Crew 2-0 Bradford 
Port Vale 1-1 Walsall
Accrington Stanley 3-2 Bromley 
Barrow 1-2 Milton Keynes Dons 
Chesterfield 2-1 Tranmere Rovers 
Doncaster Rovers 3-1 Cheltenham Town
Gillingham 0-0 Salford 
Harrogate Town 1-2 AFC Wimbledon
Morecambe 2-2 Grimsby Town 
Newport County 3-1 Carlisle United 
Notts County 2-0 Colchester United 
Swindon Town 2-1 Fleetwood Town

I won't bother you with all the statistics buzzing around ahead of Saturday's game, suffice to say that the omens are not good. The game should be treated as a free hit and a gritty determined performance might be the best we can hope for from Hibs.

Celtic are already runaway leaders in the Premiership and don't show any signs of lessening their grip on that lead. If we can come away with the right performance and attitude and continue it against Ross County the following weekend, we can continue with our new-found optimism.

Jon Brady has resigned as manager of League One Northampton Town.

The 49-year-old leaves after three and a half years in charge with the club 21st in the table.

The announcement comes just 48 hours after Brady had talked about his pride at the work that had been done during his time at Sixfields Stadium before his 200th game in charge against Stevenage.

The Cobblers lost that game 2-0 - their sixth league match without a win.

Brady's assistant Ian Sampson has been put in interim charge and will lead the team in Monday's home game against Peterborough.

The club said they received Brady's resignation on Wednesday and accepted it "given the circumstances".

"We really appreciate what Jon has done for the club, initially within the academy and over the last four years or so as first-team manager," chairman Kelvin Thomas said., external

"I personally appreciated Jon's kind words earlier this week when he acknowledged how well-supported he had been by the club.

"However we also all fully understand the real pressures that come with being a manager and while we all would have preferred things to be different, we understand Jon's decision.

"We will now work with Jon and the LMA [League Managers' Association] on his exit agreement."

Although unable to save Northampton from relegation to League Two when he took interim charge in February 2021, Brady led the Cobblers back to the third tier two seasons later.

He consolidated their place in League One last term, finishing 14th and a comfortable 16 points clear of the relegation places.

But this season has been tough with only four wins so far, leaving the club in the bottom four.

National League strugglers Braintree Town have appointed Steve Pitt as their new manager.

Pitt has replaced Angelo Harrop, who was recently sacked. He worked at the club as Harrop's assistant from the summer of 2022 until last December.

Karl Duguid will be Pitt's assistant and Phil Coleman has been installed as first-team coach.

Justin Moseley, who was placed in interim charge following Harrop's dismissal, was offered the chance to stay on as part of Pitt's coaching team but has opted to leave the club.

"I'm honoured and privileged to take on the role of first-team manager and will now look to build on the foundations that Angelo has already laid," said Pitt.

Braintree are 19th in the table, just one point above the relegation zone.

Harrop was appointed in May 2022 and guided the Iron to promotion last season with a 4-3 win over Worthing in the National League South play-off final.

But he lost his job after a run of just five wins from 20 games this term.

THE MATCH

SATURDAY 7TH DECEMBER KO 12:30PM

v

LAST MATCH



We made it back to back away wins as we beat Derby in dramatic fashion. Derby started bright and were soon 1-0 up when as Adams fired in from close range after a pull back. We were struggling to do anything of note and thankfully went in only 1 down. DR changed the formation and we were a bit more progressive. We then levelled things up with a Bazza special from 25 yards. It looked like the game would end level until Pato created a bit of havoc and crossed for Lowe to tap home the winner.

DEJPHON CHANSIRI, GET OUT OF OUR CLUB    

THE MATCH



Back to Hillsborough and Preston make the journey over the Pennines. Preston have found wins hard to come by, just 3 in there 18 games played, hence why they are currently in 18th place in the division and haven't won a game in there last 8. They could be in for a relegation dogfight if they can't find a way top win more games. They are managed by Paul Heckingbottom, who took over after Ryan Lowe was sacked after the 1st game this season. Heck has also managed the Blunts, L**ds and the Dingles. There leading scorer is Greenwood with 4 goals and 2 assists.

DEJPHON CHANSIRI, GET OUT OF OUR CLUB    

ALL TIME H2H

OWLS 45
PREST 46
DRAWS 25

CURRENT FORM

OWLS W W D L W L                                                            

PRES D D D L D L                              

EFL STOOGES

DOES IT MATTER THERE ALL CORRUPT  

ROBERT MADLEY
Blake Antrobus and Darren Williams
Fourth Official: Adadm Herczeg

THE TEAM

Beadle
Palmer Bernard Iorfa Johnson
Bannan Charles
Windass Ugbo Gassama
Smith

SCORE & SCORER (HOME TEAM SCORE FIRST)

2-1 Smith

WEDNESDAYS FIRT GOAL TIME

26

ATTENDANCE

25456

BML LEAGUE

SCO 10
Imre 10
Washington 9
Maddix 8
Wereham 7


BMPL

Southey 10
Stateside 9
Owlkev 8
Pei 4

OTHER GAMES OF MILD INTEREST

Everton v Liverpool
Plymouth v Oxford
Portsmouth v Bristol City
Barnsley v Birmingham
Chesterfield v Tranmere

AHDAH

THE MUPPETT LEAGUE




KATE BECKINSALE TRIBUTE PIC

Group A

Amelia 14
Minizin 12
A.A.A. 12
Twerton 10
Zinman 9
Themaclad 4

Decent scoring week and one where the underdogs outperformed the usual suspects!! Amelia tops the weekly table with 14 points, she was one of 3 players to get a CR on the Gamball and backed that up with a CR on Bonus and picked up her scoreball as well. Minizin and AAA tied for 2nd with 12 points. Both of them got a CR on the Gamball but this gained Minizin two extra points as AAA did not play the Gamball this week!! Both of them also scored maximums on the Bonus but were unable to add much more which kept their scores down.

