Fog Dude

I'd better make my pick nice and early so you all know where you stand for the bet: Premier League Brentford 0-1 Liverpool Fulham 2-2 Hull City Newcastle United 1-0 Aston Villa Leeds United 2-0 Manchester United Nottingham Forest 0-2 Arsenal FA Challenge Cup Fourth Qualifying Round Leatherhead 0-3 Yeovil Town Irish Premier Division Sligo Rovers w/Fog Dude 2-1 Dundalk Ligue 1 Strasbourg 1-1 Paris St Germain Olympique Lyonnais 3-1 Nice Portuguese Cup Round of 64 54 Louletano 1-2 Rio Ave

The final scores went into the initial post on Sunday night, and led to a change at the bottom of the table. With the damage done the week before, I Bent My Wookie slipped into last place behind Stinky Dad despite the latter self-handicapping by missing the first weekend and sometimes picking late. They weren't the worst performer for the round though, as MVP RULZ kept up the tradition of a poor score while getting a D2D bet wrong. It could've ended up even more wide of the mark, mind you, as his beloved Owls needed a last-gasp equaliser to avoid defeat at Huddersfield. Only Chutney Spoon failed to disagree within him and yet was somehow joint top scorer anyway. At the other end, TildeGuy consolidates his lead over Gooner by increasing it from four points to five. Everybody except the aforementioned MVP RULZ and Bent Wookie took a point from the randomly selected "wildcard" fixture, which was match #2 at Stamford Bridge. That turned out to be an even more comfortable home win than anyone was expecting against an out-of-sorts Cherries side. Elsewhere, slim pickings really. Victories for Liechtenstein's women (as in the football, not recent political changes there) and Leverkusen's men were generally good for one-pointers, but all the domestic outcomes proved to be a mixed bag, while Bayern's draw down the road at Augsburg, in their closest thing to a local derby nowadays, caught most people out. We've had a bit of a complication with one of the D2Ds but it's not the next one, so let's not worry about that just yet. In the meantime, a new card with a long-planned D2D should appear at the top of the thread just a moment.

Loathe as we might be to praise Romesh on here, I think he got it spot on when he said the instruction to choose "the most trustworthy person" in the initial group before they even got to the castle, was an experiment to see how quickly most other contestants turned on them.

Premier League Aston Villa 2-1 Brentford Chelsea 3-1 Bournemouth Ipswich Town 1-0 Fulham Sunderland 1-2 Brighton & Hove Albion Manchester United 2-0 Spurs Liverpool 1-1 Manchester City League One Huddersfield Town 2-2 Sheffield Wednesday w/MVP RULZ Imitation Bundesliga Augsburg 0-1 Bayern Munich Mainz 1-2 Bayer Leverkusen Women's international friendly Liechtenstein 0-0 Gibraltar

So that's where I heard the name! I think one of his relatives was the sole representative of Mexico at a past Winter Olympics, in skiing? That's one minor annoyance put to bed then. As for padel: a whole load of new courts just opened up down the road from here, but whenever my Dad visits he'd prefer to find somewhere to play pickleball instead these days.

Sorry, didn't notice you hadn't put an England score until I came to collate the results together on Monday night (they're also in the opening post, natch). In hindsight, predicting that Croatia would score doesn't look too clever but it does unfortunately leave you having scored nothing from the remaining nine matches. I've double checked because it gives me no pleasure to report somebody getting nought so do let me know if you think I've got that wrong. Anyway, for some reason ImgBB is co-operating again this week so we're back there again for the table. Despite getting his D2D bet wrong, as mentioned Chutney Spoon wasn't the worst performer for the round and in fact made it into double figures to stay in the top half of the standings. Seven of the eight people who picked on time correctly disagreed with him to nab two bonus points apiece, albeit Rory wrongly thought the tie would go to a replay. After being unlucky not to take the lead last time out, TildeGuy makes no mistake and does overtake Gooner after all. The latter was saved before by the randomly selected "wildcard" game but in a reversal of those fortunes, it was match #5 at Windsor Park that came out of the hat and only Tilde got it spot on as a stalemate. Stinky, although he posted his guesses late, is now only three points adrift at the bottom. Elsewhere, wins for Scotland, Denmark, Cowdenbeath and both Man City and Barcelona's women all generally proved fruitful, alongside a draw in Port of Spain. Meanwhile, Ireland being held in Serbia caught some people out, while England's huge victory in a training exercise in Rijeka was only good for one-pointers. Mostly back to normal football this coming weekend, aside from a single international that will make everybody roll their eyes and/or groan. The next set of 10 will also contain another D2D in the original post in short order.

The above isn't just a random long name, it's an old posh German family. Not sure how somebody from there ended up managing beach football in Gib, mind.

