April already?! Not as much to write about this week with Easter having had it’s usual impact (not bad, just not normal!), fingers crossed for a return to normal for next week.

LEAGUE NEWS

Spaces are starting to become a premium in our current leagues, so if you’re not currently playing but want to get started, or do currently play but fancy doubling (or trebling) up now the brighter, hopefully warmer nights are here, you best get in touch.

The BRAND NEW WEDNESDAY LEAGUE started this week, but due to a couple of surprise drop outs we were left with a couple of spaces, one of which has been filled, so we currently have ONE SPACE for an immediate start.

We are also in a position where the final space for teams for the new MONDAY LEAGUE which starts on 23rd April will probably not be available for long, with a few teams hovering around. Get your name on that space now otherwise it will be gone.

We remain determined to find a way to add a 5th division to our SUNDAY LEAGUE in May, so if you play 11’s and want to keep sharp during the summer, get involved. We’ve already potentially got 5 teams lined up and can get friendlies going for any teams while they wait for a space.

FOR MORE INFO ON ANY OF THE ABOVE, FILL IN A ‘JOIN A LEAGUE’ FORM ON THE HOMEPAGE OR CALL OR TEXT 07809252658

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

The first week of the new Wednesday league season dropped on the same night as the first leg of Liverpool v City in the Champions League, so we were as always pleasantly surprised by the turnout of our Wednesday teams. Sadly we lost Magpie FC and Sevilla Lacatalent at the end of the previous season, so with a space still to fill we had two games on this week. Stockport Eagles, Polish Army and Exeter Gently could barely be split in the race for second place last season, and they were all looking to get the new season off to a winning start. Eagles faced Wellspring on the opening night, and it quickly became clear that they were going to get off to a winning start as Warren Yeo, Ray Donnelly and Matty Aked gave them a three goal lead in the first 10 minutes. That lead was doubled by the break as Paul Waugh, Connor Harding and Aked added to that early flurry of goals. It didn’t get any better for Wellspring in the second half as they played their 4th game in 4 nights, as Donnelly added 4 more, Yeo and Waugh two, and Harding the other as Eagles ran out 15-0 winners. The game between Exeter (fresh with their new Instagram page, go give them a follow…..) and Polish Army was always likely to be a much tighter affair, but the Poles started much the stronger as Michal opened the scoring on 5 minutes before Dominik added two more in a minute half way through the opening period. Michal’s second made it 4-0, and Marcin made it 5 after just 20 minutes. Mehrad Torkian pulled one back for Exeter before the break, and there was a glimmer of hope for an impressive comeback when Kristian Igo made it 5-2 6 minutes after the restart. Michal got his third two minutes later, and that killed off any chance of an Exeter revival, as the Army saw the game out for a 6-2 win.

ONE OF THE TWO SPACES HAS BEEN FILLED, SO ANY NEW TEAM JOINING FOR NEXT WEEK WILL STILL BE ABLE TO CATCH UP THE MISSED FIRST GAME. DO IT NOW…..!

SUNDAY LEAGUE

For an Easter Sunday, one of the days of the year where we anticipate more than a few teams having issues fielding a team, the turnout wasn’t too bad and it included the Sunday Classico as Insole desperately needed a win over Kinky Slipper to keep the title race interesting at the half way point. Joe Lailey gave Kinky the lead in the 10th minute, but two goals in three minutes in the final 5 minutes of the half from Aaron Campbell and Kyle Clarke put Insole 2-1 up approaching the break. Jordan Hutchinson made it 2-2 in the stroke of half time, but they were behind again 5 minutes into the second period when Brad Street scored. Bizarrely we then had a goal from Kinky ‘keeper Luke Braden with 10 minutes left to have us set up for a big finish, and in that final 10 it was Insole who nicked it thanks to Matthew Atkinson’s goal 4 minutes from time. Insole now lead the division by three points from Kinky and Duno, with both of those teams having a game in hand on the leaders. It’s going to be interesting……

Real Maskid will be expecting to be part of the mix up in the top flight next season, and they looked to continue their stroll towards the Premiership with a win over a  Wellspring side who may have been a little the worse for wear following their escapades of the previous evening. Either way there’s not much point dwelling too much on this one, as 8 goals from Darren McConnell, 6 from Jack McConnell and Kieran O’Connell, three from Jake Morrey and two from Jordon Connell were just about enough to see off the goals from Mike Devitt, Jake Hamilton and Chris Murray. That’s 25-3 for those of you who didn’t have access to a calculator. The battle already seems to be for second place, with just two points separating second and bottom before this week’s games kicked off, and unsurprisingly both of them were closer than the Maskid one. A fast start in the Inter Row Z v McMuffin Men game saw three goals in 4 minutes from Brandon Byers-Wilkes (2) and Ray Donnelly put Inter 3-1 up by the 10 minute mark after Sam Delgado had given McMuffin Men an early lead. It was 3-2 at the break as Ryan Bradley pulled one back half way through the opening period, and they turned the game back in their favour when Mark Bailey and Jack Searle scored in the first 6 minutes of the second period. Donnelly’s second 14 minutes from time sent us into the final 10 minutes at 4-4, and his third with 6 minutes left was enough to give Inter a hard fought win. The Championship had a full house of games this week, and El Caliente were looking to bounce back from last week’s heavy defeat against a Step Brothers team who went into this week’s games in second spot. Danny Robinshaw gave Caliente the lead in the 7th minute, and despite Chris Moore producing a moment of magic to put the Brothers level halfway through the period, Caliente lead 3-1 at the break as Nathaniel Odysseus-Kingsley and Ross Grealey scored in the last 10 minutes of the half. After some half decent form of late this was a bad night for the Brotherhood, and two more goals from Fidelis Eberegbe and Grealey in the final 10 minutes put the cap on an impressive win for Caliente, who join Inter on 7 points at the half way point of the season. Point of note, every game in the Championship has been played in the opening 5 weeks of the season, with 8 of the 15 games played ending with two goals or less between the teams. Maskid are runing everything in this division……

On the flip side there were no League One games played this week……

A couple of games survived in League Two this week, including struggling Deportivo Lack Of Talent taking the drop down for the remainder of the campaign to help them get through with injuries etc causing them issues. Top of the table FC Stront Bakken were up against SK Six this week as they looked to keep their promotion campaign on track. They didn’t get off to the ideal start as Steve Blunsten gave SK the lead in the 10th minute, but they quickly turned it round with two goals from Declan Matthews in the next 4 minutes. Blunsten got a second 9 minutes from half time to make it Desmond, but the Bucket Boys had a two goal lead at the break as Matthews and Shaun Jemison scored in the final 5 minutes. SK remained well in this one, and Max Blunsten pulled one back for them three minutes after the restart, before Steve made it 4-4 with his third with 16 minutes left to play. Matty Aked scored the 9th and final goal of the game for Stront Bakken two minutes later as the leaders make it 5 out of 5 in the first half of the season. Deportivo’s first game back at this level was against a Rooneytunes team who had threatened to leave us in the last few weeks, but couldn’t resist the urge to get their weekly Ballers fix. They lead 2-1 at the break thanks to goals from Cian Gillespie and Connor Atkinson, with Ben Proctor scoring a debut goal for Deportivo in response. Rooneytunes held onto their lead into the final quarter of an hour before Proctor’s second of the game made it 2-2. Deportivo took control in the final 10 minutes, and goals from Brad Peet, Ashley Ellwood and Rhys Moult were enough to see Deportivo’s return to league action end with a win.

Kipsta Cobras took on Stockport Eagles in a friendly this week with both teams fielding patched up sides. Kipsta ran out 6-3 winners in a competitive game, with one of their ‘guests’ Phil Carroll scoring three.

THE REGULAR SUNDAY LEAGUE IS FULL, BUT WE ARE STILL LOOKING TO ADD A 5TH DIVISION IN FROM MAY, SO GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

MONDAY LEAGUE

A couple of Championship games and a friendly survived the Bank Holiday, with FC Rhino Ket looking to continue their mission to be part of next season’s top division against a Nice Buns team who were short of a couple of regulars this week. They fell behind to Charlie Williamson’s early goal, but swiftly hit back with goals from Jake Shaw, two from Jack Needham and another from Louis Moore before we’d reached the halfway point of the opening period. Buns hit back though and three goals in 4 minutes, two from Jimmy Williamson, the other from Charlie had us level at 4-4 heading into the break. Rhino Ket tried to make the break again at the start of the second period as Shaw and Moore scored in the opening three minutes of the half, but Paul Cheetham kept Buns in contention with a goal a minute later. Further Shaw and Needham goals sent Rhino into the final 10 minutes with a three goal lead, and they finished the stronger side  as Needham and Moore added another couple each before Jimmy of the Williamson clan scored a late consolation. Pique Blinders were playing just their second league game but were hoping to make it two wins from two as they took on struggling Pathetico Madrid. Pathetico looked up for the fight this week, and James Littlewood and Craig Moss gave them a two goal lead in the opening 14 minutes, before Emmanuelle pulled one back for Pique before the break. Liam Needham eased Pathetico two goals in front again 7 minutes into the second half, but Emmanuelle and Kieran Norris drew Pique level with 12 minutes to play. John Peneveyre (we really hope that’s how it’s spelt…..) restored Pathetico’s lead two minutes later, but Pique looked to have nicked a win when Nathaniel Kingsley leveled things up before Ross Grealey put them in front for the first time with just three minutes left. Pathetico picked up their first point in a little while when Littlewood grabbed the 10th and final goal of the game a minute from time, now they just need a little consistency in their player availability to try and build on this unlikely point. Wellspring rocked up again for a friendly this week with Netsix & Chill, and they were involved in a competitive game where a narrow 2-0 half time lead for Netsix turned into a 6-2 full time win for the Chillers as Mike Pinder helped himself to three of the 6.

THERE IS ONE, REPEAT, ONE SPACE LEFT FOR A NEW TEAM AHEAD OF THE START OF THE NEW MONDAY SEASON IN A FEW WEEKS TIME…… 

TUESDAY LEAGUE

The collective Easter hangover rolled onto Tuesday, with 4 friendlies played on what should have been the catch up week, meaning second place was dictated by forfeit results. Second place is first loser anyway…… In the equivalent of the Tuesday Community Shield Premiership winners Gangs Of Dwight Yorke took on new Championship winners Shaka in a game between two unbeaten teams. The first half was a good competitive game, with Mark Brookes leveling up for Shaka after Aden Jones had given Gangs a second minute lead. Jones quickly restored the Gangs lead, and Warren Yeo made it 3-1 half way through the half, and despite several chances at either end that remained the score at the break. Yeo and Jones added to the lead in the first 7 minutes of the second half, and they restored their 4 goal lead when Connor Harding scored a minute after Brookes had got his second of the game. Brad Street pulled another back for Shaka, but the Premiership winners finished the stronger as Callum Jones grabbed two, Aden Jones his 4th and Yeo his third to seal a 10-3 win. Black Jack took on Inter Row Z as we try to work out what division everyone should go in next season given that the Championship was a brand new league. Black Jack pulled it back to 2-2 after 7 minutes as Jack Roberts and Ryan Alderson turned things around after Joe Fletcher and Callum Donnelly had given Inter a two goal lead inside the first 4 minutes. Inter regained control and goals from Donnelly, Calvin Alexander and Fletcher saw Inter into the break 5-2 up. Alderson got the first goal of the second period to reduce the arrears, but two more from Callum Donnelly and another from namesake Ray meant that Roberts second of the game two minutes from time was just a consolation. It looks a little early for these two teams to be swapping places……. Con Dog have decided to have a name change and go with the wonderful title of Stroke Titty going forward, and they had a very tight game with Turkish Delight this week. Mohannad gave Turkish the lead in the 11th minute, but Sam Tattersall scored just before the break to make it 1-1 at half time. Tattersall put Titty in front two minutes into the second half, but Jake leveled things up again at 2-2 with 18 to play. Despite both teams best efforts this was the final goal of the game, and maybe we need to try and get hold of some of Turkish Delight’s lads surnames…. Beercalona’s latest chance to pick up a first win came against Wellspring and they got off to a great start when Scott Williams put them in front in the opening minute. Chris Murray drew Wellspring level on 7 minutes, but three more Williams goals with an own goal in Wellspring’s favour sandwiched inbetween saw Beercalona go into the break 4-2 up. Callum Wilkinson pulled one back two minutes into the second half, before Beercalona collapsed by conceding 5 goals in 6 minutes to go 8-4 down with 15 minutes still to play, Mike Devitt and Murray with two each, and a second own goal adding to their misery. Nathan Wilkinson, Murray and Devitt added further goals in the latter stages to condemn Beercalona to another defeat, but the signs of improvement are there.

THERE’S NO SPACES TO BE HAD IN THE TUESDAY LEAGUE WHEN THE NEW SEASON STARTS NEXT WEEK, SO CAST YOUR EYES ELSEWHERE

The clocks have gone forward, the sun has made an appearance, and many more weeks like this and I’ll be able to afford to get a haircut……

LEAGUE NEWS

One thing we weren’t expecting was to have to find a new team for the NEW WEDNESDAY LEAGUE which starts NEXT WEEK!

With the NEW MONDAY LEAGUE set to start at the end of April, we are down to the LAST SPACE as we look to get back to two full divisions.

By the time May comes around we will be looking to get the SUNDAY LEAGUE up to 5 divisions while the 11’s season is over for a few months.

For more information on any of the above, go to the home page and fill in the form on the ‘Join A League’ page

SUNDAY LEAGUE

If anyone saw our Facebook post a couple of days ago, you’ll have seen that Sunday was mostly made up of ridiculously close games. One game we didn’t fancy to be particularly close at start of play was champions Kinky Slipper’s game with Team Tom, and Rob Cresswell’s 7th minute goal was the first in what we expected to be a fairly comfortable win. The Tommers didn’t read the script though, and Rob Jordan leveled up for them 8 minutes from half time, but they didn’t make it to the break all square as James Radcliffe restored the Kinky lead 4 minutes from the interval. Two goals in 4 minutes from Joe Lailey put Kinky 4-1 up with 14 to play, but Tom Hornsby reduced that to a two goal lead with 8 minutes left. Radcliffe got Kinky’s 5th with the final goal of the game two minutes later, and the leaders keep up their 100% start to their title defence. Insole can’t afford too many more slip ups after their loss to Duno, and their game with struggling Dench again didn’t look likely to derail them any further. They raced into a 4 goal lead in the opening 10 minutes as Jordan Cunningham, Kurtes Curran, Brad Street and an own goal put them well in charge. Dan Jones pulled one back for Dench on 15 minutes, but Cunningham and Curran’s second of the game made it 6-1 at the break. There was a bit of symmetry about the second half as Cunningham and Curran added to the Insole lead before Jones got his second for Dench. Kyle Clarke, Aaron Campbell, and other own goal and Street’s second of the game made the second half score also 6-1, giving us a full time score of 12-2. Tough times for Dench…… Duno’s colours were lowered for the first time this season in defeat to Kinky Slipper, but they could join Kinky and Insole on 9 points if they could get back to winning ways against a Kipsta Cobras team who manage to keep scraping a team together in a time of struggle. They weren’t struggling in the opening 12 minutes as an own goal and a Jack Horgan goal put them 2-0 up, but Danny Burgess and Calvin Alexander quickly responded for Duno to send us into the break level at 2-2. Duno went in front for the first time through Rhys Clooney’s 32nd minute goal, but Wayne Reeves ensured that lead last just one minute as we headed into the final 10 minutes at 3-3. Burgess looked to have settled things in Duno’s favour with two goals in three minutes, but a Warren Yeo reply a minute later left them hanging on for the final couple of minutes. Hold on they did though, and it looks to be a three way fight at the top for the title this season.

