with clubs in the lower leagues struggling to stay afloat during this pandemic
and premier league players earning mega zillions in wages...so they can afford their mansions and flash cars
got me wondering
why don`t they donate some of their riches to lower league sides
already seen what happened to Bury
and they will only be the tip of the iceberg

clubs in the lower leagues are not going to survive much longer
no fans=no income=no club eventually

the likes of Chelsea  paying £200 million in this window are a club who obviously aint bothered about
lower league clubs going bust are they

same with the T.V companies
as long as they can screen the premier leagues top clubs week in week out  they are sitting there in their plush offices rubbing their hands
together 

i know this pandemic has hit all clubs 
but the lower leagues have been hit more than most

not sure if any of you saw what Jurgen Klopp had to say a few days ago regarding Chelsea
but it kind of made sense

anyway 
thats what i think

This must be some kinda record broken where a player signs for a Scot Prem footie club and then leaves very quickly on a mutual agreement. Apparently training on that shit artificial pitch was not agreeable to Stokes' requirements. Curious!

With actual fans in grounds being restricted to 1000 (where allowed), Sky sponsorship money due to be dropped by 50%. How long can clubs continue to survive. Obviously football is our main interest, but other sports - Rugby, Athletics, Motor car/bike racing, Horse Racing, Pop/rock gigs, Band tours, Cinema's and Theatres, Basically anything which brings crowds of people together.
The whole entertainment business will soon be gone, arena's closed event staff lost. Even Southampton's boat show was cancelled last week.
I don't know what the answers are, but unless some normality resumes Suicides may begin to outnumber Covid 19 deaths.
With infection rates now rising again. Do we stick 2 fingers up to covid19 and soldier on? or do we hide away until our society breaks completely?

Apparently Barnsley are considering "doing a Coventry".

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/footba...ssion=true

Player Pts CS CR GB BB SB
Snooty 21 2 3 10 3 0
St Charles 19 1 5 5 6 0
B.B.B. 12 0 6 5 -3 0
A.A.A. 10 0 4 NP 3 1
Amelia 9 1 3 -3 3 1
Derby 7 0 4 -3 3 1
Sanjay 7 1 4 -3 -3 1
Themaclad 5 1 3 -3 -3 1
Bomber 4 0 3 -3 3 0
Twerton 4 0 3 -3 3 0

Welcome back one and all to the 20/21 season!! Special welcome to Twerton, Amelia and Lord Snooty after their promotion from the Championship. This season looks like being more competitive, especially as the bottom place won’t be automatically filled by Beefy this year!!!

Taking top spot this week, and laying down a heavy marker, is newly promoted Lord Snooty with 21 points. He was the only one to get a correct score on the Gamball, backed that up with a CR bonus and scored points on 5 games. Last seasons perennial struggler St Charles comes in 2nd on 19 points after getting a CR Gamball and a spot on Bonus, scoring on a weeks high of 6 games. Third place goes to BBB on 12 points, while like SCO he scored on 6 games he wasn’t able to convert any into CS, although he did get a CR on the Gamball but missed on the bonus.

Fourth place is AAA on 10 points, like BBB no correct scores kept his score down but his consistent non-playing of the Gamball saved him 3 points this week. Amelia is in 5th on 9 points, she did get one CS but missed the Gamball with a solid score on her return to the PL. Joint 6th on 7 points are Derby and Sanjay. Both missed on the Gamball but Derby at least picked up a CR Bonus and Sanjay got one CS.

The bottom three this week is made up of last seasons two divisional champions and the PL runner up, not the best start for any of them!! Themaclad takes 8th place on 5 points, he at least got a CS but missed on both the Gamball and Bonus. Bomber and Twerton take joint last spot this week on 4 points. Identical records with no CS and both missing the Gamball but getting points on the Bonus.

So week 1 is in the books and if Beefy stays true to form and chooses the Albion game for the Gamball, then most of you Baggies are going to have to seriously think about removing those blue tinted specs for a lot of games!!!

