So the Banterbury Review has had a bit of a Christmas break, but the leagues have had anything but! We now have our 16 qualifiers for the Shield, which starts in game-week 21 (Jan 11th). On New Year’s Day we have round 4 of the Banterbury Cup. So as we enter the second half of the season the leagues are really coming to life!! A lot of teams will not just be thinking about promotion or relegation but they will also be dreaming of cup glory or of winning the shield, which in my eyes is the ultimate glory. Ok so we will now go around the leagues, cup & shield with me your host Bench and I’ll try and update you as best I can!
Banterbury Cup – Ties to be played Jan 1st
1 Park Bench Exports v Fergie’s Henchmen
2 Busby Babes v Bocadillo Allstars
3 Gasco’s athletic v Monty (Caz Daz)
4 Son of a Pitch v Cookie’s Monsters
5 Horse FC v Manlet F.C
6 Kop Warriors v DavesRedDevils
7 WhoIsRonaldo v Buzz’s Bomb Squad
8 Owls Rule v Gallowgators
Banterbury Shield
So as I said earlier we now have our 16 for the first ever Banterbury Shield, which consists of the top 4 from each league at Christmas. The qualifying period lasted for 17 game-weeks and I feel the cream has risen to the top. Group 1 looks a bit tasty to say the least!
So here are the 16 and their groups plus the opening day fixtures (GW21)
Group 1
1) Cookie’s Monsters
2) James 101
3) Powerful Potty Fc
4) ChorleyRocks
Cookie’s Monsters v ChorleyRocks
James 101 v Powerful Potty Fc
Group 2
1) Gallowgators (Gallow)
2) CFC (Awesome)
3) White Boys Day (Drexel)
4) Where’s The Dosh? (The Cooky Boys)
Gallowgators v Where’s The Dosh?
CFC (Awesome) v White Boys Day
Group 3
1) Monty (Caz Daz) (Monty)
2) Norfulk-in-chance
3) Arsene’s Boys
4) WhoIsRonaldo
Monty (Caz Daz) v WhoIsRonaldo
Norfulk-in-chance v Arsene’s Boys
Group 4
1) 4th Place Trophy (Burnsey)
2) Park Bench Exports (bench)
3) Son of a Pitch (inertia)
4) we love manchester (gpriley)
4th Place Trophy v we love manchester
Park Bench Exports v Son of a Pitch
Now to the bread and butter stuff, although I’m sure the likes Mutts, Potty and Nifty will not be looking forward to it!
Premier
Cookie is top going into the New Year and what a stellar first half of the season he has had picking up 45 points, in all 4 of the leagues not one of the winners managed 80 points to win a league last season. Last season’s champion Bench is very much in contention, he seems to know how to win ugly (must be his beer goggles), he sits 3rd and just one win off Cookie. Also having a great season are Arsene’s Boys, who came up from the Championship and sit 2nd on the same points as Bench. Big shout-out to Pork n Cheese United who won all their festive fixtures and now sit 5th. Gasco’s athletic & Horse FC sit mid-table after a storming start which seems to have tailed off. Killer Instincts 2nd quarter has been a little bit special, after picking up only a point from his first 11 games he has won 6 form his last 9 including wins over the top 2. At the bottom we have THE MUTTS NUTS who surely can’t wait for the January WC and a new start after managing only one win and a draw in hhis 19 games. Joining Mutts in the bottom 3 at the half way mark are TheKopKnightRISES & Prutsers; allemaal.
http://fantasy.premierleague.com/my-leagues/843/standings/
Championship
Moving on to the championship and Gallowgators ‘hits and build value’ strategy has no doubt worked in the first half of the season, as he is still in all 3 Banterbury competitions. James 101 & WhoIsRonaldo both favourites in Potty’s Bookmakers for promotion sit 2nd & 3rd at the half way stage. I would also watch-out for Mito’s Mercenaries in the 2nd half of the season, worth an each-way bet @ 20-1!
http://fantasy.premierleague.com/my-leagues/9338/standings/
League 1
What has happened to Potty? From 12 unbeaten and an 11 point lead at the top, to 7 defeats on the spin and stuck in Somerset with floods (of Tears) and he goes into the new year 5th in the table. So sitting top is Elliot aka CFC(Awesome), 2nd is Little Red aka Monty (Caz Daz), in 3rd we have GPriley’s we love Manchester, 4th is everyone’s favourite Dingo, DavesRedDevils, in 6th are Fergie’s Henchmen and in 7th is inittowinit***. An interesting 2nd half of the season is certainly in store in this league and lots of banter I hope.
http://fantasy.premierleague.com/my-leagues/9479/standings/
League 2
I would like to congratulate the 4 teams that made the Shield, 4th Place Trophy, White Boys Day, ChorleyRocks & Norfulk-in-chance as well as the 2 teams who are still flying the flag on New Year’s Day in the Cup, Busby Babes (pj) & Owls Rule (NZ Alex).
http://fantasy.premierleague.com/my-leagues/9698/standings/
Qualification League
This is a classic league with 2 places up for grabs in the official Banterbury leagues. The current top 5 are Norfolk n’ Chance, The Cape Bulls, The special onesie, NINja Warriors & Cloughie’s Revival. All 5 are in with a great shout of qulification so best of luck to you all as well as to all the other managers in the league, of course!
H2H for the opening of FF247
What’s the story FC, LANGOLD SM4CKHEADS(Chopper), Mystic Devils, Zoostorm FC (Flingy) and The Gift & The Curse have all won 6 out of 7 in this qualification league.
Happy New Year to you all from the Banterbury Leagues and everyone at FF247!
This article was written by Bench
Cheers Kop
Hey all, think I’m set now, care to rate my team?