Real Maskid will want to get in that shake up next season, and with a perfect three from three record they went in against El Caliente this week in what looked on paper to be a fairly tough test. They looked set to make light work of it in the opening 10 minutes as goals from Darren McConnell, Alec Pattinson and Kieran O’Connell put them three up. Ross Grealey pulled one back for Caliente, and we looked well set for a competitive second period. Maskid made their mark with two more goals in the opening 8 minutes through McConnell and Jake Morrey to pretty much put the result out of doubt, and the wheels well and truly fell off for Caliente in the final 10 minutes. McConnell and Morrey added three more each, and O’Connell his second of the game to give Maskid a thumping 12-1 win which will serve as notice to the Premiership teams that Maskid’s aren’t going to go away easily. The rest of the division is an absolute pick ’em for the second promotion place, and with El Caliente losing the other 4 teams had the chance to leapfrog them into second place. Step Brothers and Inter Row Z faced off in a game that was always likely to be close (and given that we’ve already talked about a 12-1 and a 12-2, we already know the rest of the games are close!), and it took 13 minutes for the deadlock to be broken through Josh Armitage’s finish. Ray Donnelly leveled up for Inter 4 minutes later, but an own goal and a well worked Rob Sheldon goal put the Brotherhood 3-1 up 4 minutes from the break. We looked like going in level at the break as Donnelly and Brandon Byers-Wilkes scored two in a minute, but Chris Moore produced a moment of magic in the final seconds to restore the Brothers lead. Sheldon’s second gave them their two goal lead back in the first minute of the second period, but the twists and turns continued as Michael Winn and Donnelly made it 5-5 with 18 minutes left to play. Armitage quickly put the Brothers in front yet again, and they looked like they might hold on for a vital win until Donnelly grabbed his 4th and the final goal of the game to end a great game all square at 6-6. Wellspring had kick started their season with a good win over Inter last week, while The McMuffin Men were still looking for that elusive first W. It didn’t look like happening this week as Wellspring flew into a 4 goal lead in the opening 8 minutes through two goals from Lewis Arden and two from Jay Berrisford. Sam Delgado pulled one back a minute later for McMuffin, but there were no more goals in the opening half and we went in at 4-1 at half time. Wellspring looked to have killed the game off 6 minutes after the break as Jake Hamilton scored their 5th, but McMuffin retained a slim chance of taking something from this one when Charley Eyre got their second a minute later. Delgado got his second 6 minutes from time but that still looked like being nothing more than a consolation until Eyre also got his second a minute later to make it 5-4. Mark Bailey grabbed the final goal of the game two minutes from time to give The McMuffin Men the most unlikely of points, while Wellspring will no doubt have been kicking themselves that they didn’t claim all three.

League One looks like it could be anyone’s to win this season, and leaders FC AOTS took on an improving Pat’s Giants in an attractive looking game. This one exploded into life with 5 goals in the opening 10 minutes following Steve Whittle’s 3rd minute opener. Jack Emmerson quickly leveled up for the Giants, and after Adam Duty had restored AOTS lead, he scored two more to turn this one in Pats favour for the first time. Duty got his second to level things up, and they were in front again when Eoghan Scott put them in front 9 minutes before half time. It was 4-4 at half time as Matt Hall got on the score sheet two minutes from the interval, and the same player put the Giants back in front two minutes after the restart. Again the game turned ad Adam Atherton scored two in three minutes to put AOTS in front with 17 minutes left, but wouldn’t you just know it if Giants didn’t fight back again with goals from Emmerson and Danny Brookes putting them 7-6 in front as we headed into the final 10 minutes. Emmerson’s 5th in the 44th minute looked to have sealed the win, but Whittle’s second three minutes from time meant it was a one goal game again. The Giants were able to hold on for the win in the end and they now join AOTS on 6 points in the early league table. Stockport Eagles and The Veterans both had three points on the board after their opening two games, so the winner of this one would join AOTS, Giants and Polish Army (who didn’t play this week) on 6 points in the promotion race. At half time it looked like being the Eagles as Ben Waugh and Ryan McAndrew (2) goals gave them a three goal lead at the break. Paul Atherton got The Vets on the board two minutes after the break, but Paul Waugh and McAndrew both added to the Eagles lead to make it 5-1 with 17 minutes left. Jay Willinghams 35th minute goal looked to be a consolation for the Vets, but when Atherton scored two more the score was 5-4 with three minutes still to play and we had yet another team trying to hang on for a win. The Vets couldn’t find a 5th though, so Eagles become the 4th team on 6 points in League One.

Only one game in League Two this week, but wouldn’t you just know it, it was another close one! Inter Your Sister are looking to make 2018 their year after an almost exclusively miserable 2017 (football-wise), but they faced an SK Six team who had picked up their first ever Ballers win last week. Brandon Byers-Wilkes gave Inter an early lead that was doubled in the 15th minute by Gaz Sumner’s goal (did he definitely score it this week?). Brad Bent pulled one back for SK 5 minutes from the break, but it was 3-1 at half time as Dave Smythe got his name on the score sheet. Henry Cooke got the first goal of the second half to make it 3-2, but it was the first and only goal of the second period as Inter hold on for their second straight win to go second in the table/

FC Stront Bakken and Polish Army played out a competitive friendly this week which the Poles won 7-5 with Mateusz scoring 4 of their goals.

WE HAVE HAD ONE DROP OUT IN THE SUNDAY LEAGUE THIS WEEK (SHOCK!), IT’S THERE FOR THE FIRST TEAM WHO GETS IN TOUCH!

MONDAY LEAGUE

The full Monday season is nearly at an end, and in the Premiership things would be over as far as the title race goes if AC MIlmanchester failed to beat Expected Toulouse this week. Their attempts to keep the title race open didn’t start well as Jordan Milne and Waz Akram put the title favourites two up in the opening 7 minutes, but after a sluggish start they did pull a goal back through Simon Hackney’s finish a minute later. Akram got his second a couple of minutes later, and Toulouse were well in control at the break as Jack Taylor scored their 4th in the final minute of the half. It looked a long way back for the current champions when Milne got his second two minutes into the second period, but they stayed in touch as Callum Jones pulled one back a minute later, and it was game on when Kiarno Samms made it 5-3 with 19 minutes left. Milmanchester were applying pressure, but Toulouse always looked extremely dangerous on the break and Akram got their 6th 11 minutes from time to restore the three goal lead. Samms got his second 5 minutes from time to keep ACM in with a sniff, but Toulouse had the final word with Taylor’s second of the game in the last minute to give Expected Toulouse their first Monday Premiership title!

It might be early doors for some of the teams in the Championship, but it looks all to play for with a division of teams who mostly look capable of taking points off each other. The possible exception based on recent form is Pathetico Madrid, who have struggled for consistency of squad and performance of late, and they went up against a Nice Buns team who were after a first win after last week’s opening defeat to Jeremy Cheadle. Three goals in the first 5 minutes saw Buns lead 2-1 through goals from Jimmy and Charlie Williamson, with Alex Findlow having scored for Pathetico. Pathetico really didn’t get going in the first half, and by the quarter hour they were 5-1 down as Tom Hall, Dale Kirkham And Jimmy added three more goals. Nathan Thomson pulled one back, but another from Jimmy, another from Hall, a goal from Aaron Ellis and another from Charlie made it 9-2 at the break. With not much more than pride to play for, Pathetico were at least able to keep the score down in the second half as Charlie, Jimmy and Hall scored the only three goals of the half to give Nice Buns their first Ballers league win. FC Rhino Ket were looking to build on last week’s win over Pathetico against a Netsix & Chill team who had suffered a narrow defeat to Pique Blinders last week. Mike Pinder gave Netsix an early lead, but Louis Moore leveled things up on 10 minutes. Aaron Campbell quickly restored the Netsix lead, but we were Desmond at half time as Jack Needham(?) grabbed the leveler in the last minute of the half. Netsix flew out of the traps in the second half and seemed to have the result in the bag as Pinder and Campbell scored two each in the first 10 minutes of the period. Needham pulled two back to make it a two goal game with 8 minutes left, and Netsix were holding on when Jake Shaw scored another two minutes from time. Hang on they did though, so it’s another first Ballers league win for a new team this week.

In friendlies this week, Phantom Brazilians picked up a much needed confidence booster as they beat Ballers first timers (mostly) JM FC (a name we gave them) 6-4 in a highly competitive game. Hopefully we’ll see more of the JM Lads in time…… Having fought for that first friendly, Stockport Eagles came in to fill a slot after a late cancellation, and they lost that game narrowly to Pique Blinders, who having struggled to field a side at least kept their winning start going, final score 7-5.

WITH THE NEW MONDAY LEAGUE STARTING IN APRIL THERE ARE A NUMBER OF NEW TEAMS FLOATING AROUND LOOKING FOR SPACES, OF WHICH THERE IS ONLY CURRENTLY A MAXIMUM OF TWO. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS…..

TUESDAY LEAGUE

A full house of games in the Tuesday league this week as the Tuesday league goes from strength to strength with things looking really good for the new season which starts in a few weeks time. Gangs Of Dwight Yorke might have the league won, but teams have been running them close of late as Oooze became the first team to take points from them last week, and Karl Robins gave Inter Mi Van the lead in the this one on three minutes. It didn’t take long for Gangs to turn it round, two minutes in fact, as Jason Singleton and Liam Ellis scored to put the leaders in front. The put the foot on the gas for the remainder of the half, and a goaleach for the same two players either side of Connor Harding’s goal sent them into the break with a 5-1 lead. Inter hit back in the early stages of the second period and Ryan Andres and Gary Wood pulled a couple back to make it 5-3 with 18 minutes to play. Chris Singeleton scored with 4 minutes left to ease Gangs into a three goal lead again and that seemed to be that, but they had to hold on as Simon Royle and Wood scored to make it 6-5 with a minute to play. That was that though as Gangs just about get back to winning ways. Second place is going to go down to the wire, with Inter Row Z, Only Kruls & Horses and Oooze FC all able to overtake Mi Van with a win this week. Kruls and Inter couldn’t both win as they were playing each other, and as expected this was a close one too. Reece (just Reece) gave Kruls the lead in the 3rd minute and made it 2-0 in the 10th. Marcus Acott made it 3-0 less than half way through the opening period, but Inter kicked into life to score three of their own in the next 6 minutes. Kyle Clarke grabbed two before Callum Donnelly made it 3-3 6 minutes before half time. They didn’t go in level though, as Reece got his third of the half to edge Kruls into a half time lead. Tension kicked in in the second period, and for long periods it looked like we would be finishing up at 4-3 before everything kicked off in the final few minutes. Clarke leveled up for Inter 4 minutes from time, and Ray Donnelly scored a minute later to put Inter in front for the first time. Kruls weren’t up for letting this one go though, and Dan (just Dan) scored to make it 5-5 a minute later, before Seb Etchells grabbed a last gasp winner with just about the last kick of the game to send Kruls into second place in the table. Turkish Delight have been a funny team since they joined, being competitive in each game without yet gaining a point, and they were facing the much improved Oooze FC this week. It looked to be another week without that point arriving as Jay Roddis scored two and Phil Parker another as Oooze eased into a 3-0 lead in the opening 15 minutes. Volkan got Turkish on the board two minutes later, but Adam Corr restored Oooze’ three goal lead with 4 minutes of the half to go. Volkan got his second and Mohannad another as Turkish Delight got back to within one goal just before half time, but Parker’s second on the stroke of half time gave Oooze that vital two goal lead at the break. The second half was much quieter in terms of goal mouth action, and there was just the one Roddis goal in the final minute to seal the win for Oooze. They could yet nick second spot……

Shaka look set for a bash at the top flight next season as their 100% record looked likely to continue from a game with winless Beercalona this week. They got off to the ideal start as three goals each from Liam Paull and Tom Hannan gave them a 6-0 lead at the break. Beercalona improved after the break, and Ben Smith scored for them 19 minutes from time, but as the game looked like limping to a comfortable Shaka win, James Holden added two more and Mark Brookes the final goal to turn a comfortable win into an emphatic one. Black Jack were missing a couple of regulars this week as they took on the new / returning Con Dog, who went in front on 4 minutes through Joe Lailey’s finish. Alex Morell-Cooke leveled up for Black Jack, but the new team lead 3-1 at the break through two Jason Willingham goals in three minutes. Ryan Stevens looked to have sealed the win for Con Dog with their 4th half way through the second half, but Jake Whitehead halved the deficit soon after. Jimmy Leeson took advantage of a mistake from Black Jack’s keeper with 8 minutes left to seal the win for Con Dog, and all but end Black Jack’s chances of chasing down Shaka at the top of the table. LQ FC and Wellspring look likely to remain in this division next season, but the game between the two started spritely enough as Tim Price’s 5th minute goal canceled out Lewis Arden’s 3rd minute opener for Wellspring. George Quayle restored Wellspring’s lead half way through the period, but within 5 minutes LQ lead for the first time as Jason McLean and Matthew Brierley scored to see LQ into the break 3-2 in front. That became 4 two minutes after the break as Price got his second of the game, and LQ looked in control. Nathan Wilkinson pulled one back for Wellspring with 16 to play, before Murray Tupman made it 4-4 as headed into the final 10 minutes. An unfortunate own goal turned out to be the decisive goal and it went Wellspring’s way to give them a third win of the season.

THE TUESDAY LEAGUE IS CURRENTLY FULL. FOR SPACES, LOOK TO THE OTHER THREE NIGHTS!

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

This was the final night of a Wednesday league season that already had a comfortable winner as Michu At De Gea Ba retained their title with a 100% record for the season. Just the one league game played this week, but it was the always popular Polish Derby between struggling Magpie FC and a Polish Army team who were looking to make second place theirs. The only goal of a tight opening 20 minutes was scored by Bania of the Army, but in those final 5 minutes of the half the wheels fell off for Magpie as two more from Bania and one from Pawel gave the Army a 4-0 half time lead. It wasn’t a completely one sided game, but Magpie didn’t carry any real threat going forward, and Polish Army added two more goals in the final 4 minutes through Pawel and Mateusz to give them a comfortable looking win in what could be Magpie’s last game with us.

In friendlies this week the champs won a hard fought game 8-5 against Stockport Eagles, who will be wanting to have a good bash at it next season, and Wellspring popped over from Sunday/Tuesday to give Exeter Gently a game and went away with a 6-1 win.

THERE MAY BE SPACES AVAILABLE IN THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE FOR THE NEW SEASON WHICH STARTS NEXT WEEK. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS!

