIDAY SEASON. THESE SPACES WON’T HANG AROUND LONG SO GET IN TOUCH TO REGISTER YOUR TEAM.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

Most of the games in the Tuesday Premiership this season have been competitive, but despite being in a few close games Gangs Of Dwight Yorke maintained their 100% record going into their first meeting with Total Bala, who had only lost once this season prior to this week’s meeting. It looked like it could be a long night for Total when Gangs went into a two goal lead in the opening 14 minutes through Connor Harding and Chris Singleton goals. They were back level within two minutes as the debuting and one-named Olly grabbed a quickfire brace, but Callum Jones restored the Gangs lead before the break. Bala started the second off well and leveled three minutes in through Rick Kelly’s finish, but that spurred Gangs into life and they struck three in 6 minutes, two from Jones and one from Josh Morrissey, to take a firm grip on the game. They went 4 up through Wez Barker’s goal half way through the period, and though Matt Kelly pulled one back with a rare goal that wasn’t off his shin, Barker confirmed the win for Gangs before Olly’s third gave the full time result a more realistically close look to it. One of the games in this division that hadn’t been close as Gangs heavy win over Stroke Titty last week, and Stroke were behind early again as Michael Jennison scored in the second minute for Michu At De Gea Ba, as they looked to take the position of Gangs nearest challengers. Jay Willingham leveled up quickly, but Matt Barton put Michu back infront with just 6 minutes on the clock. Stroke fought back and lead by two at the break as Willingham grabbed two more and Ryan Stevens the other, and they opened up a three goal lead through Sam Tattersall’s goal 5 minutes after the interval. Barton quickly replied again for Michu, but Willingham added two more to make it 7-3 with 15 to play. Jennison got a second but Willingham replied again with his 6th of the game to keep the deficit at 4, and though Paul Mazzitelli pulled another back inside the final 5 minutes, it was Willingham who fittingly had the final say as his 7th helped Stroke to a 9-5 win.

Beercalona look the most likely to be making the step up to challenge the big boys next season and they started as heavy favourites against a Rooneytunes team who had struggled to put a side out this week. Scoot Williams and Martin Bell gave them an early two goal lead, and they lead by one at the break after Tom Ratcliffe got their third with Jack Hodkinson scoring Rooneytunes two. Hodkinson’s third had us level with 20 minutes to play, and Josh Borthwick leveled up again for them after Bell had restored the Beercalona lead as we headed into the final 10 minutes. Rooneytunes were denied an unlikely point by Williams’ second goal in the final minute, as Beercalona move onto 12 points from 5 games. Wellspring suffered their first defeat of the season last week, but would be expecting to get back to winning ways against an opposition they beat 23-2 in their first game of the season, Europeans. It was never likely to be as one way this time as Europeans have improved from that shocking opening night, and it was just 3-0 at the break with Lewis Arden getting two and Dan Stringer the other. Mohammad got Europeans on the board early in the second half, and Umair got their second just after Mike Devitt had added two more to ease Wellspring clear again. Callum Clarke, Arden and Stringer scored to secure the win for Wellspring, but Mohammad got his second in the dying stages to make this a far more respectable defeat for Europeans.

WE HAVE ONE SPACE IN THE TOP DIVISION OF THE TUESDAY LEAGUE FOR ANY NEW OR RETURNING TEAMS. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

Ajax Treesdown took on Magpie as they looked to strengthen their grip on the top spot in the Wednesday league, and having struggled to put a side out this week they were given a helping hand when an own goal gave them the lead in the second minute. Magpie struck back within minutes as Tomasz Glebiowski leveled things up, Evan Farrell restored the Ajax lead 9 minutes before the break, and they lead by two at the half time whistle as the same player got his second 5 minutes later. A second own goal, again two minutes into the half, saw the lead extend to three, but Dawid pulled one back for Magpie with 15 minutes left. Ajax killed off any Magpie hopes with goals from Daniel Kitchingham and Farrell, before Dawid got his second in the final stages to keep the scoreline respectable. The newly formed Random Ballers made their collective Wednesday debut against Exeter Gently this week, and with the make up of the team being 7 lads who’d pretty much never met before, it was always going to be a big ask for them to fit together as a team straightaway. They did score first when Max Brookes grabbed an opening minute goal, but reality quickly kicked in and Exeter hit back to lead 7-1 at the break, Tom Harrison and Kristian Igo with two each, James Magnani, Rob Milarvie and an own goal from Kurtes Curran (sorry. Not sorry.) the others. The Randoms improved in the second half, but still continued to concede as Harrison and Igo got two more each, and Tom Wood the other, with Curran scoring at the right end to give the Ballers a little consolation.