GW 20 team image here: http://goo.gl/muVGGg
Silva’s suspended, and Dawson plays Man United – so I drafted in Ward to play in his place – along with my 5th mid Mutch in a weakened 3-4-3, please let me know what you think
thanks
James your team is fine your set to go nice choice of putting Dawson on the bench can’t see them keep a clean sheet I can’t see united keeping it either. other than that your front 3 are good not sure if Rooney is starting we will have to wait and see the news tomorrow mate.
Thanks am, yeah hopefully Rooney will start – though it’s win win because if he does then he should deliver, and if he doesn’t Spurs may keep a CS and Dawson will come off the bench haha – but yeah, we shall see
I’m a united fan so we need to win but you need the clean sheet lol and who you making captain Suarez? Hull i can see goals
Haha, well I’ll take a CS for De Gea, even as an Arsenal fan – it’s between him and Walcott for me mate, edging towards Theo though.. I think Hull are more resilient than Cardiff at the moment – but it could go either way
James – good to go as long as Rooney starts and no rotation surprises… (not Oscar, hopefully…)
Thanks albertini, arghh I hope not! Think he’s getting back in to Mourinho’s favour now mind, and with any luck he’ll start producing for us, as Hazard seems a touch out of reach now.. plus Oscar is a nice differential when he starts
Hope you’re right mate, just can’t see how can I afford to bring Hazard in my wc team, it would be a relief to have Oscar having enough game time.
Thanks Bench :p
Morning innit!! Who are we…ahem I mean who are you going for cappo this week???? Are u keeping dzeko??? I’m tempted to bring in Podolski!!!!! 😉
Err, morning peaky! Not sure on cappo yet mate probably Suarez or Wally I imagine. I wasn’t planning on keeping Dzeko more than 1 week but Silva has changed that now unfortunately. My 4th and 5th mids are Brady and Rav so I will have to do something there and hope Dzeko plays I think. Mito talked me through why Dzeko starts and he was convincing enough for me to take a chance on him again I think.
Podolski eh?! How many punts do you want in 1 week! There are rumours about Giroud to be fair so you never know… Good luck if you do.
Lol I’m still not sure yet innit!!! Will see if I can glean any info later today about team selection.Im tempted to just bring in Nolan for silva then activate wc to shoehorn him back in!!!
Hey innit !!! Happy new yea fella !!
You’re a tad early there Bench but yeah I’ll go with it, thanks – Happy New Year!!!
Silva to Cazorla as a one week punt (playing WC next gw and just bought him last week)?
With Özil and Ramsey out he looks set to start, influential player on his day, against Cardiff at home, if it’s a one week punt (and you have no other more pressing issues?) then I’d say go for it, as long as Silva is straight back in with the WC mate
Yes mate, that’s the idea.
The only other issue I have is Ravel who is dropping tonight. I could also ditch him but I’d have only 4.8 and the only options I can see with a nice fixture are Bannan (NOR) or Ki (AVL).
Albertini – just bear in mind that Silva may not drop tonight. Following our earlier thread, I think I may bench Silva this week and do my FT as Fer -> Wilshere
No, he won’t drop tonight but he will drop tomorrow for sure, currently at -82,1% with a fall of 54% today.
I can’t afford Wilshere, he could be a good option but if I bench Silva and transfer Ravel (just saw that I can afford his dropping of tonight) I will have only 4.9.
Albertini – looking at your squad, how about playing 4-3-3 with Gabbidon (H vs Norwich)?
By the way, tough break in the Cup!
Sorry, missed your reply last night…
I thought I had win it until my 4 points hit were deducted… it would be a nice win against a team with a 1k ish overall but in the end it didn’t happen.
Right now my team for tomorrow is:
Mignolet
Gabbidon-Distin-McCartney (Chiriches, Clyne)
Oscar-Walcott-Barkley-Cazorla or Wilshere (Ravel)
Lukaku-Negredo- Suarez
Are you suggesting I should play one of the benched defenders? For which medium?
blue_moon
#Wenger confirms #Ramsey is expected to miss 2/3 weeks while #Ozil is likewise #Wilshere is also a doubt for tomorrows game
Hope he’ll make it mate, really hard to transfer in a player just to find out he might not play.
Albertini, Ravel has a 75% chance of playing so I’d leave him. How about Wilshire for a week or maybe Cabaye or Sterling. I would be getting Silva straight back tho!
B-Bash, I’ve decided to keep Ravel. It’ll be a one week punt with Cazorla/Wilshere because of the good fixture. There are rumors Sterling will be benched and Moses will play in his place against Hull. I have to go for a 100% nailed on player. Right after I’ll activate my wc and bring Silva back in unless his price continues to drop.
Not heard the Sterling rumour but can understand that mate. Good luck !
Thanks mate, good luck you too!
Hey chaps!
Goalie advice please!
Boruc going. Marshall is otner gk a nd simple options are
1. Ruddy because I have no other Norwich coverage
2. Speroni because he is a little cheaper and rotates slightly better than Ruddy with Marshally, but got Gabbidon
Cheers peeps!
B-Bash – do/will you start Gabbidon often? If not, I’d say Speroni: like you said, better rotation, cheaper, plus I feel Ruddy is overpriced given he plays for Norwich who aren’t too sound defensively…
James, I start Gabbidon based on fixtures. Hes starting on Wednesday for sure which is the only thing that puts me off Speroni! Coleman and Mert are normally nailed in and then its either Gabbi, Clyne or Chester as the 3rd def.
Speroni has always been my thought but surely its better if defence and keeper are all differen?t
B-Bash
Mannone is the perfect rotation for Marshall! Another one who rotates quite well with him is…Boruc!
I was all over Mannone till I heard Westwood is due back mate!
Aye you’re right mate. But I reckon Mannone might keep his place, he has been quite good.