Is anyone concerned that we might just never have a summer again? I think Sunday was the coldest night I have ever known……. In positive news, in case you didn’t see the MASSIVE ANNOUNCEMENT on Facebook on Thursday, we do have a new ball bag……

LEAGUE NEWS

There’s not a massive amount to report in terms of league spaces at the minute, as everything seems to be going rather well, but here’s where we could find some space.

The new Monday Championship was added this week, but in the overall MONDAY LEAGUE we will still have space for a couple of new teams when the brand new league starts in April. Spaces are available for friendlies for any potential new teams in the meantime.

We will be aiming to add a 5TH DIVISION to the SUNDAY LEAGUE when the 11’s season finishes for the summer (and hopefully beyond). Again, friendlies will be available for potential new teams.

For information on any of the above, fill in an enquiry form on the ‘Join A League’ page.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

Duno are looking to step up from last season’s nearly men to Premiership kings, and they’ve got themselves off to the perfect start again this season with two wins out of two going into this week’s clash with champions Kinky Slipper. The pretenders to the crown scored first as Liam Watson put them in front in the 8th minute, and they looked like hanging onto that lead until the break until two goals in two minutes from Adam (just Adam) and Wesley Harney turned things in Kinky’s favour. Just Adam added his second 4 minutes after the break, and Rob Cresswell put Kinky out of sight with their 4th with 18 minutes remaining. The same two players added to the score sheet again in the final 10 minutes to leave Duno in no doubt that they’ve still got a little way to go if they hope to challenge for the title. Insole will have been smarting from last week’s narrow defeat to Duno, and were looking to take out their frustrations on a much changed Kipsta Cobras team. Jack Atkinson made the break through on 12 minutes, and doubled the lead two minutes later before Brad Street made it 3-0 just before half time. Kipsta rallied after the break and goals from George Carr and Jack Horgan reduced the deficit to just the one goal, but Insole regained control with three goals in the final 10 minutes from Atkinson, Aaron Campbell and Jordan Cunningham to get Insole back to winning ways and back to the top of the table. The game between Dench and Team Tom already had a look of a game between two teams who will be fighting for their Premiership lives this season, with both teams looking to get their first points on the board. It was Dench who struck first as Jonny McAuley converted a penalty in the 5th minute, but the Tommers had turned it around before the break as Rob Jordan leveled up 5 minutes from half time before Tom Hornsby headed home their second three minutes later. Dench were level again 6 minutes after the break as Paul Bardsley scored a rare goal, but THE Tom of Team Tom got his second of the game 12 minutes from time to give them a narrow, hard fought win.

Real Maskid have taken to Ballers life like a duck to water and were looking to maintain their 100% record against a Step Brothers team who lost two of their key players less than an hour before kick off. Alec Pattinson gave Maskid the lead in the 5th minute, but Gaz Sumner leveled up for the Brothers a minute later. From here on in it was all Maskid as they smashed in 8 more before the half time break. Jack Wilson restored the lead on 9 minutes, before 4 from Jack McConnell, one from Jordan McConnell, another from Wilson and a 5th of the half for Jack McConnell put Maskid well in control at the break. Shockingly there was no way back for Step Brothers after the break as Kieran O’Connell and Jordan O’Connell added to the Maskid total. Rob Sheldon did pull one back for the Brotherhood, but Jack McConnell and Pattinson added a couple more each in the final 10 minutes to give Maskid a comfortable victory. The rest of the teams can only hope to cling onto Maskid’s coat tails, and El Caliente will be one of the teams who will be looking for a top two finish and a place back in the Premiership for next season. They faced a winless McMuffin Men this week, and started well as Nathaniel Kingsley and Jay Berrisford gave them an early two goal lead. Charley Eyre halved the deficit for McMuffin half way through the period, and Mark Bailey made it 2-2 4 minutes before the break. Eyre’s second put McMuffin in front for the first time two minutes into the second half, but Berrisford quickly drew Caliente level again before Fidelis Eberegbe and Kingsley restored their two goal lead with 17 to play. This topsy turvy game still had more twists to come, as goals from Sam Delgado and Ryan Bradley (2) turned things back in McMuffin’s favour and in with a sniff of their first win of the season with 7 to go.Both teams picked up a point in the end, as Ross Grealey made it 6-6 with two minutes left, so Caliente sit in second place but lose ground on the leaders. Inter Row Z and Wellspring FC took the step up from League One this season and faced each other with Championship points on the line this week. Callum Donnelly gave Inter the perfect start in the first minute, but Lewis Arden and Shane Bridges scored for Wellspring to put them 2-1 up by the 15 minute mark. We were level at the break as Michael Winn made it 2-2 three minutes later, and the opening of the second half was a cagey affair before things burst into life in the latter stages. Gaz Sumner put Inter back in front with 16 minutes to play, but Bridges made it 3-3 4 minutes later. As we headed into the final 10 minutes Arden put Wellspring 4-3 up, but Brandon Byers-Wilkes made it all square again two minutes later. Jake Hamilton restored the Wellspring lead again with 6 minutes left, but it looked like ending in a draw when Ryan McAndrew leveled up yet again for Inter 4 minutes later. It was Wellspring who claimed a first win of the season through Arden’s winner a minute later, as the Championship season looks like being a competitive one.

The League One season also looks set to be a good one, with all teams having lost at least one game in the opening three weeks at close of play this week, and FC AOTS were looking to get back to winning ways as they took on The Veterans. It was a fairly frantic opening 25 with plenty of goals and the lead changing hands several time. Adam Duty gave AOTS the lead on 7 minutes, but Jay Willingham and Andy Carrington turned things in The Vets favour within 4 minutes. Steve Whittle leveled up for AOTS, but The Vets hit the front again through Willingham’s second 10 minutes before the break. Duty and Sam McDonald scored two in a minute to put AOTS back in control, but Wez Hodgkinson made it 4-4 with just 20 minutes on the clock. Two more from Duty in the final 5 of the half gave AOTS a two goal lead for the first time, and in a much tighter second half, Carl Buckley’s goal three minutes into the period was surprisingly the final goal of the game as AOTS pick up a second win to go top of the table. SK Dons are technically no more, as a shift in power sees them under new management in an SK Dons-esque takeover (how ironic!) with a name change to Pat’s Giants but no relocation (thankfully). Their ‘debut’ was against Polish Army who have started the season well, but they didn’t start this game well as Jack Emmerson gave the Giants a second minute lead. Robbie Menzies doubled the lead on 12 minutes, but the Poles hit back with two in a minute to find themselves level 9 minutes from half time as Bania scored both. The Giants did lead by one at the break as Paddy Bannister scored 5 minutes from the interval, and they restored their two goal lead a minute after the restart as Emmeerson got his second of the game. His third looked to have put Pat’s in control, but Bania also got his third two minutes later to keep the Poles in touch. Emmerson got a 4th to restore the three goal lead, and Danny Brookes increased that to 4 a minute later, but this time Mateusz was the one to keep the Army in the fight with their 4th. The Giants scored three more goals in three minutes in the final 10 minutes to kill this game off, Brookes and Bannister with their second and Max Bradwell his first, meaning Grzergorz’ goal two minutes from time was just a consolation.

Beercalona made their Ballers Sunday league bow this week, and in this division it doesn’t look like there could have been a tougher test as they faced an FC Stront Bakken team who look serious contenders for the title this season. The new team scored first as Ste Bowler put them in front on 8 minutes, and they held that lead for 11 minutes before Shaun Jemison drew the leaders level. Dylan Marginarisa put the Bucket Boys in front three minutes before the break, and they took charge in the second half as three goals from Darius Forbes and one from Declan Matthews were enough to ease Stront Bakken to a third straight win, and they’ve only conceded two goals in those three games so far, impressive stuff! The team formerly know as Lads On Toure and Expected Toulose returned as SK Six this week, and having failed to pick up a point in either of their previous incarnations, what would change about them this time around? They fell behind to a Pathetico Madrid team who have struggled for numbers recently, Adam Norton and Ashley Ellis-Quirke with the goals in the opening 4 minutes, but they hit back with 4 in 6 minutes from Max Shepherd (2), former boss Harry Bridge and new boss Brad Bent. Their lead at the break was reduced to one as Michael Winn scored for Pathetico, and the same player scored again two minutes into the second period to make it 4-4. Ethan Giles, Bridge and Shepherd scored three more quick goals to give SK a significant three goal lead with 17 minutes left, but that was reduced to two when Norton and Sam Johnson scored. Shepherd stepped up again for SK with two goals in the last two minutes to secure a first win for the new team at the third time of asking. Following this game Pathetico have left us, hopefully for just a little while as the numbers game has proven just too much for them. They were one of the Ballers originals so we hope to see them again somewhere down the line.

SPACES WILL BE AVAILABLE IN A NEW 5TH DIVISION WHICH WE WILL BE LOOKING TO START OVER THE SUMMER. FRIENDLIES WILL BE AVAILABLE IN THE MEANTIME, SO IF YOU KNOW ANYONE WHO MIGHT BE INTERESTED, POINT THEM IN OUR DIRECTION.

MONDAY LEAGUE

We’ve been banging on about the return of the Monday Championship for a little while now, and finally it arrived this week! There’s still a Premiership title to be decided this season though, and both of the contenders were in action this week with AC Milmanchester up first against Phantom Brazilians. The opening 15 minutes were pretty tight, with chances at either end, but AC quickly took control after Jason Singelton opened the scoring 10 minutes from half time. He added another three to make it 4 in 10 minutes before half time, with Chris Singleton scoring the other as Milmanchester went into the break 5-0 up. Phantom did get the first goal of the second period three minutes in through Max Paterson’s finish, but apart from that the second half pretty much followed the same pattern as the first. Jason Singleton grabbed two more either side of goals from BIlly Gallagher and Simon Hackney, before Gallagher got his second to make it 5 goals in 5 minutes. Hackney’s second and Martin Gordon’s goal in the final minute capped a convincing win for ACM which did their goal difference the world of good. Expected Toulouse were looking to open up their three point lead as they took on a Not A Chance team who are looking to be the best of the rest for this season. Things were tight throughout the opening period as Paul Bardsley leveled up after Jack Taylor’s opener inside the first 5 minutes, but tow goals from Liam Mottram either side of Callum Rahman’s goal seemed to have put them in control. Callum Wild pulled one back 11 minutes from the break, and we were all set up for an exciting second half when the returning Dom Andrew (who just happened to be back as Not A Chance won a free month of football…..) made it 4-3 just before half time. Niall Hillen scored in the first minute of the second half to ease Toulouse two goals in front again, and his second 10 minutes later, followed by Jordan Milne’s goal 10 minutes from time settled any nerves Toulouse might have had about dropping points. Phil Carroll got a goal back for the Chancers in the last minute, but Toulouse stay top ahead of next week’s game with Milmanchester .

FC Rhino Ket are a funny team, and we were border line as to whether to keep them as part of the Premiership, so they were always going to provide a tough task for struggling Pathetico Madrid (in terms of player availability as well as performance). Louis Moore scored the only goal of the opening 15 minutes for Rhino Ket, but they took control in the final 7 minutes of the opening half as Jake Shaw scored a quickfire hat trick to make it 4-0 at the break. Liam Needham pulled one back for Pathetico three minutes into the second period, but in truth Rhino Ket were always in control and Ben Pawsey made it 5-1 before Shaw got his 4th and Mike Hennessey added two more to give Rhino a comfortable win. Jeremy Cheadle made their Ballers return in an interesting looking clash with Nice Buns who had had a mixed bag of results in their friendlies with us so far. It took 18 minutes before Dan Pauls broke the deadlock for Cheadle before Ballers newbie Joe Rogers made it 2-0 three minutes before the break. The same player made it 3-0 8 minutes after the restart, and Alex Whelan’s goal 10 minutes from time followed quickly by Rogers’ third put the result beyond doubt. Jimmy Williamson did pull a couple back for Nice Buns in the final 6 minutes, but Jack Whelan scored the final goal of the game a minute from time to give Cheadle a victorious return. The renamed Netsix & Chill took on Monday new boys Pique Blinders, but in truth both teams contained several Ballers veterans. One of them, Michael Jennison, gave Pique the lead in the 7th minute, and Nathaniel Kingsley scored the only other goal of the period to make it 2-0 at half time. Jennison’s second of the game three minutes into the second half looked to have put Pique well in control, but Matty Aked gave Netsix a glimmer of hope when he pulled one back 18 minutes from time. That glimmer became much more than that when Matthew Atkinson and Mike Pinder scored in the space of a minute to draw Netsix level with 13 minutes left on the clock. Kingsley’s second 5 minutes from time edged Pique back in front, and Callum Jones scored a minute later to give them a two goal cushion. Atkinson’s second two minutes from time meant we had a big finish on the cards, but Pique held on for their debut win.

THERE ARE SPACES FOR US TO ADD TWO MORE TEAMS TO THE MONDAY LEAGUE FOR THE NEW SEASON IN APRIL. FOR MORE DETAILS, GET IN TOUCH.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

With the Premiership title already won, the only thing left for Gangs Of Dwight Yorke to focus on was completing a perfect season. The latest obstacle in their way was an Oooze team who have rebuilt themselves following the hammering they took at Gangs hands earlier in the season. It still looked like being Gangs night when they went three up inside the opening 5 minutes as Callum Jones, Aden Jones and Jason Singleton scored in quick succession. Jago Stackhouse quickly got Oooze on the score sheet to keep them in touch, and Callum Bullock reduced that lead further on 13 minutes as the game turned out to be providing as much entertainment as we were expecting. It was 4-2 at the break as Chris Singleton scored 6 minutes before the break, but we were all square 6 minutes into the second period as Adam Corr scored a minute in and Bullock got his second 5 minutes later. Gangs hit back again as Callum Jones restored their lead with 15 to play, and Connor Harding looked to have finally ended Oooze resistance with their 6th 5 minutes later. Stackhouse got his second two minutes later to put the result in doubt again, and a breathless game had one final twist as Bullock completed his hat trick 5 minutes from time to end Gangs 100% record. Oooze somehow still sit 5th and could drop through the trap door if their other results don’t pick up. Inter Mi Van were asking how long it would be before they could drop down a few weeks ago, but a win this week against Only Kruls & Horses would see them go into second place in the race for runners up. Only Kruls were the team in possession of that slot at start of play, and they went in front through Seb Etchell’s first minute goal. Inter, who were sporting their smart new shirts, leveled through Karl Robins 11th minute goal, and Simon Royle put them in front on 18. Jack Mullern made it Desmond at the end of a tight first half, but it was Inter who made the decisive move with two goals in three minutes from Lee Boshir and Gary Wood to give them a 4-2 lead with 15 minutes to go that they held onto til the full time whistle. Inter Row Z are another team who would find a season in the Championship beneficial in getting the lads motivation levels up again, but they were also still in the shake up for second place and took on a Turkish Delight team who had surprisingly given Gangs a decent game last week. Ryan McAndrew gave Inter the lead in this one on 4 minutes, but Omur drew Delight level 10 minutes before half time. In those 10 minutes Inter took control as Ray Donnelly scored two and McAndrew his second to give Inter a 4-1 half time lead, and Donnelly’s third half way through the second period was the final goal of the game as Inter eased themselves into 4th place, level on points with Kruls. We think Turkish Delight will be fine once they settle into Ballers life, maybe it was asking a lot from us to throw them straight in at the deep end…..