Cheers
SCO


WEEK 1 TABLE AS ABOVE


Beefy 18pts 1CS 6CR 5GB 3BB 0SB
Minizin 16pts 1CS 6CR DNPGB 6BB 0SB
Zinman 16pts 1CS 5CR 5GB 3BB 0SB
Joker 14pts 0CS 5CR 5GB 3BB 0SB
Somerset 10pts 0CS 5CR 5GB -3BB 0SB
1TrueBaggie 9pts 0CS 4CR 5BB -3BB 1SB
Stairs 9pts 0CS 4CR DNPGB 3BB 0SB
DD 6pts 0CS 4CR -3GB 3BB 0SB
BaggieOne 4pts 0CS 3CR -3GB 3BB 0SB
Silver 0pts 0CS 3CR -3GB -3BB 0SB
Lady Jane 0pts 0CS 1CR -3GB 3BB 0SB

So here we go again - new season, some new players and an unusual name at the top of the league (it won't last). We have had a few issues with peoples balls - a reminder, the Gamball can only be played on the specific game chosen by Beefy. 2 of our new players got it wrong this week but in a spirit of highly unusual generosity, kind Uncle Zin has decided to let you off this week and include the gamball points as if you'd got it right. This offer is for this week only - any further balls ups will result in you being smeared in fish oil and locked naked in a room with a starved Beefy for 2 days.

Trying to shake that image from my mind, I'll move on to the scores. 2 games, Blues and Cardiff, proved to be the coupon busters with nobody predicting a Sheff Wed win (SCO wants a word) and only BaggieOne not taken in by the Brentford hype.
It was also a mixed week for our newcomers but some familiar names at the top.

Beefy and Zin both decided to give others a chance last season but have started as if they mean to get straight back up. Beefy heads the table for the only time this season with 18 points, scoring on 6 games including his bonus and gamball. The Zins share second place with 16 points, Mini matching Beefy's 6 correct results though he would have headed the table on his debut if he'd been brave enough to play the gamball - I've no idea why he wimped out, though I suspect it's probably my fault. The top 3 were the only players to get a correct score with Minizin getting his maximum on his bonus ball.

Joker had a good start to the season, scoring on both his gamball and bonus, though the lack of a correct score kept him out of the top 3. Decent enough starts too for 2 other debutants, Somerset and OneTruebaggie though both lost points on the bonus ball, though 1TB was the only person to get the extra scoreball point . Stairs also sits in mid table, like Minizin losing out by not playing the gamball (I'm not to blame for that one!)

4 players took a wildly optimistic view of the Baggies fortunes and lost points on the gamball - unsurprisingly these 4 sit at the foot of this weeks table. DD took a break from posting his jokes (much appreciated by the way) to join in this weekly beanfeast but he'll be disappointed with his first showing. BaggieOne just missed out on promotion last year but will need to improve on this week's showing if he's to challenge this year - still early days though. Silver was our final debutant but he decided to wait until next week to start scoring - zero points due to a complete failure with his balls. He isn't alone on zero as Lady Jane also had a nightmare with just 1 correct prediction - the fact that it was her bonus ball saved her from getting the first negative score of the season.

Thanks to everyone for taking part, especially our newcomers.....but get your balls right!

Zin


WEEK 1 TABLE AS ABOVE

v



The image is what was the Baseball Ground however they upgraded and moved to Pride Park and have spent the recent couple of seasons apparently buying the ground back from themselves.

It does not seem so long since Rooney was scoring direct from a free kick after a foul was incorrectly given in the league about two months ago, the thought of a Carabao Cup match will have left supporters of both clubs extremely underwhelmed in what will likely be a mainly second string affair.
They have even moved the game to a 6.30 pm kick off. The winners of this epic shoot out will play Brighton or Portsmouth at home.

Last Round

DERBY COUNTY 0 BARROW 0



Rams went through on penalties

PRESTON NORTH END 4 MANSFIELD TOWN 0



A cruise for the Whites.