Arguably the game of the night came in the friendly between Stockport Eagles and Wellspring, which swung back and forth throughout. Eventually two second half goals from Michael Winn, adding to two by Ray Donnelly, were enough to give Eagles a 6-5 win, with George Quayle scoring two in reply for Wellspring.

WITH POLISH ARMY RETURNING IN A COUPLE OF WEEKS (YAY!) THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE WILL BE FULL AGAIN! FEEL FREE TO ENQUIRE THOUGH, AS THERE’S RUMOURS ABOUND THAT ONE OR TWO TEAMS MIGHT BE LOOKING TO MOVE NIGHTS.

Just two more full weeks until the first Ballers holiday! Must try and keep up the high quality of work that goes into these round ups…..

LEAGUE NEWS

Here’s our CURRENT LEAGUE SPACES for any teams looking for an immediate start:

MONDAY LEAGUE – ONE SPACE IN THE CHAMPIONSHIP

TUESDAY LEAGUE – ONE SPACE IN THE PREMIERSHIP

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE – ONE SPACE

We have created a team to take the space that was in the Tuesday Championship, and now we’re looking to do the same for the space in the Wednesday league. If you are an individual player, or someone who wants to play but doesn’t have enough players to form a team but could bring a friend or two, and you want a regular weekly game at 9pm on a Wednesday evening, let us know.

The NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE kicks off on 2ND SEPTEMBER, and while the league is currently full, we are looking at our options for expansion that could include a 5th division, or the addition of one or two teams to each individual division. 7 teams per division could lead us to incorporate a League Cup within the league structure. Any thoughts from existing teams on that are welcome, but if you are currently a Ballers team but want to be, fill in a Join A League form on the homepage, or call or text 07809252658.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

We’re into the final few weeks of the Sunday league, with plenty still to play for in the top division as Duno looked to take another step towards retaining their title if they could pick up a repeat win over Bangers & Pash after last week’s emphatic 10-0 win. The chances of an exact repeat lasted only three minutes as Robbie Fallon gave Bangers the lead on three minutes, and an even first half ended up all square as Jack Cope leveled on 16 minutes. Duno looked like they might have had the game won when Liam Watson and Jack Cope scored to make it 3-1 with 17 minutes to play, but Matt Sheehan looked like making them hold on for the win before Ray Donnelly scored a couple in the last couple of minutes to secure a hard fought 5-2 win. That win left Insole as the only other challengers for the title, and they needed to beat an El Caliente team who won the reverse fixture between the two earlier in the season to remain in contention. This was a much changed Insole team, and it took 12 minutes for Dylan Feast to break the deadlock and give them the lead. He added two more before the break, but Danny King reduced the arrears for El Caliente, who’s season has gone off the rails after a promising start. Insole eased to a 7-1 win as Kyle Clarke scored three in 6 minutes to go alongside an own goal to keep them in the hunt. They will need to win the double pointer with Duno this weekend and make up a goal difference disadvantage in their final couple of games to claim a 4th(?) Premiership title.

Another team needing a win to retain hopes of winning a title this season were Kipsta Cobras, who had to beat struggling Team Tom to stay in the fight in the Championship. They looked up against it as an own goal and Alex Dodgeson’s finish in the opening 10 minutes gave Team Tom a flyer. Kipsta showed the stuff of champions to claw themselves back into it before the break as Warren Yeo and Connor Harding scored in the final 5 minutes, and they looked to have the game won as Harding added two more and Wayne Reeves scored their 5th to make it 5-2 with 9 minutes left. Dodgeson scored what  looked to be nothing more than a consolation with 5 minutes left, but it was the catalyst for a remarkable and unlikely comeback as Rob Jordan and Dodgeson scored again within two minutes to make it 5-5, before James Cresswell scored a last minute winner to give Team Tom the shock win under interim manager Liam Lathom. Calls for a change of team name to Team Leemo are growing as the weeks go on……. That result confirms Stockport Eagles as Championship Winners, congratulations to them on back to back promotions after most of their previous seasons had been spent in the lower leagues.

