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X11 season 45 - de rigueur Mortis

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    It was skin or swim for Viking South Utsira’s title bid as, having climbed back up to second place the previous week, they travelled to leaders La République de Random.
    With five points between the sides at the start of play, only a win was good enough for The Blood Eagles. Hopes of this lasted for, ooh, 27 minutes. That was when Random’s early pressure and chances became a lead, one they never came close to surrendering. It was two by the break and three midway through the second-half as Velvet Android’s side were well beaten.
    Defeat saw Utsira lose a place to sit third in Division 3e. But only goal difference out of the play-off place. Promotion is still possible, but then so is relegation as the side in sixth only trail VSU by five points.

    The mid-table zone of Division 4h is rather congested, making matches such as Drakaina’s meeting with Pinkie Pie rather edgy affairs.
    The first half was balanced pretty well on a knife-edge, The Dragons just shading it with 52% of the ball and the one chance of the 45 minutes. The balance shifted very marginally towards Etienne’s girls after the break, pushing up to 54% possession and 2-1 on chances. With three up front, this was enough for the key breakthrough, Grace Winter nodding home just past the hour-mark.
    If anything Drakaina’s win made things even tighter. They remain fifth, one point ahead of the drop zone but only two adrift of the play-offs.

    Much like VSU, if LNWR Locomotive wanted to re-stoke their promotion fires they needed to beat FC Sprezzatura.
    The Steamers trailed fairly early on as Sprezzatura struck on 11 minutes, and generally found themselves on the back foot despite Viktor Boskovic’s exhortations from the touchline. Hopes continued to flicker as long as the gap remained at one, which was up until the hosts scored a 77th minute penalty. LNWR got a spot-kick of their own on 89, Ragna Hofvander converting, but it was too little, too late.
    Defeat left Locomotive eight points from the summit and seven points from the Division 5:17 play-off spot. However they remain well clear of the drop zone in points terms, as the gap between themselves in fifth and the side who sit just below the line is still six points.

    Having slide from top spot last week, Coxy Ladies Wulpen were looking to get their season back on track when they visited Wheelies Wobblers.
    One would have been hard pressed to find a better side for The Waders to face in the circumstances, as Janik’s side had thrashed Wheelies in each of their more recent meetings. This time might have been different if the hosts had converted a 7th minute penalty, but Wii Lee Rubbish lived up to the unfortunate English connotations her name evokes. Buoyed by this let off Wulpen took the lead on 21 minutes through Moreen Mahony, and added two more as the game moved into its final quarter from Ursula Madjarevic and Laetitia Vandenbergh. All three goals came from headers.
    The news got even better for Coxy Ladies as the side that has displaced them at the top of Division 5:18 suffered an unexpected defeat, allowing Wulpen to return the front of the pack.

    Kanjeng Ratu Kidul WFC made the trip to the Moorside Chippy looking to maintain their recent improvements in their league position as they took on Aspull Academicals.
    Academicals missed out on promotion in the play-offs last year, and seem to have suffered a massive hangover from it as relegation is all-but certain this time around. The Sea Spirits gave them another shove towards it when Diana Doom opened the scoring from the spot 16 minutes in (appropriate scorer!).
    The hosts raged briefly against this with an equaliser only for Diksha Dalmiya to head in a corner before the break and Tia Farisy to do likewise ten minutes after. SeanoftheShed’s side had further chances in the remaining time without adding to their total. They really didn’t need to, though.
    It wasn’t just Solent Sirens in the last chance saloon when they took on Flick of the Wrist; all of the bottom three in Division 5:21 were relying on Andrew7610’s troops getting a positive result against the side in fifth.
    Things appeared really promising in the first half, with Solent holding 60% possession and fashioning five chances. Except, except... Simone de Beauvoir’s 14th minute ‘opener’ was disallowed, The Sirens couldn’t force any of their other chances home and then, with half-time looming, Flick were awarded a penalty, which was converted by Dame Hope [was there some kind of Divisional rule that only players with portentous names could take spot kicks?!?]
    The sides turned around with the score at 1-0 to the visitors, a result that would have sent the South Coast side down. The second-half saw possession flipped to mostly in Flick’s favour and obviously chances followed that. Wait, no, they were almost identical, but with one rather key difference. This time Solent finished three of their five opportunities in the half. Simone de Beauvoir headed an equaliser on 66 minutes, Jin-Ae Hyeong followed suit three minutes later to turn the match on its head (her first for the club) and de Beauvoir made the game safe with a breakaway in stoppage time.
    Solent’s win might Witches of Chiswick would live to fight another day regardless of their result at Victorious Secret. However defeat would leave them hanging by a single fibre.
    The Bewitched were on back foot for most of the first half but with only one piece of damage in the 23rd minute. When it became two soon after the break it was game over though, as Wiblflibl’s side were unable to mount any sort of comeback.
    Following round 10 the Division 5:21 standings look thus; Kanjeng sit fourth, but within three points of leaders Girls Aloud, who visit Indonesia this week; Solent have climbed to sixth after putting off relegation for seven days, eight points adrift of their vanquished foes who remain fifth; Chiswick stay bottom, and are now eleven points from safety.