Shaka won the early top of the table clash with Black Jack last week, so now look favourites to join the top flight for the new season. LQ FC picked up a first win since returning to Ballers last week, and they got off to a flyer in this one as Sam Holland and George Springer scored in the opening two minutes. Shaka settled down and two goals from Krisstian Ebanks-Perrin drew them level by the half way point of the period. Ryan Green put Shaka in front 6 minutes before the break, but Matthew Brierley scored two minutes before half time to end an entertaining first half all square. The second half started tentatively, and it was 12 minutes in before things kicked into action after Springer put LQ back in front. Liam Paull and Tom Hannan quickly turned things back in Shaka’s favour, before LQ quickly drew things level again. Hannan and Andrew Cadwallader scored the 6th and 7th goals in 8 breathless minutes to edge Shaka 7-5 in front, but we looked set for a big finish when Brierley scored his second with three to play. Hannan scored his third of the half a minute later to end any doubts, and Shaka make it 4 straight wins. Black Jack were looking to bounce back after last week’s first defeat against a Wellspring team who’ve struggled of late, and they looked in control early on as Kev McClean and Alex Harper gave them a two goal lead in the opening 12 minutes. Chris Murray halved the deficit just before the break, and drew Wellspring level just after it, before scoring again just after Jake Whitehead had restored Black Jack’s lead. Wellspring went in front for the first time as Murray got his 4th with 20 minutes to play, but Alex Morell-Cooke and Ryan Alderson turned it back Black Jack’s way. Morell-Cooke and Murray both scored within seconds to keep it as we were, before Whitehead and Jack Roberts eased Black Jack three goals up with three minutes to play. Lewis Arden scored with the last kick of the game, to ensure that both Championship games played this week finished 8-6. What are the odds?!

THE TUESDAY LEAGUE IS CURRENTLY FULL! FEEL FREE TO ENQUIRE AS WE DON’T HAVE ALONG WAITING LIST, BUT FOR AN IMMEDIATE START CAST YOUR EYES OVER TO OUR SUNDAY AND MONDAY LEAGUES

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

A MASSIVE shock in the Wednesday league this week, as only two games took place, one of them a friendly as we approach the end of the season. The league game saw Exeter Gently continue their unlikely campaign to finish second after a disastrous start to the season, and they faced a Magpie team that has been struggling of late. It was the strugglers who hit the front as Pawel Klimczak scored for them in the 6th minute, but Exeter, who were also sporting shiny new shirts this week, took control before the break as Jacob Gough scored two and Kristian Igo three to put them in comfortable control. Once the same two had added to the Exeter lead early in the second half, it became a case of seeing how much they could do to improve their goal difference to improve their chances of a second placed finish. Three more goals arrived in the final 10 minutes as Brad Robison, Tom Harrison and Gough completed a comfortable win. They will now be relying on Magpie to do them a favour against Polish Army next week. In the friendly, Polish Army and Stockport Eagles went at it for the 400th time, and this one was as competitive as any league game. Eagles lead 2-1 after 5 minutes, and at the break as Ryan McAndrew scored twice before Marcin pulled one back, and the Poles turned it around within 6 minutes of the start of the second half as Bania scored two. Un-named player made it 3-3 with 16 to play, but Dominik put the Army back in front three minutes later. The Eagles produced a big finish to this one, as Paul Waugh leveled up three minutes from time, and Matty Aked scored the winner with one of the last kicks of the game.

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL, BUT AGAIN WE DON’T HAVE MUCH OF A WAITING LIST, SO GET IN TOUCH FOR INFORMATION ON ANY OF OUR LEAGUE NIGHTS!

Let’s see if we can keep this week’s review below 3000 words……. Mothers Day on Sunday, City on Monday and United on Tuesday will have limited the number of games played this week, so we’d rather have the games on to mean we needed to write the words….. Hey ho.

LEAGUE NEWS

It’s still all about MONDAY, as the only space we currently have in all of our league nights is in the NEW MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP which starts NEXT WEEK. There’s a game there for you and your lads next week if you want it!

Other than that we are putting you all on early notice that we intend to add a 5th division to the Sunday league for the summer once the 11’s season has finished. If you and the lads might be up for a bit of Sunday evening out of season action, let us know.

Get in touch by filling in an enquiry form on the home page for more details or to register your team.

MONDAY LEAGUE

It was a quiet one in the Monday league this week as the first half of the season came to an end on a night when Sky decided one of the Manchester clubs should do the Monday night thing again. The only league game saw FC Rhino Ket face Not A Chance for the final time for a little while as both sides will be in different divisions when the league splits. Rhino Ket will be at a lower level than the Chancers, but they lead at the break in this one as Louis Moore got the first half’s only goal. The Chancers were pretty quiet in the first half, but burst into life with 4 goals in 5 minutes to turn this one on it’s head. Chris Priestley grabbed a quick fire ‘perfect’ hat trick before Callum Wild added their 4th to virtually kill the game off. Ben Pawsey pulled one back for Rhino Ket two minutes later, but that was as close as they got and Not A Chance go into the second half of the season off the back of a hard fought win.

The renamed Netsix & Chill took on Nice Buns in a final friendly before the league gets going again next week, and the three first half goals were crammed into 5 minutes as Matthew Atkinson and Warren Yeo scored for Netsix to put them in front after Jimmy Williamson had originally given Buns the lead. Atkinson completed his hat trick with two more in the second half to give Netsix a 4-1 lead, and though Williamson got his second to reduce the deficit with three minutes to go, Yeo’s second in the final minute completed the Netsix win.

THE MONDAY LEAGUE SPLITS NEXT WEEK, CREATING SPACES FOR NEW TEAMS. ONE SPACE LEFT!

SUNDAY LEAGUE

While Mothers Day had it’s annual impact, we still had 9 league games played this week across the 4 divisions. Two games took place in the top division, with last seasons second and third placed teams facing off as Insole took on Duno. Insole are looking to regain the title they lost to Kinky Slipper last season, and they went in front through Kyle Clarke’s second minute goal. Luke Newsham leveled up for Duno on 16 minutes, but Clarke restored the Insole lead 6 minutes before the break. Rhys Clooney grabbed the 4th goal of the half three minutes before the break to make it Desmond, and Newsham put Duno in front for the first time three minutes after the interval. There was plenty of huffing and puffing throughout the second half, but there was no more goals, so Duno make it two wins from two as they start a second straight season in the top flight very strongly. Can they maintain it this time around? The other top flight game was between two teams who are less likely to be fighting it out for the title, as a patched up Kipsta Cobras took on Team Tom. Just one goal in the opening period saw Kipsta go into the break a goal up through George Carr’s finish, but Sam Collicott drew The Toms level 6 minutes into the second period. Carr restored the Kipsta lead a minute later, but we headed into the final 10 minutes at 2-2 as Collicott also grabbed his second. It was Kipsta who won it though, as Warren Yeo grabbed the 5th and final goal three minutes from time to give Kipsta their first win of the campaign.

Real Maskid laid down a solid marker last week with a heavy opening night win, but they faced a tougher task on paper this week against Inter Row Z. It didn’t look like it in the first half though as Maskid carried on where they left off last week as goals from Alecs Pattinson (2), Jack and Kieran O’Connell gave them a 4 goal lead at the break. Ray Donnelly got Inter off the mark in the opening minutes of the second half, but Jack McConnell restored the 4 goal lead with 21 minutes to play. Donnelly grabbed his second two minutes later, and then his third to close the gap to two goals with 6 minutes to play, but that was the end of the scoring as Maskid ensured their was no stain on their record just yet. Step Brothers held on for a narrow opening night win last week, and would hope to continue that good start against The McMuffin Men, who suffered that heavy defeat to Maskid last week. This game was a different kettle of fish, with the post being rattled a number of times in a scoreless opening 40 minutes! As we continued to film the chosen GOTD with the thought in our minds that it might actually finish 0-0, McMuffin’s were given a penalty with 8 minutes remaining. Charley Eyre’s kick was saved by Brothers keeper Chris Moore, but he poked in the rebound to finally break the deadlock. After waiting this long for a goal, we didn’t have to wait long for more, and Eyre added his second two minutes later to seemingly kill this game off. Josh Armitage halved the deficit with 5 minutes left, and then grabbed an equiliser with two minutes to play to give both of these teams a point that looked likely for long periods of the game. Wellspring and El Caliente were both looking to bounce back from opening night defeats, and it looked highly likely that it was going to be Caliente who got their first three points when Nathaniel Odysseus-Kingsley scored a hat trick in the opening 5 minutes. Ross (just Ross) added their 4th after 13 minutes, and Jay Berrisford, who plays for Wellspring in the Tuesday league, scored two against them in the final 5 minutes of the half to make it 6-0 at the break. O-K made it 7-0 5 minutes after the break, but Wellspring didn’t throw in the towel and scored three of their own in the final 15 minutes through Lewis Arden, Jake Hamilton and Nathan Wilkinson. Caliente will expect to be in the mix for promotion this season, while it looks like it might be a season of struggle for Wellspring after last seasons impressive showing.

FC AOTS and Polish Army both started the season with a win, and these two enjoyed an absolute hum-dinger of a game on the final night of last season. Could either of these sides be in the shake up for promotion this time around? Adam Duty carried on where he left off last week with the opening goal for AOTS in the 12th minute, but the Poles had turned this one around before the break thanks to a goal from Bania and two from Mateusz. AOTS were back in it two minutes into the second period as Duty got his second of the game, but the Army looked to have the game wrapped up when Mateusz grabbed two more to make it 5-2 with 16 minutes left. Sam McDonald reduced the lead to three again with 9 to play, but Bania added two more either side of Duty’s third to give Polish Army pride of place at the top of the table as the only team with two wins from two. Stockport Eagles and SK Dons were a contrast to the other game in this division as they both went into this week’s game looking for their first points of the season. It was the League Two winners of the Eagles who took charge early on in this one, with Michael Winn’s 8th minute opener being added to by two goals from Ben Waugh and one from Alecs Pattinson before the break. Ryan McAndrew added their 5th just after the break, before Danny Brookes pulled one back for the Dons with 16 minutes left. James Marshall scored two minutes later and again with three minutes to play to seal the win for the Eagles, with Martin Butler’s last minute goal scant consolation for the Dons.

FC Stront Bakken fancy themselves for a promotion push this season, and a solid 4-1 win over Inter Your Sister last week was followed by a game with a Rooneytunes side who also fancied a bash at top two this season. In truth Rooneytunes never really got started here, and they were three down in the opening 10 minutes as Lukas Voveris, Dylan Marginarisa and Darius Forbes got the Bucket Boys off to a flyer. Forbes and Shaun Jemison added another couple before half time and this one was as good as over before the break. Marginarisa grabbed another couple and Forbes joined him on three goals for the game as Stront Bakken ran out impressive 8-0 winners to leave striker turned ‘keeper Benjamin Dean out on his own as the only shot stopper with two clean sheets since we started the ‘Golden Gloves’ list. Pathetico Madrid had a bit of a scramble for players this week, and they didn’t get off to the best of starts as they quickly found themselves two down against Inter Your Sister as Steve Johnson and Gaz Sumner scored in the first 4 minutes. Sam Johnson’s first Ballers goal halved the deficit half way through the opening period, but they were 5-1 down at the break as Brandon Byers-Wilkes scored a 7 minute hat trick to help ease Inter towards a first victory of the season. They were helped on their way by Pathetico being reduced to 5 men due to an unfortunate injury, and Inter ran away with it in the second period. Johnson grabbed another two, Dave Smythe 4, Craig Johnson one, Matt Kealy 4 and Byers-Wilkes another two, with just a solitary reply from Pathetico’s Johnson in return. THere’s always next week……

THE SUNDAY LEAGUE IS CURRENTLY FULL, BUT WE WILL BE LOOKING TO ADD A 5TH DIVISION TO COINCIDE WITH THE ENDING OF THE 11’S SEASON. FOR MORE INFORMATION, GET IN TOUCH.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

You wouldn’t have thought United were playing this week, as the turnout in the Tuesday was fantastic! At least now we don’t need to be concerned with who they get in the next round……  We feared the worst for the still relatively new Turkish Delight as they took on runaway leaders Gangs Of Dwight Yorke in just their second league game, and while it was a Gangs team missing a few regular, we still couldn’t have guessed how the first half would have gone. Two goals from Baboucarr and one from Omur put Turkish Delight 3-0 up in the opening 10 minutes, and though Gangs were able to stop the rot with a Rob Brock goal, they were still 5-2 down at the interval as Morgan and Deigo scored either side of a Jimmy Leeson strike. Gangs showed their fight in the second half, and reduced the lead back to just one as Aden and Callum Jones scored in the first 5 minutes of the period, but as we headed into the final 10 minutes the score remained the same. As with their first game, Turkish Delight faded in the latter stages, and Gangs scored 4 goals without reply, two from Leeson, two from Aden, to give the already crowned Premiership champions a hard fought victory. Outside of Gangs, the other original teams from the start of this Tuesday season have shown they are all capable of beating each other, so Inter Row Z v Oooze was a pick ’em game depending on which version of each team turned up this week! Oooze got off to the better start, with Jay Roddis and Adam Corr scoring in the opening 12 minutes, before Jack McDonagh pulled one back for Inter 9 minutes from half time. Corr got a vital second on the stroke of half time to give Oooze their two goal lead back, and they took a grip on the game with three goals in the first 10 minutes of the second period, two from Callum Bullock and a second of the match for Roddis. Kyle Clarke grabbed two back for Inter to make it 6-3 with 10 to play, but Harry Williams scored the final goal of the game for Oooze to give them a decent win.

Shaka and Black Jack look like being the two teams to fight it out for a Premiership place for next season, with both teams two from two going into this weeks game. Black Jack looked to have taken control of the game in the early stages as they lead 2-0 7 minutes before the break through goals from Luke Waiting and Harri Budd, but Tom Hannan halved the deficit before the break. Liam Paull drew Shaka level two minutes into the second period, but Black Jack were back in front almost immediately through Waiting’s second of the game. Shaka hit back again and were level two minutes later through Paull’s second of the game, and they hit the front for the first time through Hannan’s second with 18 to play. Jonny McAuley gave Shaka a two goal lead two minutes later, and they ran away with it in the final 5 minutes as Hannan and McAuley grabbed another two each to give the scoreline a more one sided look than it actually was. Beercalona and LQ FC were both looking for a first win since joining / returning, and a tight opening saw Craig Scanlon level things up on 12 minutes for Beercalona after Sam Holland’s penalty had given LQ the lead. A couple of minutes of calamitous defending saw LQ hit three in two minutes, two from Matthew Brierley and one from Alex Heggie, and Heggie made the most of some more naive defending to make it 5-1 at the break. Heggie completed his hat trick 6 minutes into the second period, and though Scanlon got his second with 13 minutes to play, further goals from Heggie, Brierley and Alex Brash eased LQ to a 9-2 win to get them off the mark.