Both teams came second on Saturday so hopefully both will be out to improve on Saturday's defeat, life behind the scenes at Deepdale appears not to be all happiness and light at the moment, the usual transfer window nonsense, amazing how many players we have sold via Twitter

The last cup meeting between the two sides was on 26/8/2008 the Rams won 1-0 at Deepdale a familiar result over the years, it's 14 games since we beat them.
Still debating if there is a live I Follow broadcast whether to watch suspect many are of the same opinion.

2 points for a correct result
4 points for a correct score
2 points for each correct scorer
Correct joker doubles your score      
Wrong joker result gives you minus 2
Correct Random Badger gives you 2 points

The random badger is used for any random prediction used once in each matchday sequence. For instance, a scorer at a particular match, the number of red cards in the matches or yellow cards or own goals or owt you want really within reason, I do need to be able to check whether it's correct or not. Please don't put stuff like....."Commentator says...."  
The joker   is played for one match in each sequence and if correct you get double points. So if you've predicted 1-0 and it finishes 2-0, you get 4 pts, but if you've predicted 2-0, that's 8 pts. But if you get it wrong, it's minus 2.
Jokers and badgers are optional. You don't have to play one if you don't want.


Cup games:
In the event of a draw, it's half the points if you've predicted a draw when it gets to 90 mins and the full points if it's still a draw after extra time. Half the points will be awarded for correctly predicting the winner of the match if it goes to penalties.

Random score generator: I will be using the random score generator again for those who miss predicting, so we shouldn't get some people too far behind that after missing a couple of weeks they lose all interest, because I know it's not easy getting on here every week.
To be fair to everybody, this is going to be like, say if three people in one week miss their predictions, the first one in the table will be given all 0-0, the second one down the line will get 1-0 and the third will get 0-1 and so on, like if there's four missing the 4th will get 1-1, then 5th 2-1, 6th 1-2. and if there are so many missing, might as well pack in.
And if you miss two weeks on the trot, I'll stop until you come back on again. Not doing it for half a season like I did t'other year.  

Friday 18th September:
Coventry City v Queens Park Rangers

Saturday 19th September:
Brentford v Town
Town scorers:
Brentford scorers:

Nottingham Forest v Cardiff City (12:30)
Blackburn Rovers v Wycombe Wanderers
Luton Town v Derby County
Middlesbrough v AFC Bournemouth
Norwich City v Preston North End
Reading v Barnsley
Rotherham United v Millwall
Sheffield Wednesday v Watford
Swansea City v Birmingham City

Sunday 20th September:
Stoke City v Bristol City (14:00)

Bonus matches:
Saturday:
Premier League:
Everton v West Bromwich Albion (12:30)

Sunday:
Scottish Premier:
Hibernian v Rangers (12:00)

Table after Matchday 2:

1. Baggiebob(BBB) = 33 pts
   
2. Lord Snooty = 32 pts
   
3. ritchiebaby = 30 pts
   
4. themaclad = 30 pts
   
5. Beefy 1965 = 29 pts
   
6. jjamez = 26 pts
   
7. theo_luddite = 24 pts
   
8. Amelia Chaffinch = 23 pts
   
9. St Charles Owl = 23 pts
   
10. SHEP_HTAFC = 22 pts
    
11. neonfoxinthebox = 18 pts

Got to the stage were I now find it hard to watch games being played in empty stadiums, it is awful, soulless vacuums , without the supporters the game is dead even when we are allowed to go back in it won't be the same as no away supporters are likely to be allowed in. Yesterday for instance when my hapless white shirted heros eventually got their act together having he fans behind them might have got a different scoreline.
Warching quest last night 100 ish goals not celebrated in the ground by the folks that matter.
Could hve watched Liverpool/Leeds chose to watch Battle of the River Plate couldn't face watching the game.
In two weeks time face a conundrum, we are at home to Stoke can only watch via computer clashes with FA Cup matches which there will be some local games, do I stayun or go to a game?
Next weekend Bundesliga starts although not at full capacity people will be in there wil be atmosphere, even Norweigian games with 200 fans only had atmosphere instead of what we have at the moment