    A simple win for Csiki Girls over bottom side Farkaslányok wouldn’t be enough, seeing as the visitors manager has been absent for a few weeks. With his side therefore zombified and likely to ship goals in their matches, The Csiki’s needed to run up the score.
    If manager Ad Hoc’s message to his side was ‘hit them from the opening whistle’, then this got through loud and clear – Csiki Girls were three up within 12 minutes following strikes from Liraz Israca (4 mins), Maria Morientes (6) and Ellie Clevan. Clevan added a fourth before the break, completed her hattrick after 53 minutes before Morientes wrapped up the scoring from the spot just under a quarter-of-an-hour from the end.
    Despite the big win, Csiki Girls remain in the bottom three in Division 5:31. They did climb to sixth though, one point from safety. Unfortunately all the sides around them still have to play Farkaslányok in the second-half of the campaign.

    Invisible Ladies had a last, vanishingly small, chance to chase their season ambitions when they travelled to promotion chasers DSV 1900 Frauen.
    The See-Throughs probably needed some luck if they were to win the game. Instead basically everything that could go wrong, did. Manager Pebblethefish had included reserve ‘keeper Persephone Ostrovski for experience. She lasted just 15 minutes before being stretchered off with an 18-day injury. By then it was already 1-0, and that had increased to two when Dee Stoneley got the ball into the DSV net. Disallowed. 3-0 to the hosts from the spot. Two yellow cards in the game, both shown to See-Through Afton Merson. Bah!
    With four games to play, Invisible sit fourth in Division 6:41, six points clear of the drop zone. Avoiding that is the only remaining ambition for a forgettable campaign.

    Menywod Maeshafn came into their game with second-placed The World Is Yours flying on the back of five straight wins.
    Following a forgettable first half, the game exploded into life in the opening five minutes of the second. It appeared to do so in response to a double change by Maeshafn boss IsThatcherDeadYet. Certainly opening scorer Simone Kjellberg was one of the 46th minute changes, and she wasted no time in netting in the 48th minute. By the 50 mark it was two, Ada Westerberg finishing a set-piece move.
    The visitors must have been rather shell-shocked by this. The one response they could muster came after 61 minutes, but the Welsh superiority was reasserted soon enough when Elodie van Hijde socred a trademark direct free-kick.
    That concluded the scoring, and lifted Maeshafn above their conquered foes in the Division 6:55 table. They also climbed past former leaders ZFK Nase Taksi, who were unexpectedly held to a draw. Maeshafn now sit second, one point off the leaders and ahead of third only on goal difference. It promises to be a tense run-in.

    Dublin City Womens FC had suffered a set-back last week when they were beaten by promotion rivals Slingers City Ladies. This week The Dubs took on Terrific ladies but with their attention rather divided as elsewhere in Division 6:57 Slingers were taking on leaders Black Widow FC.
    The aim for Mortal Joe’s side was win the match and not get carded or injured. The winning part was mostly sorted by two quick goals from Mave McAteer and Dympna Clifden on 15 and 19 minutes. McAteer’s was a debut goal, as the youngster had only been promoted from the Dublin youth system two days before the fixture.
    Ai Kamide made it three with a penalty midway through the second-half, at which point Dublin settled. Meanwhile elsewhere Slingers were beating Black Widow 2-0 to throw the top of the table wide open. Dublin remain second, but are now just three points behind Black Widow and remain level with Slingers City.

