To one and all

2 points for correct result
4 points for correct score
2 points for each correct scorer
Correct joker doubles your score   (correct score on a joker would give you 8 points)
Wrong joker result gives you minus 2
Correct Badger gives you 2 points

The prize for winning the league is one rep point.

Cup games: In the event of a draw, it's half the points if you've predicted a draw when it gets to 90 mins and the full points if it's still a draw after extra time. Half the points will be awarded for correctly predicting the winner of the match if it goes to penalties. However, if you do predict a draw and it's a match that won't be going to a replay, you can get a possible extra point by stating which of the two teams you think will eventually win.

Random score generator: I will be using the random score generator again for those who miss predicting, so we shouldn't get some people too far behind that after missing a couple of weeks they lose all interest, because I know it's not easy getting on here every week.
To be fair to everybody, this is going to be like, say if three people in one week miss their predictions, the first one in the table will be given all 0-0, the second one down the line will get 1-0 and the third will get 0-1 and so on, like if there's four missing the 4th will get 1-1, then 5th 2-1, 6th 1-2. and if there are so many missing, might as well pack in.
And if you miss two weeks on the trot, I'll stop until you come back on again. Not doing it for half a season like I did t'other year.  


At the end of the season, the winner of group 2 and the bottom of group 1 will swap places in what is commonly known as "promotion" and "relegation". It's something that most football fans will be familiar with, unless you're a fan of Liverpool or Arsenal or one of those other fashionable clubs.

The second placed player in group 2 will then have a play off with the player who finishes second from the bottom in group 1 to decide whether they will be going up, down or staying where they are.

We're going to have two seasons in one though, just to try and make it a bit more interesting and not so long drawn out. The first season will end on the Boxing Day fixtures, with the play offs being on the dates of the Twixtmas fixtures and the NYD fixtures.

The second season will start the following week, which is usually the FA Cup 3rd round, finishing on the last game of the League One season. Then another period of relegation/promotion play off games, taking in such fixtures as the EFL play offs, FA Cup Final, UEFA finals and such like.

Each group will have it's own set of fixtures. Both groups will have the Town games, with scorers to predict as before. Then it will be a split of League One fixtures and bonus matches, hopefully around ten, eleven or twelve games per Matchday.

The random badger is restricted to three goal scorers in any of the fixtures in your group.

Here's how that will appear at the end of the fixture list. All you have to do is fill in the blanks.......


*** scores for ***
*** scores for ***
*** scores for ***

Any of those will score two points if correct. No minus points for getting it wrong.

Postponed matches will only count if the match is re-played before the next Matchday is under way. Abandoned matches will be awarded half the points for the score at the time of abandonment, so 1 point if you have the correct result, 2 points if you have the correct score.

Substitute or scorer in one of the Town games:- These will be only be allowed if you change them before the match involved has kicked off.

Prediction League Archive: https://www.sportsbabble.co.uk/showthread.php?tid=12830



Division One table after Matchday 19:

1. themaclad = 352 pts
   
2. St Charles Owl = 334 pts
   
3. jjamez = 329 pts
   
4. Baggiebob(BBB) = 325 pts
   
5. Lord Snooty = 296 pts
   
6. SHEP_HTAFC = 288 pts
   

Thursday 26th December:
Town v Stockport
Town scorers:
Stockport scorers:

Leyton Orient v Crawley Town (13:00)
Birmingham City v Burton Albion
Bolton Wanderers v Barnsley
Charlton Athletic v Cambridge United
Exeter City v Bristol Rovers


Sunday 29th December:
Town v Burton Albion
Town scorers:
Burton scorers:

Rotherham United v Stockport County (12:30)
Bolton Wanderers v Lincoln City
Peterborough United v Barnsley
Reading v Mansfield Town
Shrewsbury Town v Northampton Town
Stevenage v Bristol Rovers
Wrexham v Wigan Athletic

Bonus matches:
Championship:
Thursday:
Derby County v West Bromwich Albion (17:30)

Sunday:
Preston North End v Sheffield Wednesday (12:30)

*** scores for ***
*** scores for ***
*** scores for ***

1. neonfoxinthebox = 366 pts
   
2. theo_luddite = 364 pts
   
3. Devongone = 320 pts
   
4. ritchiebaby = 305 pts
   
5. Amelia Chaffinch = 280 pts
   
6. WakeyTerrier = 256 pts
   

Thursday 26th December:
Town v Stockport
Town scorers:
Stockport scorers:


