Our home has been transformed into a Santa Claus shrine, complete with 7.5ft Christmas tree, 100 baubels and enough tinsel to ensnare a small army of happy elves. Beer has been replaced by mulled wine, Radio 1 has been blasted away by old school Christmas classics and my fridge seems dangerously over-stocked with figgy pudding and pigs in blankets!! (that’s the cheese wrapped in bacon variety by the way, a little bit classier than the average sausage ones, I think you’ll agree!!)

On the football front, we had European and Cup games last week, the World Cup draw and a full weekend of Premiership drama. Interestingly it will be the first World Cup that has no debutants and has every single past World Cup winner in the mix. After a favourable draw, Englands odds of winning were cut to less than Brazil with only Spain considered more likely to lift the trophy. All I want now is another Tony Christie remix and I will be officialy pscyhed!!

There were crazy scenes on Sunday as Everton fought back from 2 nil down against Spurs to equalise with 5 minutes to go – only to have a penalty awarded against them in extra time – and to see their American keeper Tim Howard save Defoe’s spot kick. Meanwhile Adebayor went from villain to hero, as he gifted Chelsea an own goal in the 8th minute, before scoring for Man City in the 37th. Tevez sealed the deal in the 56th, as the gap at the top of the league continues to tighten. Man U had a fun away game with West Ham, as Scholes, Gibson, Valencia and Rooney all found the net. With only 10 points between 12th place Blackburn and 3rd place Arsenal, this season is wide open…

So in our little league, there is a similar story with just 100 points seperating 20th place and top spot (still held by Luan but with gap closing). Interesting a lot of the top 10 recorded low points for the week, with many of those in the 10 to 20 spots clocking up some hefty scores to apply the old pressre. All the transfers have come into effect for December, giving us a grand total of 243 made so far.

Until next time… don’t eat yellow snow.

www.thisisfantasyfootball.com

funny christmas

Before anything else, I just wanted to ask the 75 of you who chose the now injured Owen, whether these words mean anything to you…

Eggs? Basket? All Yours? In One?

Not working for you? How about a pictorial representation…

Anyway the month ended with some drama, as I managed to get exactly zero points during the week, which means that Anna goes top, Luan second, Joanna climbs into 5th, whilst Carys and Faye take 6th and 7th. In fact you could say the ladies are seriously bossing it this year. Great skills.

In terms of the first set of monthly prizes, that means that Anna takes the highest points prize (£5). Normally there would be a highest position climed prize aswell but we never do that in the first month as it’s always the same person. The third regular set of prizes is what I call “The Zero Zero Bonus” – basically anyone who finishes a month on a points total that is an exact hundred gets a quid. So this month, Michael J Davey, Gerard Crispie and Mathew James all grab £1 for finishing the month on an even 300 points. The fourth prize each month is at my discretion, it could be a fun quiz competition, it could be a lucky dip or it could be a prize awarded for special effort or skills. Anyway this month, the prize goes to Sam Brown as he was the only manager to choose a team that contains the three top scoring players, namely Rooney, Drogba and Torres. Well done to everyone – who knows, maybe I’ll even throw in some more prizes…

All the transfers I have received will come into effect before this weekends games.

Stay frosty.

www.thisisfantasyfootball.com

GOAAAAALLLLLLLL!!!!!!

It was a beast of a weekend in the Premiership with 33 goals to thrill the crowds including a hatrick from Torres during the 7 goal match against Hull, 4 goals from the mightly Robbie Keane during Spurs 5 nil demolition of Burnley, and a raft of goals from the likes of Van Persie, Gerrard, Babel, Geovanni, Saha, Berbatov, O’Shea, Jenas, Bramble, Drogba, Bent, Jones, Samba, Dunn and Agbonlahor!!!

So back in our magical league, it was a massive case of mixed fortunes, as you can see…

“El Nino’s A Coming” up 78 points and 49 places
“Champagne Super Rovers” up 76 points and 46 places
“Cupcake Cuties” up 75 points and 45 places
“Bees Knees” up 69 points and 39 places
“Shinys Giants” up 67 points and 37 places

“Bayern Bru 2″ down 4 points and 42 places
“Weezeh’s Wanderers” down 2 points and 39 places
“Airwolf” down 1 point and 37 places
“Sarah’s Guys” down 1 point and 34 places

At the top of the league, Faye and Millo both enter the top 10, whilst Luan climbs into 2nd place and Carys also performs strongly climbing to 5th.

