First, nuts and bolts. Here is Saturday’s recap. And here are Sunday’s results:
T17 Ulfstead 0 vs. 2 #6 Junction & Sheds
#8 E.C.D. 2 vs. 5 #12 Marron
#1 Dryaw 3 vs. 3 #10 Suddery
#3 Peel Godred 2 vs. 0 #9 Glennock
#12 Lakside 3 vs. 5 #18 Brendam Utd.
We’ll recap that bolded Feature Match in a bit. Where does the weekend madness leave everything? Here’s a smexy link to the updated complete table.
With four matches in this inaugural league season to go, we now have a tie atop the table! More, there’s once again a tie for 17th, right on the Relegation line. And remember, in IoS PL, even on points means even – period. No goal differential or other tiebreakers. If needs be, tied teams will have a playoff match in Suddery at season’s end.
Starting at the bottom, Brendam United jumped back out of the Drop Zone again with a solid road win. After Ffarquhar‘s home loss Saturday, fated favored B-Utd. again as Ulfstead couldn’t even score a goal at their own place. The two losers sit on the Cutline, tied.
At table’s top, a team other than Dryaw FC sit on the top line for the first time in months! On a rainy day over most of the Isle that kept scores down, then-#3 Peel Godred scored two early, then played keep-away to win 2-0.
That meant Dryaw needed the full three points at home against Suddery to maintain their #1 solo status. Here was Noob’s prediction to this Feature Match:
Noob’s call: Dryaw haven’t overwhelmed teams all season long for the most part, so one fears them overly. Suddery will have confidence after having beaten them in March and be no less comfortable wearing visitors’ kits today. But with Wilbertson back, DFC won’t drop all the points. 3-3
Even former full-time website prognosticator Noobstradamus had to admit I nailed this one COLD.
“Lucky schmuck.”
The teams traded early goals and then that rain came in and made it tough on everyone. Visiting Suddery led 2-3 heading into stoppage time, appeared set to sweep the season series from Dryaw and perhaps ruin their championship campaign.
But after a week off with an injured neck, Dryaw star striker Christopher Wilbertson made his move on POTY! Clearly not 100% yet, he struggled to contribute all match long. Just couldn’t keep pace nursing that neck. It took a corner kick set piece to give our hero his chance.
CW hung back at the edge of the box, understandably seeming to not want to risk further neck injury in the scrum up front. But it was trickery! Suddery made the mistake of leaving him completely unmarked and could only ogle in wonder after CW went charging to an edge for the tying header at 93′. The late point earned keeps them even with PGFC.
After weeks of title contenders not being able to string much success together, Knapford may have found their stride. 2-2-0 in their last four. They’re winning close, they’re winning in low and high-scoring affairs. That 2-3 road win over now-#3 Peel Godred was their match of the season.
Kirk Ronan, how are you still within double-digits of the table’s top? 2-2 in the last four isn’t awful at a glance. But that stretch started with a quirky back-to-back split against #19 Arlesburgh Utd. Last week’s 2-3 road win at top-half Glennock was admirable, but Noob doubts it washed away the bitter taste of an 0-7 loss to Marron right before the Easter break.
While that may be working in Loon-land, things went catastrophically awry Tuesday night when some supporters of the Isle of Sodor’s Championship club Ballahoo A.F.C. tried singing it. 15 people ended up being treated after the ensuing brawl in the stands, with three still in intensive care at Vicarstown Memorial Hospital.
So what happened? After Ballahoo’s 4-2 win over Cross-ny-Cuirn FC, some home supporters started singing “Wonderwall”. A few catcalls aside, the crooners continued unimpeded until the beginning the chorus.
Sheela Boyd, president of the creatively-named Ballahoo Supporters, had this to say after hiding her brass knuckles: “Many of us thought it was a joke and they’d stop. But we no more than heard, ‘Because maybeeeeeeey,’ and knew they were for real and that chorus had to be stopped.”
We welcome them. But they should've left their Oasis fanboyishness back in the Kingdom. Look, we understand the band is considered iconic there. The instrumentation is superb. The production choices they made for studio albums were concrete and admirable. But Liam Gallgher's singing is unbearable to anyone with an ear.
Ethel Merman. Stevie Nicks. Both Brooks and Dunn. Liam Gallagher. There's your top four list of most awful, nasally singers the Lord God saw fit to create. We will never know why, as His ways are higher than ours."
“Ballahoo FC will be docked one point in the table. Dumping beer on anyone is wasteful, alcohol abuse. Liam Gallagher’s singing is terrible and his tambourine-playing is marginal at best.”
The key match of the weekend turned out to be Dryaw’s home loss to Lakeside A.F.C. The league leaders were missing star striker Christopher Wilbertson. Was it the difference? Hard to say. Sodor’s “L.A.F.C” held them to just one goal in their other match this season, too.
It’s actually their U10’s — who’ve gone by “Wonky Whistles Youth FC” — that got the goods. Their jerseys were pathetic, but their coach used some straaaaange inspiration to improve things for the little kickers.
Should two or more teams tie for 1st, they’ll have a Playoff at the national stadium in Suddery. The same will be true if there is a tie surrounding the Relegation Line. No other form of tiebreaker will be used. This includes Goal Differential, despite pressure from our cousins in the English FA to follow their model.
But my best friends American author Daniel J. Heck and Doug Barr (1980’s TV “The Fall Guy”, screenwriter and vintner) both hopped back across the pond. Saturday’s feature match was in Brendam, and so there I b&b’ed for the week.
stormed back from a 2-6 deficit to earn a draw in the Walney Channel Derby. This team that had muddled through just an ok season went back to their pre-Premier League identity, as one that plays seriously rough defense. Remember: even moderately hard defense has always been considered uncouth historically.
United were featured in the Brendam Derby back in February and that brought them no good fortune whatsoever. There got utterly trucked, 7-0, by intracity rivals Brendam Harbor. Their trajectory, their problems have remained the same. They absolutely cannot score. On Sodor, where defense is typically an afterthought, that’s confusing and unmanageable. They’ve scored all of two goals in their last four matches, going 0-1-3, are in real danger of the Drop.
What could be troubling him? Interview time. I excused myself from my dinner companions, swiping the last full bottle of Barr’s Hollywood and Vine Cellars 2002 vintage cab sav ‘2480’ off the table. Heck and Reynolds could argue whether the latter’s space-swashbuckly 
(For the record, if the protagonist/s is/are young and the plot has no loops and any prominent adult characters are neutered of real power, it’s kid lit. If no, than not.)
Wilbertson: Since I'm not as famous as that giant-headed Haley Joel Osment-looking diva, I even kept my dream more realistic than Kane's. I set my sights on the American Alliance of Football.