Twerton was the only other player in double figures with 10 points, he missed on all his balls but did manage 2 CSs and 3 CRs to post a decent score. Zinman had a similar week with 2 CSs but missed on the Bonus and Gamball. Themaclad had his worst week of the season so far finishing with jut 4 points!! He missed on all his balls and failed to get any CSs so there is hope for everyone else that even he can have bad weeks!!

142 Themaclad
113 Twerton
113 Minzin
110 Zinman
101 Amelia
90 A.A.A.

No actual positional changes in the table with the scoring being quite close. Zinman drops to 4th and Minizin goes joint second but its still very tight behind Themaclad. His lead is now down to 29 points, still very healthy but as this week shows it is reachable if others can find consistency.

Group B

I'll start with a potentially controversial executive decision. I failed to notice that Lady Jane had played 2 scoreballs rather than a bonus. If I took her first scoreball as the scoreball and the second as her bonus, she would have scored -2 points from them. If it had been the other way round, she would have scored +1 point - so I've decided to ignore both balls. If anyone objects to this treatment, please send your complaints to SCO!

Stairs 17
Snooty 14
Derby 13
Lady Jane 7
BBB 6
SCO 4
BaggieOne 4

A second consecutive wipout on the gamball offset an otherwise decent week with 28 correct predictions and 10 correct scores. Half of the week's fixtures saw one team fail to score - unfortunately for Group B, these were the games chosen for the scoreball so no points from that ball either.

Stairs heads the weekly table for the first time this season. He scored on 6 games and got 2 of them, including his bonus, as correct scores to collect 17 points, his best of the season. Snooty remains as the only player yet to head the table but he was only a ball away from doing so. He also scored on 6 games but turned 3 of them into correct scores, but his failure to pick up any ball points kept him 3 points from the top. Derby was the other player into double figures helped by his 1 correct score being his bonus ball.

Not much between the rest. Lady Jane failed to hit double figures for just the 4th week as she continues to take a breather after her incredible start to the season. BBB did match Stairs' 2 correct scores but only scored on 1 other game and blanked his balls. SCO and BaggieOne share bottom spot - B1 was the only player not to pick up a maximum but did at least get his bonus result right.

152 Lady Jane
124 Derby
102 Stairs
99 SCO
95 Snooty
94 BBB
80 BaggieOne

Some shuffling of the pack this week with Stairs rising 2 places to 3rddisplacing SCO and BBB. Snooty also climbs a place but given the congestion between 3rd and 6th places we can expect to see changes here most weeks. Still a healthy lead for our top 2 while BaaggieOne is drifting away from the pack.

Okay I AM gay, so if anyone is going to bring up such a topic it ought to be me.

I understand that as with many sports, football wants to stand aside from , and even above, politics. But I studied politics. The definition of politics that I came to accept was inclusive. It is remarkably easy to find a political aspect to everything that happens in human society. Hard to establish the a-political.

Once you have a complex society diverse human sexuality cannot but be an issue. Attitudes to it unavoidably shape that society. Whatever shapes the nature of a society must by definition also become political.

So my view is the "rainbow" campaign is political. You can therefore question whether embracing any particular view and publicising it should play any part in sport.

Personally I would love to see an openly gay world-class male footballer on the road to becoming an icon. Unfortunately were I now as good as I wanted to be at the game, with a temperament to match, I'd still feel very daunted about entering the dressing room and experiencing that culture every single day. For example how would I have felt about marching out to every big game, holding some random child's hand, as though the ability and desire to reproduce was all that could make me worthwhile as a man? And isn't that in itself a political act very little different from wearing rainbow laces? Politics is all around us, the very air we breathe.

BUT, if being gay and support or opposition to diverse sexuality is political, how come sport itself does not recognise that it cannot help being political? It is everywhere in our culture, it informs our lives and the way we live, it brings nations together and divides them. It presides over collisions in race, culture, religion ........ Sport is political. It makes Israel part of Europe. It makes countries which do not exist into international teams. It punishes Russia and rewards Qatar. Sport and politics ..... how do we divide them?

There is a great deal of virtue-signalling with the rainbow campaign. There is also genuine support. Players who tie their boots and think sexuality shouldn't matter, skill should.

Does all this increase awareness and tolerance or does it eventually subside, like taking the knee, to just another thing that happens pre-kick-off?

What does anyone else think? And you don't need to be sensitive to an old poof.

Gamball:
WBA - Sheff Utd

Others:
Brentford - Newcastle
Cardiff - Watford
Hull - Blackburn
Luton - Swansea
Millwall - Coventry
Plymouth - Oxford
Portsmouth - Bristol City
QPR - Norwich
Spurs - Chelsea