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      Bloody hell. This OTF title race will be the death of me.

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        You're going to have to win your last game. It's clear that Dandy Town have a banker win

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          oooooohh this is going to be good (well probably not for Etienne or Sean)...

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            Relegation battle is also still very much on. I still expect to see Division 1 next season, but with the right set of results...

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              In fact...

              # Team Pts GD
              6. Tønder BK 18 -5
              7. Hideous Towns 17 -6
              8. Eriskay Expression 16 -11
              9. Nieuwegein Kneebiters 14 -6
              10. Athletico Deva 14 -17
              Eriskay Expression - Tønder BK
              A loss for either team could seal their relegation. My blind optimism would be willing to predict a win for the Danish team, if it weren't for the fact that their only reasonably-numbered and -skilled forward is suspended. So I'll settle for a scoreless draw then.

              Amwythig Dragons - Hideous Towns
              The Welshmen need to win their final game by at least as many goals as Dandy Town win theirs to secure the title, so I'm expecting a 3-0 drubbing here. But a simple 1-0 will do for my purposes too, so let's go with that.

              Nieuwegein Kneebiters - Banik Roystonov
              Under normal circumstances I wouldn't predict a home win here, but Banik have nothing to play for, and the Kneebiters cannot accept scoring only half a goal per game over the whole season. So instead, I'll predict a sneaky 1-0, with goalkeeper and defense once more displaying some ridiculous heroics like in our last game.

              Vita Mortis - Athletico Deva
              The home team have only lost twice all season, but the away team is the only team who still have anything to play for. However, they need an unlikely 11-goal swing to overtake Hideous Towns, and that might be a bit much. Maybe VA needs to play all his youngsters for DV, and in that situation I'll predict a 0-3.

              Final standings:

              # Team Pts GD
              6. Tønder BK 19 -5
              7. Nieuwegein Kneebiters 17 -5
              8. Hideous Towns 17 -7
              9. Eriskay Expression 17 -11
              10. Athletico Deva 17 -14

              Comment


                Might as well predict the fifth game too...

                Csiki Monkeys - Dandy Town
                The Monkeys have conceded only six goals in eight home games. Dandy Town have scored two goals per away game. With the score 0-1 in the 85th minute, will Fríðfinnur Hallgrímsson convert that direct free kick to secure yet another title? Tune in this Thursday!

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                  Bad luck VA by the way in the MLX semis. No OTFers in the final this time.

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                    There's one who has stumbled through to the MLX Plate final.

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                      The Amwythig vs Banik 2-1 win was 2-5 on chances, just to emphasise how nerve-wracking it was.

                      I was very much hoping that Hideous Towns would be safe going into the last match. I suppose they aren't likely to forget to set tactics again.

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                        You never know.

                        Hideous really needed to win tonight, but we didn't and I expect us to go down now, as at least one of Eriskay and the Kneebiters will surely win. If Eriskay pip us, I'll look back on this game with a wry smile, I can tell you.

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                          Originally posted by Etienne View Post
                          The Amwythig vs Banik 2-1 win was 2-5 on chances, just to emphasise how nerve-wracking it was.
                          Banik are specialists at finding new and interesting ways of losing. I consider it performance art.

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                            The final round is pretty tense in D1 too.

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                              Originally posted by Etienne View Post
                              VA, are you reading this? Amwythig would really really like to win the title. I'm sure your DV doesn't really need any more tweaking. ;-)
                              Well, the ball's back in your court now – straight shootout on the last day. Amazing scenes, and my sympathy goes out to Janik as Kopecky has conceded all 5 shots they've faced in the last two games including Slim Shadi's last-gasp FK winner today.

                              Don't ask about my DV, gah. It's even more frustrating in the Heineken, although Atlantis are back to the top of HLC1 today. With just two games to go, however, we could yet miss out on promotion altogether still, it's bonkers.

