skerries fantasy football

Stephen Ireland: In Need of Analysis

Entering what would, in horse racing terms, be known as “the home stretch”, it appears as if the runners are set into a sort of holding-pattern that has produced an air of inevitability about the entire proceedings. So just to shake things up a bit this season we have a twist, in much the same way that the premier league seeks to ape the activities of the American sporting fraternity, the fantasy league has shown it is not about such flattering imitation. There is however a difference, the idea that was stolen here was a good one, a draft. Not the kind that prompts you to inspect whether or not the door has been closed properly and certainly not the kind that boosted Canada’s supply of workshy bong merchants in the 60s, but an altogether different animal. After much deliberation regarding the fairness or relative merits of different systems it was decided that each team could swap one player for an unsigned player regardless of value, the only conditions being the formation could not change and the previous 3 players a team rule had to be upheld. On the basis of a last goes first system a concensus was reached in a surprisingly amicable manner, from there the choices were simple.

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Diaby Out: Mission Accomplished

Transferational innovation was the toast of the town earlier this February as the Skerries Fantasy Football contingent instituted their first (and possibly last) draft for the season. Emmanuel Adebayor was the golden goose for this year and was promptly snatched up by old turkey-neck Keith O’Dowda, who’s less than prodigious management talents gave him first dibs on the Bendtner-insulting African. Next up was his Howard Wilkinson abilitied partner and house-mate in crime, Brian “Robson” Branagan, who’s poor run gave him the option of replacing “Dowie-faced” Dirk Kuyt with Le Sulk. Harry & The Hendersons boss Eoin Carroll has seen his fortunes rise of late, but was still advantageously placed in the bottom half to get his hands on surprise performer Elano, who replaced the much (and rightly) maligned Diaby.

Up top Flints jettisoned treatment table maestro Ledley King, bringing in a solid defensive reinforcement in Richard Dunne. Sean, hoping for a narrowing of the gap to the top, drafted in Sean Wright-Phillips for Kevin Nolan. And rounding it up on the top Stevo swapped Darren Bent for Jermaine Defoe, hoping that his recent move to Portsmouth would be enough to keep the momentum going for his band of Atheists.

Remember: Draft Effective Saturday February 9th. You keep the scores for your old player for all games played before that, and your new players pick up points from that day forward.

Best of luck sweethearts.

Brango: Analytical

In years to come historians of the game will debate how the “International Break” came to be known as such, some will argue that is was named after Michael Owens need to break some part of his anatomy in every international outing, others will argue that the true origins of the phrase lie in Stephen Irelands regular break from sanity when international fixtures take place.

For those who dwell in the land of Fantasy management however the international break is a treacherous time, when injury reports are more heavily scrutinised then scorelines. But alas there is yet to emerge a fantasy football cartel with the power of a G14 to pressurise a change in the current programme so international football is something we will just have to learn to live with, like a disease that cannot be cured but can be managed with the correct levels of medication. It does however provide the opportunity for some reflection on the proceedings thus far. Early season analysis can be somewhat misleading because the tables can change relatively quickly for any number of reasons but we are into the season proper with a quarter of the league games completed and as Flinter is fond of telling us a good quarter will set you up nicely.

Tottenham’s complete refusal to conform to any sort of logic has been baffling to pretty much everybody and those who gambled, some heavily, on Spurs having their best season yet have been burned with few exceptions. On the other side of Norf London the tale is quite the opposite with Arsenals enfant terribles surprising most with their superb early season form. Chelsea ,shorn of their charismatic manager are now looking leakier than ever before and those that spent big to acquire the Chelsea back four look to have been ripped off so far. Liverpool have been predictable in their unpredictability, beginning well and then stuttering into this much needed international break. On the other hand Man U have been unusually goal shy so far while playing with a confidence at the back that seems entirely at odds with a defence featuring Wes Brown. The question of whether or not a Tevez and Rooney partnership will prove too similar or too ugly a strikeforce to work together is still unknown. Man City have been this seasons surprise package but they don’t really feature in any of the Fantasy sides so the great work of Dunne Richards and Elano has gone largely unrewarded, something that may change come the January reshuffle.

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Torres: Streamlined

The list of great managers bouncing back from illness accepted another name into it’s illustrious annals this week as Steve “Food Poisoning” Keogh joined the likes of Sir Bobby Robson (cancer), Gerard Houllier (heart attack) and Glenn Roeder (can’t stop talking about his brain tumour) in making successful comebacks to management. He shrugged off a fortnight of digestive pyrotechnics to put 76 points on the Skerries Fantasy Football board for Week 7 and take his lead to 40 points. Fernando Torres paid tribute to his solid-faeces-challenged manager by hitting a hat-trick against Reading in the Carling Cup, 28 points being the reward from the Eastern-Block mullet enthusiast.