A role taken last year by her namesake Stephen, of course. She did actively ask the people she was in the car with on the way back from the task not to tie the theory to her at all about Leigh-Anne being a Traitor because she redid her make-up after the blindfolds session.

I believe Ramsey is non-binary. Fun opener anyhow. At this point it already feels like it might be a mercy killing if they have indeed offed James Acaster right off the bat. Not that Amol Rajan is one of the more welcome presences in the castle but it could be amusing to see him try to turn things around on Richard's behalf all of a sudden.

Should've made my guesses while I was at it yesterday. Whoops. Oh well, still not too late: UEFA Nations League Croatia 2-2 England North Macedonia 3-0 Scotland Ireland 4-0 Israel (in Bačka Topola, Vojvodina) Cymru 3-1 Skidmarks Northern Ireland 2-1 Georgia CONCACAF Nations League Trinidad & Tobago 1-2 Curaçao FA Cup Third Qualifying Round Rushden & Diamonds 2-0 Braintree Town w/Chutney Spoon Scottish Cup Round 1 Cowdenbeath 1-0 Berwick Rangers WSL Manchester City 0-1 Arsenal Liga F Barcelona 4-1 Real Madrid

I genuinely didn't know that! Thank goodness for the Cup and its ability to improve my knowledge of Scottish geography. Since this stemmed from a late change to the card, I forgot to mention in the blurb that the tie in Scotland can potentially go to extra time and penalties (the second of which we ignore), but the match south of the border will go to a replay if level after ninety minutes. But you all knew that already, right? All right, I was just spitballing to try to figure out why three late sets of picks might've coincided with an international round, but if you simply forgot, Bent Wookie says they just didn't realise they hadn't hit "Submit Reply" (which has happened during ordinary weeks sometimes, to be fair) and Gooner only missed one game then I presume we're good to carry on as is.

Not sure if I messed up or there was a change at very short notice, but it turns out the Belgium came took place on Monday night after all so you can have that pick ruled as valid... which unfortunately doesn't do you any good. I'm afraid the other two have to be null and void else it'd set a bad precedent as I've no way of knowing if people have looked at the scores or not. You're in good company, since two other people also made their guesses in various shades of late this time. I understand some of you probably post around the same time as finalising your Fantasy League line-up, so during these breaks you're out of your usual routine, but nobody's ever suggested either in these threads or in a DM that we should take time off as well. If enough players want it then I'll put it to a vote, but any changes would only come into effect next season anyway since things are already in motion for this campaign. I've just made a dozen attempts to upload the table and ImgBB wasn't co-operating, so I had to remember one of my backup plans from five weeks ago. The nascent FPL Cup standings are quite minimalist; colour will be added when participants mathematically confirm progress to the knockouts. Because the algorithm used to decided the opening clashes was "Foggy's brain" we ended up with two blockbuster encounters between both last season's leading duo and the current top two. Although nobody made it into double figures, the former didn't disappoint as Vegeta bested ultimo by the odd point in 17 to keep the gap at the bottom down to four points from joint best performer Stinky Dad. TildeGuy also beat Gooner 8-6 to reduce the deficit at the summit to just three, but the early pacesetter was saved by the randomly selected "wildcard" fixture, which turned out to be the aforementioned match #7 in Brussels. Had the randomiser landed elsewhere, Tilde could've won 10-4 and taken the lead in the main competition. Elsewhere, surprisingly slim pickings for an international round, with only the stalemates in Belfast and at Europa Point generally proving fruitful, with too much optimism beforehand for goals actually being scored in Ljubljana as well. The non-Home Nations outcomes were a right mixed bag too. In the one club meeting, Liverpool's long-awaited victory in a women's Merseyside derby caught most of you out. A late change to the next round from what I was expecting to publish a week ago. All will be explained in the first post shortly, but just to let you know we're pausing the FPL Cup for a few weeks and doing a D2D this coming weekend after all.

UEFA Nations League Slovenia 2-1 Scotland England 0-2 Spain Denmark 3-1 Wales Gibraltar 1-1 Andorra Israel 0-3 Ireland (in Debrecen) Norway 1-0 Portugal Belgium 2-2 France Northern Ireland 0-1 Hungary Sweden 1-2 Poland Women's Super League Liverpool 0-0 Everton