                              Hideous nobbled Mortis' title defence about 7 minutes from the end of last season, need I remind you Etienne (and HO) by the way. Like the Murphy's, I'm not bitter...

                              Comment


                                Thanks, VA, Mortis did us proud. If only you hadn't taken four points from our encounters...

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                                  Heh, there was a great stage until we finally lost contact with your coattails, where we'd handed you your only loss, the Dandies had handed us our only loss, and you the Dandies theirs. Threatened to be a classic three-way all season for a while there.

                                  Originally posted by Etienne View Post
                                  Don't get me started on the MLX playoffs.

                                  I have to think about The Human League to get back to my happy place.
                                  I'm now with you on that first line. Watched four straight games today in which my various keepers conceded 5 goals from 5 cumulative opportunities (a.k.a. Banik Syndrome), including both shots (one a penalty) Underground faced from Private Pumpkins in the MLX semi. Wretched end to what had been arguably the best season we'd ever had up until that point.

                                  I'm not sure where I look now for my happy place – Mars Rovers in the J4GL, perhaps.

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                                    The search for my current X11 "happy place" leads me to a State of the VA Nation address, such as it is… and I'm still not quite sure where I'm happy. But hey:

                                    Viking North Utsire are in such an intriguingly well-balanced Ultimate League Division 2b we jumped from inside the relegation zone (before our long-awaited derby clash with Etienne's Cardiff Dragons two weeks ago) to the top of the table after beating Cornish Celts (recent league champs but now rebuilding) 4-1 last Monday. Promptly dropped back today after a draw though, as I'm trying to juggle rather too many youths for this level really. Hopefully we can stay in the Cup this Friday as we reach Round 4 and the straight knockout stage.

                                    As Janik has already adroitly addressed, Viking South Utsira got rolled over last week by La République de Random, as I figured we likely would, offering little resistance. We're still in with a playoff shot but have been inconsistent all season so it would be hardly deserved to go up to Division 1 this time.

                                    Mars Rovers are probably the team I'm enjoying most lately, perhaps through being by some way my most recent addition, and certainly after having secured a creditable 4th-placed finish in our maiden season at J4GL Division 1 level. Unspectacular CR though, with 13 single jumps from our 16 players leaving us treading water and with no immediate candidates to sell to raise funds. Another season of consolidation will be welcome, ideally with a derby or two along the way, although after De Stroppendragers won our division that was our last brush with another OTFer for the time being as we've no derbies this coming season.

                                    Rædfearne Island are in a holding pattern in mid top flight in the Brythonnic Premiership, winning and losing alternately and with no chance of standing up to the superstrong teams who have lately hit the top tier after climbing up through the levels post-mergers. I remain ambivalent about the joys of adminning, as it's a git trying to keep all the people happy all the time. Ironically too my least favourite of my own teams are the one whose league I've ended up running.

                                    Royal Atlantis had won nine and drawn one of their last ten until Friday before last, then caved in twice in a row against relatively lowly opposition as we seemed intent on throwing away our HLC1 title chance. Two of the remaining four fixtures were against closest rivals Starchaser and New Vegas, too, so plenty of opportunity to finish badly enough to blow a tenth straight promotion altogether. We managed to beat Starchaser last Friday however, although their traditional late goal against us really set back our GD as it left us -3 behind New Vegas. My attempts to go Offensive today against Canberra Raiders amounted to only a 2-0 win – but there was an unexpected helping hand from Kev's old charges as Olympic Hammers turned over New Vegas at home with two goals from Little Timmie Gidlöf. 4 points between the top 4 though, and we finish away at Vegas, so lots of nailbiting to be done yet.