Despite the efforts of their game with Gangs, Turkish Delight stopped on to give Wellspring a game, and it was a decent one. Jamie Berrisford scored two to give Wellspring the early advantage, but three goals from Baboucarr and one for Omur meant Turkish held a 4-3 half time lead with Lewis Arden having scored for Wellspring. Berrisford and Arden both scored in the first 10 minutes of the second period to put Wellspring back in front, before Morgan ensured an entertaining game ended all square with the leveler 5 minutes from time.

THE TUESDAY LEAGUE IS FULL! SUNDAY AND MONDAY ARE THE NIGHTS TO GO FOR.

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

The Wednesday league is the Wednesday league, teams just turn up for their games every week, bless them…..The only thing to play for in the Wednesday league for this season is second place, which Polish Army held prior to tonights games. It was a friendly week for the Poles, so Exeter Gently and Stockport Eagles had the chance to close the gap. Exeter Gently looked to be the whipping boys in the early stages of the season, having lost their first 4 and taken quite a beating in most of them, which explains a negative goal difference that could end up costing them despite now being on a run of 4 successive wins. Sevilla Lacatalent have improved after a slow start, but a slow start was exactly what they had this week as goals from Brad Robison (2), Adam Robison, Tom Harrison and Jacob Gough saw them into a 5-0 lead as we approached the half time whistle. Sam Melling pulled one back just before the break, and Ryan Wall reduced the deficit to three 5 minutes into the second period. Goals from Mike Belshaw, Brad Robison and Gough meant Exeter went into the final 12 minutes with a 6 goal lead. Sevilla threatened the most remarkable of comebacks as they smashed in 4 goals in 4 minutes to make it 8-6 with 8 minutes still to play and it was game on. Exeter rode out the storm and killed the game off with Brad Robison’s 4th of the game and Gough’s third to move them level on points with Polish Army. Magpie have dropped away of late, mostly due to missing regular players, and were off the back of 4 straight defeats prior to this week’s game with Stockport Eagles. Eagles are still in with a chance of taking second spot, and despite going a goal down to Milosz Zawila’s 7th minute goal, they rallied and took control with three goals from Matty Aked and two from Ben Waugh before half time. They got the first two of the second half too to seemingly put the result beyond doubt as Alecs Pattinson and Paul Waugh made it 7-1 with 17 minutes left on the clock. Magpie didn’t give it up, and they grabbed three goals in three minutes, two from Pawel Klimczak and another from Bartosz Schmidt to keep things interesting. Pattinson got his second to give Eagles a 4 goal cushion again, and though Stanislaw Cierpiatka grabbed another for Magpie two minutes from time, Ben Waugh completed the scoring with his third in the last minute.

The top two played out a friendly this week, and it looked to be going one way when Michu At De Gea Ba raced into a 7-0 half time lead with goals from Matt Barton (3), Ian Davies (2), Michael Jennison and Jamie Longworth.. Longworth’s second, early in the second half made it 8-0, but the Poles kept going and scored three unanswered goals from Bania, Slawek and Mateusz, to leave Michu with an 8-3 win.

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL. SUNDAY AND MONDAY ARE THE NIGHTS TO ASK ABOUT IF YOU’RE LOOKING TO GET SIGNED UP.

Oh boy, let’s just start writing and see what we end up with……

Referees eh? Just here to spoil everyone’s fun, aren’t they……?

Well, not really. Without them the games wouldn’t go ahead. Or even worse they WOULD go ahead with me reffing them. Then you might appreciate what we have.

There are people out there, normally perfectly reasonable people, who from the minute they step foot on a football pitch seem to forget that referees are only human, and think they can speak to them in ways they would never speak to anyone else in any other aspects of their life, but does anyone really think being a referee is that easy?

‘But they are getting easy decisions wrong,’ we hear people occasionally cry. Ok let’s have a look at that for a second. The easiest thing in the world is to know that you’ve been fouled as you’ve felt the contact, to be the player trying to keep the ball in play and being able to see whether it’s in or out because you are RIGHT THERE. Referees get one look at it from where they are stood at that moment in time. They can’t be everywhere at once, they won’t always get it right, but just shake it off and get on with the game, we’re all meant to be grown ups around here.

Apparently these things even themselves out.

They don’t do it on purpose, and believe it or not they probably don’t have a hidden agenda against you and your team. The number of games I’ve seen where teams have suggested as much due to the decisions they can list that went against them, while somehow forgetting the ones that went in their favour, can be a little bit painful.

Referees don’t put on that famous black jacket and all of a sudden develop superhuman eyesight, so how anyone can expect them to see that the whole of the ball has gone an inch over the line on the far side of the pitch? I would personally challenge anyone who wants to have a go to stand on one one side of the pitch while we hold a ball two meters above the ground at the other side of the pitch, and you can try and tell us if it’s still in play or not. So play to the whistle and don’t be so keen to question every aspect of the referees life choices because he couldn’t see the little nick off your opponents boot laces from 30 feet away through a crowd of players.

We now live in an age where football supporters can see refereeing decisions being questioned almost constantly, from multiple camera angles at the top level of the game, being studied and analysed with a referees representative being absolutely grilled over a decision that was given, compared to another decision for a vaguely similar incident that happened 6 years ago. Regardless of what is said in these cases, people will still form their own opinion, and question the people who are questioning the referees. This is the referees circle of life at the top end of the football spectrum, but this has filtered it’s way down to every level of the game, and it’s getting a bit boring.

In our January blog we mentioned perspective, and this is what it comes down to. Just because you might get hurt in a challenge it doesn’t mean the player has tried to hurt you, and when a referee doesn’t give a decision in your favour it doesn’t mean they’ve done it personally to rile you. They are trying to call it as they see it, nothing more, nothing less. It’s a game of 6-a-side football, a way for people to let off a bit of steam and try and get themselves a bit fitter, it shouldn’t be THAT important that you feel the need to turn into a completely different person for an hour of your week.

While we are going to defend our referees where we can, mostly due to the thankless job they do, that doesn’t mean we will turn a blind eye to any complaints or issues teams want to raise. We talk to our referees at the start and end of every evening, and have an ability to raise issues with them if there becomes a common theme with what’s being brought up. Just make it helpful. They aren’t a cheat, so don’t bring that to our table, every referee will referee in their own way, so don’t expect every decision to be given exactly the same by every referee, and if we haven’t mentioned it already, they aren’t perfect.

Are you?

With ‘The Beast’ already a distant memory, this week’s review will be significantly longer than last, as barring the impact of the United game on Monday, the other nights all ran rather well.

LEAGUE NEWS

In terms of new teams looking to get all Ballered up, there is only one place to look! Our Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday leagues remain full, and while we will absolutely be wanting to add a SUMMER 5TH DIVISION to the SUNDAY LEAGUE while the 11’s season is over, for now the only option is:

Our NEW MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP, which kicks off on 19TH MARCH. There’s plenty of interest coming in, but it’s first come, first served for the final couple of spaces

SUNDAY LEAGUE

The brand spanking new Sunday league season kicked off this week, with 4 full divisions and just one game off. More weeks like this would be nice….. Duno were the surprise package for the first half of last season, before falling away to finish their debut Premiership season in a respectable third place. Dench were making their Premiership bow this week, and they quickly found out what it was about as they found themselves 4 goals down at the break through strikes from Luke Newsham, Liam Watson (2) and Jack Cope. Things didn’t get any better for them in the second half, and further goals from Callum Jones, Watson (2), Cope and Newsham handed down a heavy defeat to the top flight new boys, who face Kinky Slipper this week…… Insole started their campaign to regain the title they lost last season against the other top division new boys as Team Tom happily returned to the top flight. They were already starting the countdown til the end of the season after the first 10 minutes as they quickly found themselves 4-0 down as Kyle Clarke, Aaron Campbell, Jake Parker and Jack Atkinson found the net. Andy Walker pulled a goal back on 11 minutes, but Atkinson made it 5-1 three minutes before the break and Clarke made it 6 three minutes into the second. Carl Carter got a second for Team Tom, but Clarke got his third three minutes from time to ease Insole to an opening night win. The current champs started their defence with a potentially tricky game against Kipsta Cobras, who improved as the season went on last time around. It looked like business as usual when Wes Harney gave Kinky the lead on 4 minutes, but Connor Harding scored a brace to turn this one around and Callum Jones made it 3-1 to Kipsta halfway through the opening period. Harney got his second to make it 3-2 at the break, but Jack Horgan restored the two goal Kipsta lead with 19 minutes to play. Kinky aren’t the champions for nothing though, and within 7 minutes they hadn’t only drawn themselves level, they’d opened up a two goal lead! Dean pulled the first back on 33 minutes, James Radcliffe made it 4-4 three minutes later, before Dean and Joe Lailey added two more in as many minutes to put Kinky two clear. They were able to see out the remaining 12 minutes, and start the season with a win.

It looks like we’ve got a new team to watch in the Championship, as Real Maskid made their Ballers debut against a McMuffin Men side who’d improved towards the end of the season to survive and go again at this level. Jake McConnell got the first Maskid goal in the first minute, but Sam Delgado leveled things up for McMuffins in the 16th minute. Darren McConnell restored the Real lead two minutes later, and it was 3-1 4 minutes before the break after Jack Wilson scored. Alec Pattinson gave the new boys a three goal lead in the first minute of the second period and when Darren McConnell made it 5-1 17 minutes from time the wheels well and truly fell off for McMuffin Men for this week. Jack McConnell grabbed three in as many minutes, Darren another, a randommer called Kieran who’s name just appeared on the score card got himself a goal, and Jack scored his 5th and the final goal three minutes from time to give the new boys a heavy opening night win. Prior to that impressive win, we’d have put Inter Row Z down as potential favourites for the Championship title this season, and their opening game against El Caliente was against a side who were coming out of the Premiership. The opening 5 minutes saw a goal apiece as Ray Donnelly replied for Inter after Nathaniel Odysseus-Kingsley had given Caliente an early lead. They were the only goals of a tight first half, but things picked up in the second half with Caliente restoring their lead in the first minute of the half through Ross Grealey’s goal. Donnelly leveled it up again almost immediately, and put Inter in front for the first time 4 minutes later. Michael Winn gave them a two goal lead with 17 minutes to play, but Caliente hit back again through Anthony Sargeant’s goal half way through the period. It was Inter’s night though, and further goals from Kyle Clarke, Jack McDonagh and Winn in the final 7 minutes eased them to a 4 goal victory. Wellspring reached the second tier of the Sunday league for the first time, and played Step Brothers in their opening Championship game. The got the first goal through Lewis Arden in the 3rd minute, but by the 8th minute they were 3-1 down as Rob Sheldon, Tom and Dom Cioffi all scored in quick succession. They were the only goals for a little while, as half time came and went and the game seemed to be drifting towards a Step Brothers victory until Mike Cocks narrowed the deficit in the final few minutes. Wellspring couldn’t find a leveler in the final stages though, and Step Brothers got their season off to a narrow winning start.

FC AOTS will be hoping for a more successful campaign this time around, and started their season against a promoted Deportivo Lack Of Talent who had stumbled over the line at the end of last season, and continued to miss several of their regular starters. AOTS looked to have this one well under control in the early stages as Adam Duty scored 4 and Ben Jamieson the other in the opening 15 minutes. Ashley Ellwood pulled one back for Deportivo, but AOTS were quickly back in control as Charlie Hutchinson and Steve Whittle both added to their tally before half time. Whittle got his second just after the break, before Deportivo finally had a decent spell of their won in the match as Brad Peet, Jake Riley and Rhys Moult all scored to make it 8-4. AOTS kicked on and fired in 4 more to end the game on a high as Duty got his 5th, Hutchinson his second, and Whittle his third and 4th of the game to give AOTS the best possible start. The other two games bode well for a decent League One season, with both games being tight and competitive. Polish Army took a two goal lead in at half time against Stockport Eagles after newbie Bania grabbed both first half goals. There were 4 goals crammed into a very short period in the second half, but they resulted in the Poles maintaining their two goal lead as goals from Bania and Marcin were enough to see off the two goals in reply from James Marshall. SK Dons very kindly voluntarily stayed in the third tier, and looked good to pick up an opening day win as early goals from Kyle Norris, Paddy Bannister and Danny Brookes gave them a three goal half time lead over The Veterans. The Vets had a terrible second half to last season, but they had a good second half here, as they took their chances while the Dons missed theirs, and goals from Paul Atherton (2), Simon Grainger and Andy Carrington saw them recover to claim a 4-3 win.

League Two is where we lost the one game for this week, as new teams Beercalona and SK Six were unable to start until next week. All 4 teams who played this week will be looking for better seasons than last, including Inter Your Sister and FC Stront Bakken, who’ve become quite familiar with each other in recent seasons. Craig Johnson grabbed the opener for Inter in the 7th minute, but Darius Forbes leveled things up a minute later as we went into the break at 1-1. Shaun Jemison gave the Bucket Boys the lead 7 minutes into the second period, before two more Forbes goals sealed an impressive opening night win for Stront Bakken. Is this their season? Pathetico Madrid have undergone a overhaul of their playing staff, and the new look team took on relegated Rooneytunes this week with both teams looking to put down a marker. Just the one first half goal from Jack Hodgkinson was enough for Rooneytunes to lead at the break, before a goal from Saul Heavyside and two from Chris Sinclair put them well in control. Adam Boswell did pull one back for Pathetico, but Cameron Higginbottom killed this one off with Rooney’s 5th before Matt Boswell struck a late consolation for Pathetico.

THE SUNDAY LEAGUE IS CURRENTLY FULL, BUT WE WILL SOON BE LOOKING TO ADD A 5TH DIVISION OVER THE SUMMER PERIOD ONCE THE 11’S SEASON FINISHES. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

MONDAY LEAGUE

Sky are doing us no favours at the minute, with United on the telebox this week, and City set to cause us some disruptions next week. Only one league game and one friendly survived this week as far too many people wanted to watch the team who are fighting to be first losers this season…… The one league game saw AC Milmanchester look to keep the pressure on Expected Toulouse at the top with a win over FC Rhino Ket (or FC Rhino Something as most of their lads say when they come in to pay). Rhino Ket kept things tight in the early stages, and even took the lead on 8 minutes through a Louis Moore goal, but Singelton’s Chris and Jason had Milmanchester in front by the time we’d reached the 11 minute mark. Martin Gordon and Jason added two more before the break to give ACM a comfortable half time lead. The Ketters got the first goal of the second half to reduce the deficit to two as Jack Needham scored, but ACM were always in control and they killed this one off with goals from Gordon (3), Callum Jones (2) and Jason Singleton’s third. Jake Shaw did grab a late goal for Rhino Ket, but Milmanchester roll on towards what seems like being a crucial second game with Expected. We threw Nice Buns under the bus a bit this week, as after a couple of friendly wins in recent weeks we put them in with Expected Toulouse to see what they were really made of……. It was a step too far for them at the moment, as early goals from Jordan Milne and Waz Akram, followed by strikes from Callum Rahman (2) and Liam Mottram made it 5-0 at the break. Jimmy Williamson got Nice Buns on the board two minutes into the second half, and they looked like getting a respectable defeat out of it until Toulouse added 6 more in the final 11 minutes through Milne, Akram, Mottram (2) and Niall Hillen (2). Hopefully a slightly lesser opposition for the Buns next week!