Second place was on the line in League One as either Sevilla Lacatalent or a resurgent Inter Your Sister looked to join Ladzio in the Championship next season. Sevilla have the games in hand, so all Inter could do was try and win this one and make them play for it in the last couple of weeks, and they looked like doing that as they recovered from going behind to Jake Riley’s 6th minute opener to lead 4-1 at the break thanks to goals from Ant Williams, Dave Smythe, Brandon Byers-Wilkes and Simon Steel. They made it 5-1 through Steel’s second 5 minutes into the second half and this one looked done and dusted, but Riley and David Witter pulled a couple back with 11 minutes remaining, before a spell of 5 goals in 9 minutes gave Sevilla a remarkable comeback win. Sam Melling got the first of those 5 before Riley added the rest as Sevilla move to within two points of guaranteeing second place with three games in which to get them. The other game played this week was all about survival as the previously doomed looking FC Stront Bakken took on The McMuffin Men, who were in need of points to move away from the bottom two. They looked like doing that as Charley Eyre and Sam Delgado gave them a two goal lead in the first 18 minutes, but Ethan Kaye halved the deficit before the break. This was rapidly becoming a night of comebacks and The Bucket Boys provided another one as Declan Matthews scored the only goal of the second period to give them a narrow 3-2 win to drag themselves out of bottom spot and leave former Premiership team Step Brothers occupying that space with games running out.

Was this the week that Beercalona picked up the League Two title that’s looked set to be heading their way for the majority of the season? A recently improved FC AOTS looked like providing a fairly stiff test, and they lead 2-1 after 10 minutes as Eoghan Scott and Paul Buckley replied to Tom Ratcliffe’s opener for Beercalona. The champions-elect responded before the break and Jay Ratcliffe’s leveler was added to by Tom Ratcliffe’s second and Scott Williams’ finish. Buckley’s second early in the second half made it 4-3, and they stayed in it again at 5-4 with 8 minutes left when Adam Duty replied to Martin Bell’s goal for Beercalona. It was Beercalona who clinched this one in the end, with 5 goals in the final 7 minutes to give them a more comfortable looking victory than it was, Bell and Jay Ratcliffe with one each, and Tom Ratcliffe with three more. So that’s the League Two title also won! Deportivo Lack Of Talent finished off a consistent season knowing that second place would be theirs if they could beat The Veterans this week. A busy opening saw The Veterans make the better start as an own goal and two from Simon Grainger gave them a 3-1 lead after Brad Peet had given Deportivo the lead. Rob Parker and Ben Proctor scored to drag Deportivo level, and Peet’s second, followed by a Dean Minshull strike for The Vets meant we headed towards half time all square at 4-4. An own goal just before the break put Deportivo back in front, and Proctor added two more in the opening 10 minutes of the second half to put them in control. Peet looked to have secured the win 5 minutes from time with his third, but Ben Mercer grabbed another before Peet put one in at the wrong end to give The Vets a sniff of a chance. Deportivo did pick up the win that confirms second place as Parker got his second with the final kick to mean the promotion spots in League Two are done for the season. Rooneytunes may be looking at mounting a promotion push next season and third place was still within reach as they started this week’s game with SK Six, who’ve had player issues with holidays etc in recent weeks. The guesting Ben Mercer gave SK a three goal half time lead. We’re pretty sure you can guess how the second half went on this week of comebacks, and Rooneytunes fired back with a vengeance in the second half as they struck 8 goals without reply, 5 from Josh Borthwick, two from Dec Church and one from Jack Hodkinson put them 8-3 up, before Steve Blunsten grabbed a late reply for SK.

In friendlies, Stockport Eagles faced an interesting challenge from League One winners Ladzio, that they eventually won 10-8 with Paul Waugh scoring 4 and Callum Davies three for them, while George Cox grabbed a hat trick in reply for Ladzio. SK Dons were back for a second friendly ahead of their return for the new season, and 5 goals for a debuting Paul Russell were enough for them to edge a 15 goal thriller with Wellspring, as 4 goals from Nathan Wilkinson weren’t enough to stop the existing league team slipping to an 8-7 defeat.