                                    Sandringham Park Rovers have been in full implosion for weeks, just when I thought we might challenge strongly to get out of Division 2 (er, upwards I mean) at last this season. My move to sign a replacement senior defender in the shape of Lady Penelope Pitt-Stopp just before the campaign started, after Lady Diana Ross-Kemp's retirement, seems to have backfired horribly in my face – I ummed and erred over it for a while, since we could possibly have got by with our remaining trio of defenders plus an academy acquisition, but figured a bit more experience for a couple more seasons would be best. Unfortunately I spent all the million and a half econs we had, and the entire season so far has thus been a deadly spiral of no money, no training, poor form, no scouting and/or win bonuses, subpar performances, mass form drops, each new sponsor cashload going straight on training, no money... repeat to fade. After crashing to Ætheflæd a week ago, to hand them their first win in æons, then getting squashed by Depok on Tuesday we plunged to 9th. This weekend though we finally won – just. It was us barely clinging on to a 1-0 lead against whipping girls Flapton Nogley whose goalie had been sent off in the 37th minute, but I'll take anything I can get as things stand. All I can hope for is for some lucky break where the system decides to hand me only one or two red arrows after a match soon, as otherwise we can't seem to break the cycle.

                                    Tiree Automatic are still looking out of our depth at Pro Zone level, two seasons after demotion from the Xpert Zone – mainly because the terrible affliction we suffered early last season, where neither goalie could save a single shot fired at them for weeks on end, seems to be back with a vengeance. Two nasty defeats in succession put us in the relegation places after only three matches, although there is at least the prospect of putting the Glencairn Inner Hebrides Challenge Trophy up for grabs in a league meeting for the first time ever soon when we finally meet FC Tobermory in a competitive fixture.

                                    Oh, and there's United Underground, of course. Who have admittedly done pretty well with a 'Triple Crown' of MLX C, MLX Shield and Kevchenko Cup, though I'm still disappointed about blowing the chance for a first-ever unbeaten season with minutes to go in the regular campaign – and of course our SF defeat in the playoffs means we've now blown a real chance of an unprecedented MLX Grand Slam, likely for good. There's the lurking suspicion that despite having fought our way back toward the top of MLX after half a dozen or so fallow seasons, now is about as good as it gets once more – our ever-present senior players are soon to go over the hill, whereas the cadre of clubs like VVV who have been ruthlessly developing whole cohorts of super youths into mega players are going to disappear off over the horizon in the next few seasons. So we're going to struggle to remain competitive much longer. Again.

                                    Comment


                                      How are we looking for the next season in the OTF league? Are we losing or gaining any managers as it stands?

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                                        We are definitely having nmrfox back,andmaybe dglh as well. The only possible departure might be Pat Pending.

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                                          So after all this season's to-ing and fro-ing at the top the OTF title comes down to the last game and a simple permutation, the Highwaymen need to beat Csiki Monkeys by one more goal than Dragons beat Hideous, or we need a better result. In our favour is the fact that Monkeys are already on the beach, whilst Hideous are still playing for something, and with Eriskay playing Tønder on the final day need just a point to stay up, so could just attempt to shut up shop against Dragons. We have a good record against Monkeys, but the last four games have produced three one goal victories and a draw, which likely won't be good enough, and Monkeys' strength is in defence.
                                          My biggest gamble this season was selling Vilgot Hyland, though. he had been injured twice and was on course to drop a skill bar and quite likely retire next season, so with money being fairly tight I cashed in. It's bitten me in the arse to some extent with Christiaan van de Ven picking up his third yellow of the season against Mortis in the previous game and getting himself suspended.

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                                            I've just looked at the Monkeys record vs Dandy Town. Bloody hell. It's worse than ours vs Zeugmaspor.

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                                              Hopefully they are following the Vitas Gerulaitas philosophy.

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                                                Originally posted by Etienne View Post
                                                Hopefully they are following the Vitas Gerulaitas philosophy.
                                                Yes, let's say it's that

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                                                  Originally posted by Sean of the Shed View Post
                                                  Hideous are still playing for something, and with Eriskay playing Tønder on the final day need just a point to stay up, so could just attempt to shut up shop against Dragons.
                                                  Oh, thanks, I hadn't worked out that a point would be enough, but I see now that you're right.

                                                  Bit of a shame, really. I was looking forward to getting relegated with a draw, as it would have given me the opportunity to bang on about us going down on the back of a run of 1 defeat in 11 games.

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                                                    Hey, going down with 2 defeats in 11 ain't so shabby either HO.

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