Emmet “Stomach Ulcer” Flinter has taken the SFF table by storm in recent weeks, and has filed squatter’s rights for second in the table - Keith and Brian’s new apartment beware! The “not waiting for your incarcerated partner” adherent put 30 points between him and third this week, with an impressive team performance from the likes of Vidic, Bale, Keane and Bellamy combining well to put Emmet’s title challenge, if not health, into a much more promising position.

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Mini-Sam: Dishing out the Bolton Blues to Eoin

In an acrimonious week where supposed side-nudging profiles revealed themselves as nasty barbs, Steve “Gay For His Own Voice” Keogh let his homosexual verbosity do the talking on the pitch, as his faith-challenged strike-force catapulted him 21 points into an early lead. While “Atheism’s Target Men” would usually bring to mind Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, Darren “No Friend of the Church” Bent and Fernando Torres (the Spanish for towers, possibly symbolising the twin towers) provided the Godless ammunition to leave his competitors scrambling for loaves and fishes.

No fan of faith himself, Seán “Go The Distance” Carroll saw his early title challenge stumble somewhat, with his side yielding only the third best points haul of the week. Fat Frank Lampard was on target with a hotly disputed penalty at Anfield, but it was not enough for the West Coast Cooler fanatic to keep the pace with his erstwhile title rival and back-packing behemoth.

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Whether it’s the cut of their jib or the skeletons in their closet there’s a lot to the Skerries Fantasy Football managers that you may not know. Thanks to the contributions of their luminaries, manager profiles are now on-line. You can find them from the team pages on the manager’s name link.

Martins: Assassination Survivor

Caring and sharing are not emotions prevalent in the cut-throat world of Skerries Fantasy Football, but Steve “Street Fighter” Keogh and Seán “Teeth Fighter” Carroll share more than a common interest in gay culture this week, as they cosy up to each other at the top of the table. 43 points is the magic number for the titular table toppers, as they scheme to secure their place at the pinnacle of Skerries fantasy sporting achievement.

Closely following the leading pair with his beady eyes, Brian “Trannagan” Branagan is confident his pair of guns, in Florent Malouda and Jolean Lescott, are enough to mount a challenge in the early weeks of the league - and at least rival Flinter’s guns, in some kind of perverse metaphorical challenge.

Early week table topper, Eoin “Cool Runnings” Carroll, may be disappointed to be propping up the lower end of the table at the week’s end, but he won’t be disappointed with the 26 point haul from striker Obafemi Martins. Martins shook off a Nigerian assassination attempt in time to be declared fit for the game, and bagged a beautiful brace, which he dedicated to his friend, who is still recovering in hospital with bullet wounds to the chest.

This week’s Little Sams are Emmet “National Lampoon’s Iranian Vacation” Flinter and Keith “National Lampoon’s” O’Dowda. Keith was sweating earlier on in the week until his top Drog bagged him a goal to help lift him off the bottom, but Flinter is still sweating after star man Cristiano Ronaldo delivered an unmanly “butt” during the week at Portsmouth, seeing him out of the next three games. Stinger!

Rambo: Started the Taliban

Scorned at this year’s Fantasy Football bidding for his Nuno Valente fixation, Eoin Carroll hit back with the success of another fixation… namely “Oral Fixation Vol.II” by Shakira. That album shot right to the top of the charts, and Eoin has followed suit by topping the table after the first update. Of course the weekly bragging rights will only be secured if he stays there for the weekly round-up on Friday, but the man is in confident mood after a peachy Obafemi Martins double.

Full team updates are still being worked on so expect some progress by this time tomorrow. Automatic daily updates for teams and league tables will be up and running in the next day or two so keep checking back regularly you SFF fanboys!

Brango: Predictive

So August is upon us again and after allowing the fertile ground of fantasy management to remain fallow for last season battle is once again set to commence, and as usual there are some strange decisions, some bargains David Dickinson would be proud of and a couple of new managers coming into the cash rich world of top football management. Carlos “Controversy/Cro-Magnon” Tevez has continued his love affair with illegal transfers adding some extra bite to the pre-season jousting.

The form is hard to call coming into this season on account of last seasons lay off but given that Keith remains the champion he will fancy himself as one of the stronger contenders, there is caution to that tale though as previous champions Kev Brennan and Emmet Flinter can testify after dismal finishes last time round, the view from the top can be spectacular, but so can the fall. Kevins relegation from the league last time round was so hard to take he became a virtual recluse and eventually exiled himself to some barren outpost of the British empire. Flinter on the other hand will be looking to rebuild his shattered reputation with a solid season although he has begun in somewhat controversial circumstances.

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Welcome to the site Chaps,

I’ve emailed (or will email) you a user name and password to log into the site. Once you’ve logged on you can leave comments on any update or news item on the site (try it now with this post to see that it’s working).

This is just the first draft of this site. Over the next few weeks I’ll be adding more and more improvements as I get them done. So if you have any suggestions leave them at the end of this post.

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