WE’VE NO IDEA WHERE WE ARE UP TO WITH THE SUNDAY LEAGUE! THE NEW SEASON STARTS ON 2ND SEPTEMBER, AND WE KEEP RECEIVING APPLICATIONS AND ENQUIRIES FROM NEW TEAMS WANTING TO GET INVOLVED! AS IT STANDS WE ARE LOOKING AT OUR OPTIONS FOR EXPANSION, SO GET IN TOUCH IF YOU WANT TO GET INVOLVED

MONDAY LEAGUE

The ever changing line up for AC Milmanchester met up with a much changed line up for Ruud van Nipplerooy this week. It was pretty much a Kinky Slipper reunion for the Ruud boys, but their rustiness showed in the first 10 minutes as David Murphy scored two and Reece Nevins one as ACM took an early 3-1 lead, with Jordan Hutchinson scoring Ruud’s response. The Nips lead 5-4 at the break though as Tommy Schofield scored two, Wesley Harney and Luke Braden one each with Murphy’s third being the solitary response in the final 15 minutes of the half the Premiership champs. Van Nipplerooy secured a second straight win with further goals from Schofield, Harney, Rob Cresswell and two more from Braden, with Murphy’s 4th of the game near the end providing small consolation on a bad night for the three time Premiership winners. The Nips are two from two on their return….. Kroos Control will look to provide stiff competition for the other Monday Premiership teams, and they started their time in this league with a game against Diva Fever. Liam Watson scored 5 first half goals to help them to a 6-2 half time lead, with Calvin Alexander scoring the other and Joe Dodd scoring two for Diva in reply. Diva threatened a comeback in the second half, and got it back to 6-5 with 14 minutes to play as Dodd got his third and Bevan Southward added two of his own. Watson scored two either side of Southward’s third to leave us at 8-6 with 10 left to play, but the new team then Kroos’d clear as Watson got three more to make it 10 in total (all of them within 6 inches of the goal line…..), and Jack Cope got the last after Dodd had got his 4th for Diva. The top division looks pretty competitive.

Netsix & Chill and Phantom Brazilians couldn’t be split after last week’s 0-0 opener, and it looks like they quite like being close to each other after week 2…… Class On Fake Grass made their first appearance of the season against the only other team they’ve played on a Monday in Netsix. Things were a little different this time around as Netsix lead 2-1 at the break through Warren Yeo and Aaron Campbell goals, with Mike Cocks having grabbed Class’ goal in between. Two goals in the first 10 minutes of the second half from Wayne Reeves and Yeo edged Netsix close to the winning post, and an own goal 9 minutes from the end sealed that win as Class take their time getting back into it again. So that’s 5 goals scored and on conceded for Netsix, what could Phantom do? Well it never helps when the team organiser somehow manages to get the game time wrong while the rest of his lads were there, so Nice Buns kindly played the first half with 5 men to make it an even game, but they might have regretted that as they went into the break three down through goals from Daniel and Ryan Clayton. Restored to 6 players each, Paul Cheetham pulled one back early in the secon half for Buns, but Paul Wilkinson scored a couple of late goals to give Phantom a 5-1 lead that keep them level with Netsix on everything!

WE HAVE ONE SPACE IN THE MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP. ANY NEW OR RETURNING TEAMS WHO MIGHT BE LOOKING TO GET INVOLVED SHOULD GET IN TOUCH ASAP!