Due to the fact that the weekend is falling mid-week, I will accept transfers for next month, up to the end of this Friday with transfers coming into effect for the weekends games. All you have to do is drop me an e-mail with the name(s) and number(s) of the player(s) you want out and the name(s) and number(s) of the player(s) you want in. Remember your team must still add up to £50m or less.

Also if you haven’t already done so, please transfer in your team entry money.

Monday’s just got a whole lot better.

www.thisisfantasyfootball.com

Last update until I return from what I’m excited to call the “Drink, Eat And Dance For All The Time” session (or DEAD FATT for short) so get ready for a bit of a sing-along…

On the 1st day of Christmas, Ian Crocker said to me, I’ve got 956 points and a 36 point lead….
On the 2nd day of Christmas, Mark and Anna said, watch out Ian, whilst we storm ahead….
On the 3rd day of Christmas, Nic said to Jock, we’re climbing so fast, I think my socks blew off…
On the 4th day of Christmas, Alex said to all, my weekly points rock, so now hear me roar…
On the 5th day of Christmas, Marshall said to Jon, give me a subway, you’re falling like a rock my son…
On the 6th day of Christmas, Lewis sung a tune, up 15 places, now I’m over the moon…
On the 7th day of Christmas, Luan said to Oz, you might be ahead, but remember I’m still the boss…
On the 8th day of Christmas, Lloydy felt insane, as he was down near the bottom, but had a cool team name…
On the 9th day of Christmas, Jack climbed 18 spots, chasing his Dad, all the way to the top…
On the 10th day of Christmas, Millo fell 15, now he wishes, Anna had picked his team…
On the 11th day of Christmas, Kirsty said to Dean, I used to be ahead, this is the most insulting thing I’ve seen…
On the 12th day of Christmas, Sam and Quirk schemed, if we’re going to beat Lyons, we’d better play mean…

Hope everybody has a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

www.thisisfantasyfootball.com

Beer Tree

Apologies for the lack of updates but I have been off on holiday – or more accurately I spent 3 days at an awesome wedding, followed by what seemed like a lifetime trying to travel back to Wales. 4 hours just on the M25 during the mother of all storms whilst being overtaken by hedgehogs on the grass verge – all whilst dangerously dehydrated and tired, really tested the old pain thresholds let me tell you. All this means though is that there’s even more movement in the fantasy football points – as this update is basically two weekends worth. Ooooohh, intense!!

For those of you who haven’t sneakily been keeping an eye on the BBC website all day following the final day of transfers, there’s some crazy news:

Man City have not only been taken over by Abu Dhabi but have made an audacios bid in excess of £30m for Berbatov. It’s still up in the air but it’s going to be a humdinger whatever way it goes.

The confirmed last day transfers though are:

In: Everton (Saha), Liverpool (Flora, Gulacsi), Newcastle (Gonzalez), Portsmouth (Belhadj), Tottenham (Pavlyuchenko, Corluka)
Out: Bolton (Dzemaili), Fulham (Zakuani), Liverpool (Finnan, Voronin), Man City (Corluka, Vidal), Man Utd (Saha), Stoke (Parkin), Wigan (Bouaouzan)

As for the scores on the doors – there are a lot of new faces in the top 10 – many of whom spent last season languising in the relegation zone. Top spot goes to Jamie on 120 points, with Sam and Kirsty in hot pursuit. Also in the mix is Zoran, closely followed by the Crispy family. Last years champs are spread across the league at this early stage with Gareth in 17th, Keivan in 13th, Jon in 54th, Dylan in 103rd and MG in 89th. Some big climbs from the ladies with Luan up 104 places, Joanne up 95 places, Rebecca up 72 places and Carys up 70. This update’s biggest faller though was Nadia down 113 places.

As requested by Baker and Rawlings, there is now an additional column that shows the points since the last update (usually a week).

Meterologically speaking, today was officially the first day of Autumn, which means that with rain and wind pretty much guaranteed for every day now until June next year, now is the time to invest some cash in the new Lazy Boy chair and start religiously watching your favourite team in style and comfort. (http://www.drinkstuff.com/products/product.asp?ID=657&gclid=CP6kvtb5upUCFROI1Qodgyz_QA)

Until next time…