THE FINAL SPACES ARE FILLING UP FOR THE ADDITION OF THE MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP ON 19TH MARCH. GET IN TOUCH TO RESERVE YOUR SPACE.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

We’ve had to wait a while for a Tuesday like this, but we are finally their with the two full divisions, and only one team stopped us from having a full house of games this week. We’ve got a sneaking feeling that Gangs Of Dwight Yorke may be crowned Tuesday Premiership champions this season, as they sat 12 points clear at the top of the table before this week’s game with Inter Row Z, who still have second place to play for. After a quiet opening 7 minutes, this one burst into life after Ray Donnelly had given Inter the lead. Jason Singleton quickly leveled up for Gangs, before two Aden Jones goals looked to have put them in control. Callum Donnelly pulled one back for Inter, before Singleton and Kyle Clarke exchanged quickfire goals to leave is at 4-3 Gangs after 7 goals in 10 minutes! There were two more in the half, and surprisingly both of them came to Interas Donelly and Ryan McAndrew scored to give them a 5-4 half time lead. We were all square again when Jones grabbed his third with 15 minutes to go, but the Gangs 100% record was in danger when Clarke put Inter back in front with 10 minutes to play. Singleton made it 6-6 in the 47th minute, and there was still time for two Callum Jones goals in the dying embers of the game to give Gangs a very hard fought win. In the fight for second place, both Oooze FC and Only Kruls & Horses remain in contention as only two points separated second and 5th going into this weeks games. Oooze’ form had markedly improved since their recent influx of new players, but they were three down inside 16 minutes this week as Jack Mullern grabbed two and Brad Gilman the third for Kruls. Phil Parker kept Oooze in with a sniff at the break as he scored two minutes from the whistle, and it was game on 5 minutes into the second period as Adam Corr and Parker made it 3-3 with 20 to play. An unfortunate injury to one of Oooze’s players robbed them of his services for the remainder of the game, and from the minute Sean Martin put Kruls back in front 14 minutes from the end they didn’t look back, as Mullern grabbed another couple in the final 10 minutes to send Kruls into second spot. We threw Turkish Delight straight into the top flight for the second half of the season off the back of one comfortable friendly win a few weeks ago, and they faced an out of form Inter Mi Van in their first league game. It was the more experienced Ballers side who hit the front 19 minutes in as Gary Wood grabbed the opener, and they lead by two at the break as Simon Royle made the most of some slack defending from a corner. Turkish Delight started the second half well, and deservedly pulled one back with 19 minutes left through Omar’s goal, but a penalty from Mike Derbyshire 4 minutes later put Inter back in control. The new team ran out of steam in the final stages, and two more from Royle and another from Wood meant the new boys suffered a defeat on their opening league night.

After losing a couple of friendlies in the build up to the start of the Championship, Shaka were looking to make it two wins from two when the games mean something. They were playing Wellspring, who had dropped into the lower league after struggling throughout the first half of the season. Shaka got off to a flyer in this one and lead 4-0 after just 9 minutes, with Tom Hannan, Krisstian Ebanks-Perrin, Andrew Cadwallander and an own goal giving Wellspring an early mountain to climb. It got worse when Liam Paull made it 5 on 19 minutes, and though Lewis Arden grabbed a goal for Wellspring two minutes before the break, they were 5 down again as Hannan got his second a minute later. Any hopes of a second half comeback were pretty much ended within 4 minutes of the restart as Cadwallader added his second to leave them now 6 goals behind. Arden did get the next goal, but 4 more in the next 7 minutes from Jamie Forward Hannan (2) and Paull took any remaining doubts away. Mike Devitt got Wellspring’s with 9 minutes left, but Shaka had the final say as Paull got his third to make the final score 12-3. Beercalona made their return to Ballers after a couple of previously failed attempts, and they looked to have a tough opening night against Black Jack who had won their opening game a couple of weeks ago. All the first half goals were crammed into a 5 minute spell as James Holden grabbed a 4 minute hat trick before Ste Bowler got Beercalona’s first Ballers league goal. Harri Budd made it 4-1 for Black Jack, and that remained the score until the break, before another scoreless 10 minutes at the start of the second period was ended by Jake Whitehead’s goal to make it 5-1. Ryan Alderson and Budd scored to take the game away from Beercalona, but Ben Smith did grab a second for them 8 minutes from time. Black Jack added two more in the final stages as Holden and Kev McClean finished off the scoring to leave Shaka and Black Jack level on 6 points at the top of the table.

THE TUESDAY LEAGUE IS CURRENTLY FULL. IT’S ALL ABOUT SUNDAY AND MONDAY FOR PROSPECTIVE NEW TEAMS AT THE MINUTE!  

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

A full house turnout for the Wednesday league this week, with two league games and a friendly as we look to wrap up the league in the next few weeks. Michu At De Gea Ba already have the league sown up for a second successive season, but Magpie will still think they should have been coming into this season as defending champions having stumbled at the final hurdle last time out. They’ve struggled a bit of late though, and despite taking the lead through Bartosz Schmidt’s first minute goal, Ian Davies, Adam Porter and Jamie Longworth fired back to give Michu control. Mariusz Koszla looked to have left Magpie just the one behind when he scored a minute before the break, but Longworth got his second seconds later to make it 4-2 at half time. Davies got his second 5 minutes into the second half, but we headed into the final 15 minutes with all still to play for. Magpie quickly ran out of legs though, and three goals from Matt Barton, one for Michael Jennison and two more each for Longworth and Porter, meant that Schmidt’s late goal was scant consolation for Magpie. Sevilla Lacatalent picked up their first win a fortnight ago, but they were back in familiar territory early on against Polish Army this week as Bania continued his impressive scoring start to Ballers life with the opener in the second minute. That was the only goal of a tight first half, but the Army looked to have taken complete control in the early stages of the second period as Dominik and Bania scored to make it 3-0 with 19 minutes to go. Ryan Wall gave Sevilla a glimmer of hope a minute later, but those hopes ended as Bania scored two more in the final 11 minutes to ease the Poles to a 5-1 win. The Exeter Gently v Stockport Eagles may have been a friendly, but it sure was competitive! It was 2-2 at the break as Michael Winn and Ryan McAndrew twice drew Eagles level after Kristian Igo and Jacob Gough had given Exeter the lead. A mad couple of minutes mid way through the second half saw Igo grab two more with Paul Waugh responding again for Eagles, but Mehrad Torkian grabbed Exeter’s 5th 5 minutes from time to give them the hard fought win. And all this for nothing……

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL. SUNDAY AND MONDAY ARE THE PLACES TO LOOK FOR SOME BALLERS ACTION!

You need, need, NEED to head on over to our Facebook page RIGHT NOW, to get involved in our competition to win a FREE MONTH OF BALLERS FOOTBALL!

Get yourselves over to www.facebook.com/skballers/, find the post that went online at 12.30pm on Thursday 1st March and follow the instructions to be in with a chance of winning! Current teams, former teams and teams interested in signing up are all eligible to take part.

The competition will be running until Thursday 15th March at 9pm, so get as many of your lads to get involved as possible.

Good luck!

Spring is here! The clocks go forward in a few weeks, and before we know it the ‘Beast from the East’ will be a distant memory, having had a fairly major impact on the Ballers action this week.

LEAGUE NEWS

If it wasn’t for this weather we could have been reporting on a bumper week as the Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday leagues are all full, and we are down to just the one space in the Monday league which restarts on 19th March. The Beast From The East finally caught up with us and wiped out the Tuesday and Wednesday leagues this week, but we’re sure everyone will be back at it for next week.

When we say the Sunday league is full, that’s assuming we don’t gain enough teams in the next few days to add a 5TH DIVISION TO THE SUNDAY LEAGUE. It’s worth asking if you might be interested…..

As previously mentioned, we have just the ONE SPACE in the Monday league for the NEW MONDAY DIVISION WHICH STARTS ON 19TH MARCH. Get in touch for details.

sUNDAY LEAGUE

Just the final 4 league games were played this week alongside a batch of friendlies for the teams without games. We will probably mention it again bu the NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE STARTS THIS WEEKEND, 4TH MARCH, last chance to get involved…..

Insole might have lost their title, but second place was still there to be had if they could beat a Kipsta Cobras team who were one of the teams who had taken points off them this season. Liam Atkinson gave Insole the lead in the 4th minute, and doubled that lead 9 minutes later, before Jake Parker grabbed his first Ballers goal and Atkinson scored again to make it 4-0 two minutes before the break. George Carr pulled one back just before half time, and the lead was reduced to two two minutes after the restart as Matt Toft scored. That was as close at they got though, and goals from Brad Street and Aaron Campbell in the next 5 minutes eased them clear again. Atkinson got his 4th of the game and Street his second in the final minute to see Insole finish the season with a win.

The Veterans needed to recapture some of their early season form if they were to avoid taking the drop back to the third tier, a season after they came so close to claiming a Premiership spot. The had to find a win from one of their two games this week, with the first being the toughest test at Championship level as Dench looked to claim the title. There were plenty of goals in this one, and in the early stages it very much looked like being a routine win for the table toppers as Phil Carroll, Dan Jones(2), Marc Jagger and Jonny McAuley made it 5-0 after just 14 minutes. Andy Carrington and Ben Mercer got The Vets off the mark and back in contention with two goals in the following two minutes, but Jones third of the half made it 6-2 on 19 minutes. Simon Grainger got another back for The Vets, McAuley got his second for Dench, before Wes Hodkinson scored the final goal of an action packed first half to leave us at 7-4 at the break. The second half was much more one sided, as Jagger scored a minute into the period, and even though Dean Minshull pulled another back two minutes later, further goals from Jagger(3), Paul Bardsley, Carroll, McAuley and Luke Ashworth meant that Dench head into the Premiership as Champions on the back of an impressive win. It will get harder from next week…… So the final relegation place came down to The Veterans and The McMuffin Men, with the McMuffins having ran into a decent spell of form to give them a chance of saving their season. They had beaten the same opposition last week, but went behind here as the fresh Sam Collicott gave The Vets the lead in the 5th minute. That lead lasted just a minutes as Jack Searle quickly drew McMuffin level, and they took control with two goals in the final 5 minutes of the half from Sam Delgado. Charley Eyre’s goal 5 minutes into the second half looked to have sealed The Vets fate, but Andy Carrington pulled one back a minute later, and they remained in contention when Collicott got his second a minute after Searle had increased the McMuffin lead again. The final stages proved too much for The Vets and McMuffin Men scored three more through Eyre, Searle and Delgado to secure their Championship status.

Polish Army’s debut Sunday season saw them finish in a mid table position that confirmed we’d put them in the right division, but this week they were facing an FC AOTS team who will be disappointed with their showing this season. This was an absolute cracker, and Mateusz scored the first of plenty of goals in the second minute. AOTS turned it around with two in three minutes from Steve Whittle and Adam Duty, but by the break they were three behind as Marcin scored two, Matuesz got his second and Pawel got himself on the score sheet. AOTS needed a good start to the second period and they got it, as a goal from Whittle and two from Eoghan Scott made it 5-5 with 18 minutes still to play. It was a mad 18 minutes, with both teams giving it everything, and the roars that greeted each goal could be heard from miles around! Pawel put the Poles back in front, but Scott and Duty quickly turned it around to put AOTS back in front. Pawel scored again before Duty quickly responded to edge AOTS ahead as we headed into the final 5. Marcin leveled things up yet again, but Duty looked to have won it for AOTS with his 4th two minutes from time. It was probably only fair that this one ended up all square, and it did as Grzegorz scored a last minute leveler, and these two teams will get to do it all again next season!

League Two was all done and dusted last week, so all that remained of the week was a series of friendles. Stockport Eagles put up a decent showing against the Premiership winners Kinky Slipper, who may have been on a comedown after their unbeaten Premiership season, the game finishing 9-8 in Kinky’s favour. The ‘local derby’ between League One winners Inter Row Z and Duno finished in a competitive 5-5 draw as Inter will be looking to join Duno in the top flight in a seasons time. Rooneytunes and Deportivo Lack Of Talent will be swapping places this season, and Rooneytunes will be looking to mount a promotion campaign as they won this one 7-2 against an admittedly weakened Deportivo side. League One runners up Wellspring picked up a 6-1 win over Pathetico Madrid, who will remain in the bottom division and be looking to mount a more sustainable promotion campaign this time around.

THE NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE STARTS THIS WEEK. CHANCES OF US GETTING TO A 5TH DIVISION ARE PROBABLY MINIMAL, UNLESS YOU AND SEVERAL OTHER PEOPLE WHO DON’T CURRENTLY PLAY THINK ABOUT ENTERING A SIDE……. ALL YOU CAN DO IS ASK!

MONDAY LEAGUE

Following a fairly late cancellation from their opposition, AC Milmanchester missed a game for the first time this season, so Expected Toulouse had the chance to claim top spot as they played two to catch up games that were previously missed. The first was a potential banana skin against Phantom Brazilians, who were hampered by an injury in the warm up to Paul Wilkinson, and it showed in their first half performance as Expected dominated the opening 25. Jordan Milne put them in front on 5 minutes before Jack Grundy doubled the lead in the 8th minute. Liam Mottram, Niall Hillen and Milne added to the total, and though Ryan Clayton pulled one back a minute before the break, Milne grabbed his third of the half to make it 6-1 at the interval. Matt Barton toe-bunged Phantom back to within 4 at the start of the second half, and though the second half was a much more even half of football, it was an own goal three minutes from time that sealed a fairly comfortable win that saw Toulouse go top on goal difference. They would have expected to increase that advantage in their second game against bottom side Murder On Zidane’s Floor, and without wanting to dwell on this one too much, they did. ‘Keeper Nicolas Appleton joined the Golden Gloves list as he kept a clean sheet while his team mates spread the goals about as they fired in 16. Liam Mottram top scored with 6, Jordan Milne got 4, and Jack Grundy, Niall Hillen and Jack Taylor got two apiece as Murder sit tight on the league splitting at the half way point. Strikeforce found fielding a team to be a bit of a struggle, but they got 6 on the pitch again as they took on struggling Pathetico Madrid. Pathetico are another side who are awaiting the split, but they had the better of the opening period as goals from John Peneveyre, Liam Needham, Nathan Thomson and Craig Moss saw them into the break 4-2 up as Matty Aked and Matthew Ricketts responded for Strikeforce. Mike Pinder made it a one goal game when he scored 5 minutes after the break, but the man they call Dale made it 5-3 two minutes later. Strikeforce finished the stronger though, and goals from Pinder and Joey Carruth drew this one level with 10 to play. Grant Gregory put them in front for the first time before Carruth and an un-named scorer finished this one off as Strikeforce, quite surprisingly, sit in third place. Nice Buns were back for a second week as they patiently await the start of the Monday Championship, and they faced off against a mix’n’match team made up primarily of Duno and Inter Row Z players. The first half was end to end, and it was 4-4 at the break Buns goals from Charlie and Jimmy Williamson and two from Tom Dempsey were matched by three from Liam Watson and one from Calvin Alexander. The Buns controlled the second half though, and Jimmy added 4 more, Charlie two more, and Dale Kirkham and Tom Hall a pair of goals each  to ease them to a 14-6 win with Lee Clarke and Ray Donnelly grabbing a couple back.