Birmingham City v Burton Albion
Peterborough United v Mansfield Town
Reading v Northampton Town
Rotherham United v Wigan Athletic
Shrewsbury Town v Lincoln City
Stevenage v Wycombe Wanderers
Wrexham v Blackpool

Sunday 29th December:
Town v Burton Albion
Town scorers:
Burton scorers:

Charlton Athletic v Wycombe Wanderers (12:30)
Rotherham United v Stockport County (12:30)
Birmingham City v Blackpool
Exeter City v Crawley Town
Leyton Orient v Cambridge United

Bonus matches:
Thursday:
Scottish Premiership:
Hearts v Hibernian (12:30)

Sunday:
League Two:
Bradford City v Chesterfield

*** scores for ***
*** scores for ***
*** scores for ***

Woking have appointed former AFC Wimbledon and Notts County boss Neal Ardley as their new manager.

The 52-year-old replaces Michael Doyle, who was sacked on Sunday with the Cards languishing 19th in the National League.

Ex-Coventry and Sheffield United midfielder Doyle was appointed in December 2023 and helped the club finish 17th last season.

But Woking have won just five league games this season and are without a win in four games. They were comprehensively beaten 4-0 at Gateshead in Doyle's final match in charge on Saturday.

Ardley has been out of work since he was sacked after 34 games as manager of York City in February.

"The diversity of his journey illustrates his flexibility, his promotions and play-off achievements tell us that he can take us to where we hope to be one day," director of football Jody Brown told the club's website., external

Ardley has 'values wanted' at Woking
"His battles with relegation and team rebuilding processes are all invaluable experiences that he'll have learned from. Neal has the values we want in our head coach."

Ardley scored 26 goals in 301 appearances for Wimbledon FC as a player before the club moved to Milton Keynes to form MK Dons.

The former midfielder also represented Watford, Cardiff City and Millwall in a 16-year playing career.

After taking over as manager at AFC Wimbledon in 2012, Ardley steered the club to League Two safety on the final day of his first season in charge and to promotion to League One in 2015-16.

He also had stints in charge of Notts County and Solihull Moors, leading both clubs to a National League promotion final but losing on both occasions.

Woking are in the process of being taken over by a group led by former Dagenham & Redbridge vice chairman Todd Johnson.

THE MATCH

SATURDAY 21ST DECEMBER KO 12:30PM

v

LAST MATCH



We got back to winning ways as we came from behind again to see off Oxford. It was Oxford who struck first, Leigh prodding home from a flick on from a cross. We levelled things when Windass scored from close range from a Charles corner. 1-1 at the break. Onto the 2nd half and we were the better team and quickly took the lead when JLowe scored from close range after Oxford failed to clear a cross. We then made it 1-3 when Bannan and Smith combined and the latter set up Gassama who finished brilliantly. We created further chances but there goalie made several saves to keep the score down.

DEJPHON CHANSIRI, GET OUT OF OUR CLUB    

THE MATCH



So our final home fixture of the year and our visitors are Stoke. Stoke have been languishing in the lower half of the table for most of the season and they haven't won for 7 games, so if they have enough quality to avoid the relegation dog fight only time will tell. They are managed by Narcis Pelach (Spanish), who took over in September after being a coach at Huddesfield then at Norwich. There leading scorer is Tom Cannon who has 8 goals and 1 assist.

DEJPHON CHANSIRI, GET OUT OF OUR CLUB    

ALL TIME H2H

OWLS 39
STOKE 35
DRAWS 25

CURRENT FORM

OWLS W L D W W D                                                            

STOKE D D L L L D                        

EFL STOOGES

DOES IT MATTER THERE ALL CORRUPT  

SAM ALLISON
Andrew Fox and Hugh Gilroy
Fourth Official: Josh Smith

THE TEAM

Beadle
Palmer Bernard Iorfa Johnson
Bannan Charles
Ugbo Ingelsson Lowe
Smith

SCORE & SCORER (HOME TEAM SCORE FIRST)