TUESDAY LEAGUE

Gangs Of Dwight Yorke are looking to make it another unbeaten season in the Tuesday Premiership, and went up against a Stroke Titty team who were coming off the back of their first top division win last week. A repeat looked unlikely as Gangs went into the break 4 goals to the good as Jake Dean got two either side of goals from Josh Morrissey and Connor Harding. The second half didn’t get much better as three from Callum Jones and one each from Harding and Morrissey made it 9-0 with 8 minutes left. They could even afford to have their ‘keeper Ash Cobban miss a penalty, but it was a great save from Jack Tetlow in the Stroke goal. A bad few minutes for Cobban got worse when he lost his chance of a clean sheet as Aaron Collins finally got Stroke on the board with 5 to play. Morrissey and Harding added another each either side of Collins second for Stroke to see the champions and leaders to a third win from three. Total Bala were looking to take second spot if they could beat a pointless and much changed Shaka team, but Jake Tyler took advantage of an early mix up to give them a lead in the opening seconds. Lee Manion marked his first appearance since Total’s recall to the league with the leveler 6 minutes later, and he put them in front at the break with his second in the 21st minute. Rick Kelly and John Wood stretched the Bala lead in the early stages of the second period, but Danny Harwood kept Shaka in touch with a quick response. Kelly and Manion looked to have put the result out of doubt with 10 minutes left, and Wood restored the 4 goal lead after Liam Paull had pulled another back. Mark Brookes gave Shaka a glimmer of hope with 4 minutes left, but Manion grabbed the final goal of the game to give Bala their second win ahead of the game with Gangs next week.

In the Championship, Wellspring were the only team with a 100% record going into this weeks round of games, but their squad was a little short this week as they took on a Beercalona team who’s only defeat had come when they themselves were short. Lewis Arden gave Wellspring the lead, but things quickly turned sour for them as Craig Scanlon scored 4, Jay and Tom Ratcliffe two each as Beercalona went into half time with an 8-1 lead. They added 5 more after the break through Martin Bell, two more for Jay, one more for Tom and a final goal for Ste Bowler, with Arden grabbing his second to provide scant consolation for Wellspring, who lose top spot. The newly formed Team Randommer pulled players from all over to fill the space we had previously had, and took on Europeans who were back after missing out last week. Having tasted heavy defeats in their first couple of games, Europeans found themselves level at 2-2 inside the opening 10 minutes as a Mike Pinder own goal, and one from Mohammed matched up to Mikey Freeburn’s and Andy Carrington’s. We remained level at 3-3 at the break as Freeburn and Sufyan struck for each team. Pinder scored at the right end twice in three minutes to give the Randoms a two goal lead with 13 to play, but Europeans looked like they might nick a first point when Sufyan and Saad scored to make it 5-5 with 5 minutes left. Carrington got his second in the final minute to give Randoms a debut win, while Europeans will go looking for that first point next week.

Stockport Eagles were down this week and they raced out of the blocks into a 5 goal lead against Michu At De Gea Ba in the opening 11 minutes. Ryan McAndrew scored three, Ray Donnelly and Callum Davies the others. Matt Barton quickly pulled one back for Michu, and there was only two in it at the break as Michael Jennison and Barton both struck in the final 6 minutes of the half. Three goals in 7 second half minutes from Adam Porter edged Michu in front, and they were the only goals of the second half as Michu held on for an incredible comeback win.

WE HAVE ONE SPACE IN THE TOP DIVISION OF OUR TUESDAY LEAGUE FOR ANY NEW TEAMS LOOKING TO GET INVOLVED. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS 

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

The Wednesday league needs a little repair work after the two new teams who joined for this season didn’t really work out, plus Magpie were unavailable this week….. So the only game that took place this week at a lonely Ballers Wednesday was Stockport Eagles (again) against Exeter Gently. It was a good one though, and after Kristian Igo had given Exeter a third minute lead, 5 goals in 6 minutes half way through the period saw us level at 3-3 with 9 minutes of the first half to go, Paul Waugh with two and Ray Donnelly the other for Eagles, Tom Harrison and Mike Belshaw for Exeter. It was Exeter that lead at the break as Igo finished the half the way he started it by putting Exeter in front, but Ben Waugh brought us level again 5 minutes after the restart. Michael Winn, Donnelly and Ben Waugh looked to have taken the game away from Exeter with three quick goals, but James Magnani and Igo reduced the deficit to one again with 5 minutes left. Donnelly got the final goal of the game to secure a win for Eagles against the team that took points off Ajax Treesdown last week.

WE HAVE A COUPLE OF SPACES TO FILL, WITH ONE LIKELY TO BE FILLED BY A TEAM OF INDIVIDUAL PLAYERS FROM NEXT WEEK. IF YOU HAVE A TEAM WANTING TO START, OR YOU’RE A PLAYER WHO FANCIES A REGULAR WEEKLY GAME, GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.