THE NEW MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP STARTS ON 19TH MARCH. THERE IS CURRENTLY A SPACE TO BE HAD, BUT IT WON’T BE THERE FOR LONG…….

TUESDAY LEAGUE

After a mid afternoon pitch inspection showed no settled snow on the hallowed turf, we looked set for a decent night of Ballers Tuesday league action. But a heavy half hour of snow an hour before the games were due to kick off buried the pitch in snow and made the roads around the centre a little dicey, so we had no choice to but to call off our Tuesday action for this week.

WE CURRENTLY SEEM TO HAVE A COUPLE OF TEAMS ‘FIGHTING’ OVER THE ONE CURRENT SPACE IN THE NEW TUESDAY CHAMPIONSHIP, SO IF YOU’RE LOOKING TO SIGN UP, MONDAY IS YOUR NIGHT!

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

Ha, no chance…..

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL, CAST YOUR EYES AT MONDAY IF YOU WANT TO BE A BALLER.

Everything seems to be going rather well! The highly anticipated Tuesday Championship started this week, spaces are filling up nicely for the new Monday Championship which starts in March, and the new Sunday league is looking good for when that starts on 4th March. Plus we only had United playing this Wednesday, which didn’t have anywhere near the impact that Valentine’s Day had last week. Whisper it, but we even saw the sun this week……

LEAGUE NEWS

The NEW TUESDAY CHAMPIONSHIP started this week, but there’s still ONE SPACE there to be had by any new team wanting to get involved.

The next full new league to start will be our ever popular SUNDAY LEAGUE, which will be kicking off on 4TH MARCH. We currently have 4 divisions, a 5th could be added to put us at absolute capacity, so SPACES ARE AVAILABLE for any new or returning teams who want to get involved. Friendlies are available on Sunday 25th February for anyone wanting to get a game under their belts before the big kick off.

We will be adding an extra division to the MONDAY LEAGUE on the 12TH MARCH, and with 4 of the 6 slots already full, we have SPACES AVAILABLE for TWO MORE TEAMS. Friendlies are available for any new teams wanting to get a few games in before it kicks off.

There are plenty of ways to get hold of us, but from here the easiest thing to do is click on the ‘Join A League’ tab on the homepage, fill in some details and we’ll be in touch!

SUNDAY LEAGUE

The first of two catch up weeks ahead of the start of the NEW SUNDAY SEASON WHICH KICKS OFF ON 4TH MARCH (we might mention this a few more times in the next couple of weeks) didn’t really see anything finalised which wasn’t already sorted. Kipsta Cobras (or the Kipsta Allstars as they should have been known this week) should have given Kinky Slipper a guard of honour onto the pitch this week, but instead they had the cheek to take an early lead through a Warren Yeo header. Kinky weren’t up for letting their season fizzle out, and they’d leveled it up before the break as Kyle, who’s surname we should really know by now, scored 8 minutes from half time. The champs were in front two minutes after the break through Rob Cresswell’s goal, and they ran away with it in the final 10 minutes as Cresswell, Wesley Harney, Joe Lailey and Jordan Hutchinson scored to ensure Kinky finished the season unbeaten.

Having slipped to a shock defeat to The McMuffin Men last week, Dench were looking to get back to winning ways against a recently improved Step Brothers. That improvement looked like it might continue into a third straight win when Chris Moore put them in front in the 4th minute, but Callum Wild’s equiliser two minutes later was added to by three more from Marc Jagger and two from Phil Carroll as Dench went into the break 6-1 in front. Tom and Dom Cioffi got the first goals of the second period to reduce the deficit to three with 12 minutes left, but Dench killed this one off in the final stages with two more Callum Wild goals and a late Jonny McAuley finish putting this one to bed. With Team Tom not playing a league game this week, the title will come down to the final week, with Dench leading the way with a considerable goal difference advantage. The McMuffin Men were looking to build on last week’s impressive win against The Veterans in what was a relegation 6 pointer. A tight first half saw just the two goals, both going the way of The McMuffin’s with Charley Eyre grabbing both. The Veterans halved that lead 6 minutes into the second half through an cracking Egg strike. Chances came and went at both ends, but it was The McMuffin’s that ran away with it in the final 13 minutes. Sam Delgado grabbed their third, before Eyre and Dustin Lizaba added two more in the final 10 minutes. Having come desperately close to gaining promotion to the Premiership last season, The Veterans look like heading the other way this season.

Wellspring and Polish Army will be in different divisions next season after Wellspring made a decent fist of trying to keep up with Inter Row Z at the top of the table. They needed a ridiculously unlikely score line to give them the title, and from the start it seemed that just winning the game wouldn’t be a straightforward task as early goals from Pawel and Jay Berrisford meant we went into the break at 1-1. Pawel restored the Polish lead, but again they held that lead for barely a minute before Charlie Bridge drew Wellspring level. Grzegorz put the Army in front for a third time 16 minutes from time, but two Berrisford goals put Wellspring in front for the first time with 8 minutes left. It was their turn to let a lead go as Mateusz scored the final goal two minutes later to end an entertaining game all square at 4-4. FC AOTS promotion hopes ended last week, but they were still playing catch up and had two games this week. They hammered SK Dons just a few weeks ago, but a personnel change for the Dons has brought about an improvement in results, and they raced into a 6 goal lead at the break as Paddy Bannister scored three, Joe Marsland two and Kyle Norris one. Bannister made it 7, 7 minutes into the second period, before Adam Atherton briefly threatened a ridiculous comeback with a 6 minute hat trick. The Dons killed the game off as Marsland, Bannister and Matthew Richardson added three more to their total, before Atherton grabbed his 4th as a consolation in the final minute. They had a second chance to pick up a win this week against a Rooneytunes team who’d lost their last 4 games, but it looked like being more of the same in a bad week for AOTS as goals from Ashley Taylor, Cian Gillespie and Chris Sinclair put Rooneytunes three up in the first 17 minutes. Scott Robinson pulled one back for AOTS just before the break, and goals from Tom Dennerly and Ben Jamieson early in the second half meant we were all square at 3-3 with 20 minutes to play. Rooneytunes were the stronger side in the second half as AOTS began to feel the effects of the two games, and Sinclair grabbed two more before Jack Hodkinson added two of his own to put Rooneytunes 4 up. Adam Atherton pulled one back for AOTS but Rooneytunes finished with a flourish as Sinclair, Hodkinson, Taylor and Aiden Conway all scored in the last 5 minutes to give Rooneytunes a comfortable winning margin.

Everything was already wrapped up in League Two, with both promotion spots filled. Deportivo were missing a couple of regulars this week as they took on bottom of the table FC Stront Bakken, who were hoping for nothing more than to not finish bottom of the lot. Declan Matthews gave the Bucket Boys the lead in the 8th minute, before an otherwise tight half burst into life with two more Stront Bakken goals in the last couple of minutes through Matthews and Lukas Voveris. It obviously wasn’t Deportivo’s night, and Matthews completed his hat trick 5 minutes into the second period, before Darius (just Darius) grabbed three of his own in the final 12 minutes with Patrick Mitchell grabbing another as the Bucket Boys ended the season on a high note with an 8-0 whitewash of one of the promoted teams. Isn’t football brilliant……?! A defeat for Inter Your Sister would leave them in bottom position in the bottom division, just months after they were in the top division, and they faced a Pathetico Madrid team this week who’ve reverted back to their old ways of starting a season well before the wheels fall off towards the end. Inter’s new boy Brandon Byers-Wilkes gave them the lead in the 6th minute and Matthew Kealy doubled their advantage on 17. John Lodge pulled one back for Inter a couple of minutes later, and it was 3-2 at the break as Kealy scored his second before Adam Norton pulled one back on the stroke of half time. The pattern continued at the start of the second half as Gaz Sumner put Inter twoup again, only for Carl Reynolds to quickly pull one back again for Pathetico. A pair of quickfire goals from Kealy gave Inter a three goal advantage with 13 to play, and Byers-Wilkes grabbed another couple and Craig Johnson another as Inter raced into a 6 goal lead. Norton got his second in the 48th minute, but Inter had the final word as Dave Smythe scored their 10th to mean that Inter avoided bottom spot. They should probably stick with this exact same team going into the new season…….

We had a couple of friendlies for those teams who were without a league game this week, and Insole beat Stockport Eagles for the second week in a row by 6 goals to 2, while Inter Row Z made us consider what division they should be going in for the new season as they beat Premiership-bound Team Tom 7-2

THE NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE KICKS OFF ON 4TH MARCH. SPACES ARE AVAILABLE AS WE LOOK TO ADD A 5TH DIVISION TO OUR BIGGEST LEAGUE NIGHT. FRIENDLIES ARE AVAILABLE THIS WEEKEND FOR ANY TEAMS WANTING TO GET A GAME UNDER THEIR BELTS BEFORE THE SEASON STARTS!

MONDAY LEAGUE

City’s final action of the FA Cup for this season affected the turnout this week, but the top two were in action and we welcomed another new team to the Ballers family this week. Expected Toulouse are in the box seat in terms of having a 100% record, but it was AC MIlmanchester who went into this weeks fixtures top of the table as a result of having played more games, and they were first up against a Murder On Zidane’s Floor team who were still pointless. In terms of having no points, rather than there being no point to them. It seemed unlikely, even before kick off, that they would get anything from this one, and when Jason Singleton put ACM in front in the second minute it looked like being a long night. They held on in there and nearly made it to the break just the one behind, but Martin Gordon doubled the AC advantage just before half time. Kiarno Samms made it 3-0 5 minutes into the second half, but Murder tried to keep going and had chances of their own. Samms grabbed another two to make it 5 with 7 minutes left, and Simon Hackney and Samms finished off the win with goals in the last couple of minutes. Given the two teams respective records so far this season, it could have been worse…… Strikeforce had all kinds of trouble putting a team out this week, as they beg, stole and borrowed players from anywhere and everywhere, so Expected Toulouse were probably expected to pick up a sizable win to continue their quest for a first Monday Premiership title. The first half didn’t exactly go with the form book as Jay Berrisford put Strikeforce in front in the 6th minute, but Jordan Milne scored two in a minute to turn things back in Expected’s favour. Phil Carroll leveled things up again for Strikeforce, but Toulouse eased two goals in front as Liam Mottram and Wasim Akram found the net. It was back to one at the break as Berrisford got his second, but the second half was a completely different story. Milne and Akram scored to put Toulouse three up, and Milne grabbed three more, Akram and Mottram two more, Jack Grundy a second half hat trick and Niall Hillen just the one, as they ran riot with just a Carroll goal for Strikeforce in return. For those who couldn’t be bothered adding all them up, that’s a final score of 17-4. We welcomed Nice Buns to the Ballers Monday league, and their opening game was a friendly against Team Randommer. The new team took a little time to adjust to the Ballers game, and after they fell behind early, three goals from Tom Dempsey and one apiece from Jimmy Williamson and Paul Cheetham were enough to see them pick up a 5-3 opening night win. Always good to start with a win……

THE NEW MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP KICKS OFF ON 19TH MARCH. CURRENTLY THERE ARE TWO SPACES AVAILABLE FOR NEW TEAMS, WITH FRIENDLIES AVAILABLE FOR ANY NEW TEAMS WANTING TO GIVE IT A GO OVER THE NEXT FEW WEEKS. GET IN TOUCH FOR DETAILS.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

And then there was two! As planned, the Championship returned to the Tuesday league this week, with a couple of games played. First up the Premiership continued with leaders Gangs Of Dwight Yorke taking on a recently improved Only Kruls & Horses. It looked like being business as normal when Gangs went into half time three goals up as Jimmy Leeson added two goals to Callum Jones’ opener. Kruls started the second half strongly and pulled a couple back in the first 5 minutes of the half through Shane Zammit’s two goals. Leeson’s third eased Gangs two clear again, and Connor Harding’s goal 7 minutes from time looked to have finihed this one off. Sean Martin gave Kruls brief hope of staging a late comeback, but Jones got his second a minute later to make it 8 wins from 8 for Gangs this season. Inter Row Z and Inter Mi Van had the chance to overtake Kruls if either of them could pick up the win from their game this week, and it looked like being Row Z when they went two up in the first 6 minutes through Michael Win and Harry Shipton goals. When Callum Donnelly made it three on 16 minutes they looked well on their way towards the win, but Gary Wood pulled two back for Mi Van in quick succession to make it 3-2 heading into the break. The second half was tight, and we headed well into the final 10 minutes with the score line remaining the same, but it was Row Z that completed the win as Blazej Serwski and Shipton scored in the final few minutes to complete a hard fought win.

The Championship kicked off with a couple of games featuring new and returning teams. Despite doing pretty well since signing up, we took the decision to put Blake’s 7 in this division and they faced a Shaka side who’d lost their two friendlies in the run up to the big kick off. This one started off slowly, but when Shaka hit the front 7 minutes from half time through Liam Paull’s goal, they added to it three more times before the break as Andrew Cadwallader, Krisstian Ebanks-Perrin and Mark Brookes looked to have taken the game away with 25 still to play. Paull got his second a minute into the second half and it was well and truly over when Matthew Pownall made it 6 with 18 minutes left. They were in with a sniff of a clean sheet, but an own goal 15 minutes from the end ended those hopes, but Shaka still pick up an impressive first win when it counts. Black Jack were back for their second game following their debut friendly last week, and were taking on the returning LQ FC on the opening night. LQ started the stronger, with Danny Atherden and Matthew Brierley giving them an early two goal lead, but Black Jack pulled one back a couple of minutes later. George Springer restored LQ’s two goal lead in the 9th minute, but Black Jack hit back with two James Davies goals to make it 3-3 on 20 minutes. Brierley nudged LQ back in front but that lead lasted barely a minute as Davies got his third of the half to make it 4-4 at half time. Atherden put LQ in front again a minute into the second half, but again the lead didn’t last long as Harri Budd leveled it up again. Alex Heggie and Ryan Alderson scored scored for each side in the space of a few seconds and it was 6-6 with 20 minutes still left to play. Black Jack finished the stronger, and after Davies put them in front 13 minutes from time, they killed it off with further goals from Budd and two for Jack Roberts to end a highly entertaining opening night from these two teams.

THERE’S A RUMOUR GOING AROUND THAT THE TUESDAY LEAGUE, NEW CHAMPIONSHIP AND ALL, MIGHT BE FULL! YOU CAN ASK US IF YOU WANT TO JOIN, BUT WE MIGHT BE NUDGING YOU TOWARDS SUNDAY OR MONDAY FOR THE TIME BEING!