2-1 Smith

WEDNESDAYS FIRT GOAL TIME

26

ATTENDANCE

27852

BML LEAGUE

Maddix 11
SCO 10
Imre 10
Washington 9
Wereham 7

BMPL

Stateside 11
Southey 10
Owlkev 9
Pei 4

OTHER GAMES OF MILD INTEREST

Aston Villa v Manchester City
Sunderland v Norwich
Lincoln City v Reading
Notts Co v Bradford
Barnet v Halifax

HHDHH

THE MUPPETT LEAGUE




KATE BECKINSALE TRIBUTE PIC

Hibs meet Aberdeen again, this time at Pittodrie. Given past results there should be plenty of goals to come, so let's hope Hibs start off the game a lot better than they did against Ross County. The Staggies didn't punish us as they might have done, but I'm sure Aberdeen will be much more clinical.

If we can get firing on all cylinders, we could sneak a win up there, but to be honest even a point would be an improvement.

Group A.

Minizin 20
Zinman 16
A.A.A. 16
Amelia 12
Themaclad 11
Twerton 11

Second best scoring week of the season so far for Group A with 86 points in total. Two players recorded their highest weekly scores and the Boro v Millwall game produced the most points for a game so far this season!! Minizin leads the way this week with a seasons high 120 points for him. He was one of two players to get a max on the Gamball, backed that up with a CS and a CR on the Bonus. Zinman and AAA were joint second with 16 points, AAA was the other one to get a CS on the Gamball, with Zinman getting a CR. Zinman did have the luxury of 2 Bonus balls after last week postponed game and he did manage a max on one of them but missed on the other to keep his score down a bit.

Amelia is 4th this week with 12 points, she missed on the Gamball but got a max on the Bonus. Our top 2 going into this week ended up as the bottom 2 in this weeks scoring, both with 11 points. Themaclad got a CR on the Gamball and the Bonus but not much else, Twerton missed on the Gamball and the Bonus but did manage 2 CSs on other games.

155 Themaclad
137 Minzin
129 Twerton
128 Zinman
112 Amelia
108 A.A.A.

Themaclad stays top but his lead has shrunk by 1/3rd as Minizin moved above Twerton into second place. Zinman is just a point behind Twerton in 4th. Amelia and AAA are still adrift a bit but at least AAA reached the century mark!! Themaclad has been leading for ages but has struggled recently, lets see if the pack can chase him down!!

Group B

Stairs 26
Snooty 21
SCO 18
BBB 13
Lady Jane 11
BaggieOne 7
Derby 7

A record week for Group B in a few ways:
The first week to see a total of over 100 points.
The highest individual score.
The first time more than 1 player has scored in the twenties.
The highest total score on the balls.

A great week for Stairs with a score of 26 points with 4 correct scores including the gamball. While most of us were laughing at Ipswich's last minute winner, Stairs was unhappy as it prevented him from hitting 30 points. Snooty's 21 points was only good enough for 2nd place - just 4 correct predictions for him but 3 of them were spot-on including both the gamball and bonus. SCO took 3rd with a solid 18 points from 5 correct results but was held back by turning just 1 of them into a maximum (though at least it was the gamball!)

BBB was one of only 2 players not to get a correct score and was the only one to miss out on the scoreball, but 5 correct predictions including both major balls saw him comfortably in double figures. Lady Jane recovered a bit of form to gain 11 points - she was not helped by the other hilarious last minute goal by Forest (Derby was another player to miss out on 4 points from that game).

Not such a good week for BaggieOne and Derby who prop up this week's table. B1 was the only player to miss out on both major balls while Derby only got 3 correct predictions and no correct results.

[b]162 Lady Jane
137 Derby
137 Stairs
126 Snooty
125 SCO
109 BBB
94 BaggieOne[b]

Despite some moderate form over recent weeks, Lady Jane maintains a healthy 25 point lead at top, up from 21 last week. This increase is due to Derby's relatively poor week which sees him caught in 2nd place by Stairs. Snooty and SCO swap places and BaggieOne remains at the foot of the table and the only player yet to reach 3 figures.

Gamball:
West Ham - Brighton

Others:
Villa - Man City
Brentford - Forest
Portsmouth - Coventry
Sheff W - Stoke
Burnley - Watford
Millwall - Blackburn
QPR - Preston
Leicester - Wolves
Spurs - Liverpool

This will be the last set of fixtures for 2024. I'll post the next set for the weekend of Jan 4th/5th next week if I get the chance.