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

United being in Champions League action didn’t affect any of the Wednesday teams this week, and having seen their performance we’re sure everyone was happy they played! Michu At De Gea Ba already have the title wrapped up for a second season, but Stockport Eagles gave them a decent game first time around. It looked unlikely that they would be able to repeat that after Adam Porter and Paul Rice put Michu two up in the first 4 minutes, and even more unlikely after Matt Barton made it three and Ian Davies added two more just before the break. Jamie Longworth made it 6-0 7 minutes into the second half, and as we went into the final 15 minutes we looked like adding the unlikely name of Michael Jennison to our Golden Gloves leader board. Ben Waugh’s goal 14 minutes from time ended that chance, but Davies, Porter and Longworth completed the scoring in a comfortable win for the leaders. The only thing to fight for in the Wednesday league now is second place, and Exeter Gently found themselves in the extremely unlikely position of being able to challenge for this, especially if they could beat the team currently holding that position, Polish Army. Coming off the back of three straight wins, Exeter went in front on 6 minutes through Mike Lavin’s goal, but Pawel drew the Poles level on 13. Brad Robison restored Exeter’s lead two minutes later, and they were 3-1 up when Mehrad Torkian scored three minutes from the break. IN a game we expected to be tight, it was back to one before the break as Marcin scored a minute later, but Exeter looked to have made the decisive move early in the second period as Tom Harrison and Torkian scored in the opening 6 minutes to give them a three goal advantage. Marcin got his second with 11 minutes to play, and when Grzegorz scored with 4 minutes left we were in for a big finish, but Exeter held on to go level on points with this week’s opponents in third place, despite their -19 goal difference! On a night where one Sevilla failed to pick up a win, our own Sevilla Lacatalent went looking for their first Ballers win against Magpie FC, who have had a dip in form of late. They gave themselves a good chance of making that happen in the opening 25, as goals from Mike Witter, Darius Forbes, David Witter and an own goal saw them go into the break 4 goals up. Magpie needed to get the first goal of the second period to have any chance of getting something from this one, and they did as Milosz Zawila scored two minutes after the break, but Jake Riley got Sevilla’s 5th three minutes later. Radoslaw Leszczak sent us into the last 12 minutes at 5-2, but Sevilla finished stronger as goals from Riley and two from Ryan Wall gave Sevilla that long awaited first win.

THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL. THERE AREN’T MANY SPACES TO BE HAD ACROSS THE 4 LEAGUE NIGHTS, SO IF YOU WANT TO TAKE ONE YOU BEST NOT MESS AROUND!

This cold weather just isn’t funny anymore……

LEAGUE NEWS

We are down to the LAST SPACE for the NEW TUESDAY CHAMPIONSHIP, starting NEXT WEEK, the 20th February. This league is made up of the bottom two teams from the current league, and 4 brand new teams, so for an immediate start get in touch with us as soon as is humanly possible!

Following on from that, just a couple of weeks later the BRAND NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE kicks off on 4th March. As our biggest league night we have the variety of standards to suit all teams, and with available pitch space we can even expand our 4 divisions to 5 if the demand dictates. Given that there’s still a couple of weeks to go, there is still time to get a friendly or two under your belt to give it a go and dust off the cobwebs before the season starts.

Last but not least, we’ll be adding a NEW MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP back into the Monday league at the half way point of the season, starting on 12th March. Again, due to the time frame we can accommodate new teams who might want a tune up game or two in the run up to the big kick off!

For more information on any of the above, go to the homepage, click ‘Join A League’ and fill in some details.

SUNDAY LEAGUE

Week 10 is the last official week of the season, so quite a few things are now decided, with just the games that have been missed throughout the season looking to be caught up over the next couple of weeks. The Premiership title is done and dusted for the season as Kinky Slipper secured their second crown last week, but they still had an encounter with second placed Duno to get through before the season was out. As it turns out it was a Duno side missing a couple of regular lads, and Kinky strolled into a 6-0 half time lead through 4 goals from Jordan Hutchinson to go alongside goals from Joe Lailey and James Radcliffe. Lailey and Radcliffe added two more in the second period before Jack Cope got Duno on the board. Radcliffe and Lailey both completed their hat tricks in the final stages as Kinky ran out comfortable winners. El Caliente have a temporary new leader as current El Capitain Danny Murphy takes some time out injured, and they’ve also got some new players. They faced a tough game this week against a resurgent Kipsta Cobras, but they got off to the better start as Kieran Norris and Jay Berrisford put them two up inside the first 15 minutes. Dillon Lowth quickly pulled one back for Kipsta to make it 2-1 at half time, but that’s how the score remained as we headed into the final 10 minutes. Kipsta turned it around with two goals in three minutes from Matty Aked and Matthew Sheehan, and Kipsta now sit just a point behind last season’s champions Insole in 4th place.

It’s a straight fight between Team Tom and Dench FC for the Championship title, with both teams well clear of the chasing pack. The Tommers were up first as they took on a struggling Step Brothers, who themselves were looking for points to maintain their Championship status. This one was tight from start to finish, with Rob Sheldon’s goal for Step Brothers the only one of the opening period. Team Tom were level two minutes into the second period through Andy Walker’s goal, but the recent improvement in Step Brothers form continued as an own goal 8 minutes from time gave them the win. This gave Dench the chance to pull themselves level at the top of the table, with a game in hand if they could beat The McMuffin Men for the second time in successive weeks. McMuffin’s started well last week and they took the lead here too as Dustin Lizaba opened the scoring on 5 minutes, but as with last week, a much changed Dench turned it round and lead 2-1 at the break as Jonny McAuley and Phil Carroll scored. Unlike last week, the second half belonged to McMuffin Men as two goals in a minute from Charely Eyre and Sam Delgado put them in front with 14 minutes to go. A goal each from Eyre’s Charely and Mac, also inside a minute put the McMuffins out of sight with 6 minutes still to play, in which time Mac Eyre and Calan Sherer added two more to give the strugglers a surprisingly comfortable win.

On paper, Inter Row Z pretty much had the League One title wrapped up, and depending on results it could all be settled this week. It was a goal fest in the opening period of Inters game with Polish Army, with the poles hitting the front early as Pawel grabbed a 5th minute opener. Ray Donnelly grabbed three in as many minutes to put Inter 3-1 up before Salwek and Pawel drew the poles level again with two more just as quickly. Donnelly grabbed his 4th a minute later to make it 4-3 after a spell of 6 goals in 6 minutes! It was a whole 4 minutes before the net was found again, this time Jamie Kealey put Inter two goals up again, and that’s how it remained at the break. Both teams remembered how to defend in the second half, with just goals from Kealey and Callum Donnelly easing Inter to a 7-3 win. Wellspring faced a tricky match (in their new, very bright shirts) against the only team that could catch them for second place, FC AOTS, knowing they needed to win to retain a mathematical chance of catching the leaders. It took 14 minutes for the deadlock to be broken, as Lewis Arden struck first for Wellspring, but Adam Atherton fired AOTS level 5 minutes before the break. We were second away from going into half time all square, but Mike Devitt restored the Wellspring lead in the final minute of the period. Nathan Wilkinson made it 3-1 with 16 minutes to play, but Atherton reduced the deficit with 5 minutes remaining. Arden’s second of the game two minutes later rubber stamped the win for Wellspring, and left them needing just a 64 goal win from their final game to claim the title…… There’s every possibility that SK Dons and Rooneytunes could be playing each other again next season, as the new look Dons continued to look for their first win of the season. Both teams exchanged early goals as Danny Brookes put the Dons in front before Cian Gillespie leveled things up, but the Dons had the better of the half as Paddy Bannister, Paul Russell and Kyle Norris put them 4-1 up at the break. A further two Brookes goals put Dons out of sight with 10 minutes left to play, and Bannister got his second and Norris two more to give them a comfortable win with Chris Sinclair and Gillespie grabbing a couple of consolation goals for Rooneytunes.

We could have had a dramatic final day to the League Two season if SFC Club were still with us to make Stockport Eagles play for the title, but a forfeit win for the Eagles handed them the title before Deportivo had even played. Deportivo started off like a house on fire against Pathetico Madrid, as Rhys Moult, Dougie McCallum, Rob Parker, Brad Peet and Jake Riley all finding the net in the opening 13 minutes. James Norton got one back for Pathetico, but that was as close as they got in the opening period, and they slipped further behind in the second half as McCallum, Peet and Riley all added their second goals to put Deportivo 8-1 up with 8 minutes left. Adam Norton did pull one back for Pathetico, but the final deficit was back to 7 as Peet got his third 4 minutes from time. Deportivo will join Eagles in League One for the new season. Another team wearing new Ballers shirts this week were FC Stront Bakken, and they were involved in a tight game this week with Inter Your Sister. It was 1-1 at the break as Andy Carrington drew Inter Level after Declan Matthews had given the Bucket Boys the lead. Stront Bakken looked to be heading towards a rare win for them this season as Matthews and Dylan Marinarisa scored a couple of quickfire goals to make it 3-1 with 15 minutes to play, and they held that lead going into the final stages before Martin Keogh and Chris Murray scored a couple of late goals to nick a point for Inter.

THE NEW SUNDAY LEAGUE SEASON KICKS OFF ON 4TH MARCH. FOR MORE INFORMATION ON REGISTERING A TEAM OR TO BOOK A ONE OFF FRIENDLY IN BEFORE THEN, GET IN TOUCH.

TUESDAY LEAGUE

City’s stroll in Basel might have lost us a game or two this week, but we welcomed a new team down for their first game in Black Jack, and they took on Shaka, who were here for their second Tuesday night game. There doesn’t really seem to be any title race as such, as Gangs Of Dwight Yorke seem to be strolling to the finish line, and they started this weeks game with Blake’s 7 in impressive fashion, with Wez Barker, Anthony Pugh, and an Aden Jones treble putting them 5 up in the opening 16 minutes. Shaun Mather got Blake’s on the score sheet, but they were 5 down at the break when Pugh got his second just before half time. When Ryan McAndrew pulled a couple more back for Blake’s in the first 6 minutes of the second half, it looked like they were looking to make sure the final scoreline was respectable, but when he added two more and Matty Aked also scored, all of a sudden we were level at 6-6 with 10 minutes to play. There was to be no fairy tale ending for the underdogs though, as Callum Jones goal a minute later was quickly followed by three more from Aden, another from Callum and a Chris Singleton strike to make the final score look a little more straightforward than it actually was. Conditions were a little tricky on Tuesday as the temperature dropped, but the game between Inter Mi Van and Only Kruls & Horses was a cracker. 11 minutes were on the clock when Seb Etchells put the improving Kruls in front, but Brad (just Brad) drew Inter level a minute later for a team who were looking to get back to the form they had shown when they joined. Etchells put Kruls back in front after a mix up in the Inter defence, but it was 2-2 at half time as Phil (just Phil) scored two minutes before the whistle. There was very little to choose between the teams in the second half, in fact there was just the one goal, scored by Marcus Acott that gave Kruls a third straight win that sees them move up to third in the table. Shaka and Black Jack will be facing each other in the new Tuesday Championship that start next week, but for Black Jack this was just a game to check the place out and get used to the set up. They started slowly and were two down in the opening three minutes as Sam Holtham and Tom Hannan scored for a Shaka team who were looking to bounce back from a heavy defeat last week. Ryan Alderson scored Jack’s first Ballers goal on 6 minutes, and Luke Waiting notched just before the break to make it Desmond at half time. Waiting put Jack in front for the first time a minute into the second half, but Connor Atkinson made it 3-3 with 19 minute to play. The last 10 minutes were end to end as Kev McClean put Jack in front on 42 minutes, before Sam Holtham leveled it up again three minutes later. Waiting scored the final goal of the game to give Black Jack their first win, but it all starts for real next week!

WE HAVE 11 OUT OF THE 12 TEAMS WE NEED TO CONSIDER THE TUESDAY LEAGUE FULL, SO THERE’S ONE SPACE LEFT FOR ANYONE WANTING TO GET STARTED IN A BRAND NEW LEAGUE NEXT WEEK!

MONDAY LEAGUE

With Expected Toulouse’ game going down late this week, it was a chance for AC Milmanchester to go top if they could beat a Strikeforce team who were unbeaten so far this season. It was a patched up Strikeforce team this week, so a hard task was made harder before a ball had been kicked. They held out for 11 minutes, but once Martin Gordon had broken the deadlock, he added two more, Jason Singleton and Simon Hackney one each, with just the one Matthew Ricketts goal in response for Strikeforce in the opening period. Grant Gregory pulled Strikeforce within three at the start of the second period, but there was never really any danger of them causing a massive shock and goals in the final 11 minutes from Melford Knight, Singleton, Callum Jones and James Elmore eased ACM to victory. Phantom Brazilians have had a shaky start to the season and came into this week’s game with FC Rhino Ket off the back of two straight defeats (since they got their new shirts…..). Rhino Ket seemed to be heading the other way, as after a poor start they had won their last two, but this one headed the way most people would have predicted before kick off, with Phantom going into the break 4-0 up as Matt Barton, Paul Wilkinson(2) and Andrew Shaw took the chances that came their way. The game wasn’t was one way as the scoreline suggested, but Phantom were more clinical in front of goal and Wilkinson grabbed another couple either side of a Ryan Clayton goal to make it 7-0 with 13 minutes to play. Rhino Ket finally got a goal when Jake Shaw took one of their chances, but Wilkinson scored again straight away with the final goal of the game to help Phantom to a comfortable win. Pathetico Madrid seem to be counting down the days til the split in the league to get back into a comfortable Championship spot, while last season’s Championship winners Not A Chance will be looking to retain a top 6 place at the half way point. Phil Carroll put the Chancers in front on 7 minutes, but that looked like being it for the opening period until Kyle Bell and Paul Bardsley scored as we approached the half time whistle. Bell got two more in the early stages of the second half, before Liam Needham got Pathetico off the mark with 18 minutes to play. Bell added two more in the next two minutes, and Chris Priestley scored the Chancers 8th in the 40th minute. Needham got a second 5 minutes from time, but Carroll scored the final goal of the game to send Not A Chance into 4th place. We had a new team down for a friendly this week, but we’re not going to go into too much detail of this 26 goal thriller, as Team Randommer beat Rooneytunes 17-8.

THE BRAND NEW MONDAY CHAMPIONSHIP STARTS ON 12TH MARCH, TWO SPACES LEFT. FRIENDLIES AVAILABLE FOR ANY NEW TEAMS WANTING TO GIVE IT A GO BEFORE THE BIG KICK OFF.

WEDNESDAY LEAGUE

Exeter Gently and Magpie FC were the only teams not under the thumb this Valentine’s Day, so the choice of Game Of The Day was quite an easy one. Exeter have been much improved in recent weeks and they were looking to make it three wins on the bounce. They started well, and were three up inside the opening 14 minutes as Mehrad Torkian, Tom Harrison and Kristian Igo hit the net. Magpie pulled one back at the back end of the half through Radoslaw Leszczak’s finish. Exeter started the second half very sloppily, and Leszczak grabbed his second two minutes in, but two almost identical Igo goals put Exeter three goals in front again.James Magnani sealed the win three minutes from time, with Tomasz Glebiowski’s last minute goal just a consolation.

DESPITE THE TURNOUT THIS WEEK, THE WEDNESDAY LEAGUE REMAINS FULL. IF YOU’RE WANTING TO PLAY ON SUNDAY, MONDAY OR TUESDAY EVENINGS, GET IN TOUCH!