My only other thought was

Off the top of my head I think I heard somewhere that it's

And that's why we love football. Stafford Rangers did indeed cause the upset of the round, winning 3-2 to knock The Bulls out at the earliest possible hurdle. You're right that it perhaps not the best choice of D2D fixture since you'd have only got four more points even if Hereford had gone through, but it was definitely a more interesting pick than any league fixture would've been. As for feeling "physically sick" at the Old Firm prediction? Well, you've gotta go with your head sometimes and not your heart. Anyhow, the results were up in the opening post on Sunday night, and the table was updated soon after that, complete with the draw for the FPL Cup on the right-hand side. It was based on a seeding system using performances in both competitions last season, but I've put the groups into alphabetical order to disguise that somewhat. I had considered one big "Swiss system" (i.e. new European League phase-style) group of 10, but with our usual "crosspools" clashes in odd-numbered groups it'll likely produce a similar outcome regardless. We'd need a few dozen more frequent players for me to consider actual divisions so there's no relegation as such, but if Stinky Dad is now worried about the wooden spoon then he's in good company because it seems reigning Double holder Vegeta has decided to join him. The gap there is now four points, just one fewer than at the top where Gooner still leads and three people are level on 40 points as his nearest challengers. Despite being best performer for the round, Rory isn't among them but he does at least make it into the top half of the standings. The randomly selected "wildcard" fixture was, strangely enough, once again match #10 which took place at the Estádio do Dragão where the home side triumphed by threeOn goals to one. Nobody managed the exact scoreline, but half a dozen participants took an extra bonus point each. Elsewhere, victories for Everton and PSG generally proved fruitful, but score draws in Italy and at Penydarren Park produced more of a mixed bag of guesses, while reverses on the road for title-chasing Arsenal and Hull caught most people out. On reflection, should've possibly included the fash-on-fash* Madrid derby instead of that tie in Merthyr, but adding a game from yet another league makes things untidy. Truro have since won the replay to keep alive hopes of a highly rare appearance by a Cornish side in the First Round proper. As promised, the final stats for D2D picks which total more than thirty despite no overlap, because one person sent more than three teams in just in case (I do always say I need a minimum of three teams, to be fair): That's mainly in spoiler tags for reasons of space, by the way. It still doesn't give too much away. Right, high time we put a new lot of encounters into the original post, including the first tranche of FPL Cup group clashes. See you all there. *Not as in Justin vs John. Figure it out

I thought the "massive asterisk" was gonna involve some dodgy tracing of the boards' origins back to 1966, which would make it predate ARPANET. So, in the interests of being the resident pedant around here, I feel the need to point out we're talking about a silver anniversary here, aren't we? Wasn't in any of the predecessor (or rival) forums but did start lurking after about a year, then decided to dive in and set up an account a few months later and you've all had to suffer ever since. The other two wrestling message boards I hung around in at the time were both American. One definitely doesn't exist now and the other I haven't even checked on for decades, but they just didn't feel right compared to here anyhow. You're all a decent bunch really.

Premier League Brighton & Hove Albion 2-2 Arsenal Everton 3-1 Ipswich Town Newcastle United 1-1 Hull City FA Cup Second Qualifying Round Merthyr Town 2-1 Truro City Stafford Rangers 1-0 Hereford w/Bent My Wookie Scottish Premiership Celtic 1-2 Rangers Serie A Roma 0-1 Internazionale Fiorentina 0-3 Napoli Ligue Un Marseille 0-0 Paris Saint-Germain A Primeira Liga Porto 2-0 SL e Benfica

The final scores went into the opening post on Sunday night, and for the fourth time in five rounds, they were very much on the low side, so there wasn't too much change to the table. Have I been picking odd fixtures, have the results been genuinely unpredictable so far or are we just a hopeless bunch? Possibly a mix of all three, although the last card didn't feel particularly controversial. Gooner still leads, but his advantage is cut to eight points by new nearest challenger Bent Wookie, who leapfrogs TildeGuy alongside joint top scorer Chutney Spoon (who got the only exact scoreline guess this time out for Hibs' win in Dingwall). At the other end of the standings, it's now ultimo that Stinky is trying to catch, with the deficit down to four. The randomly selected "wildcard" was, unusually, match #10 at the Anoeta where a majority of participants correctly thought Atleti would triumph, but nobody thought it'd be as comfortable as it actually ended up, so have to settle for a single bonus point each. Elsewhere it was an utter crapshoot, but the outcomes at Dean Court, Old Trafford and the City of Valencia Stadium (confusingly enough, not the home of Valencia CF) were the least bad for one-pointers. Next week is the cut-off point for sign-ups, so there'll be a lot of housekeeping: the full D2D statistics (ideally without giving too much away) plus the draw for the FPL Cup group stage. In the meantime though, there's still one more lot of domestic matches before the men's international break, so we're going to use that to get somebody else's first turn done and dusted, in the middle of a set of nine other games in the first post in just a moment.

Welcome in, it's another bloomin' FPL season! Sign-ups are now closed. Missing a D2D turn incurs a points deduction. The plan is to update this line with the standings throughout the campaign, so here you go. === First half is from the EPL this week, then our scheduled trip abroad is to France. My only personal visit overseas this year has been to Ireland, so I picked an Irish team for my first-choice D2D... except the league in the Republic generally has a full programme exclusively on Friday nights nowadays. It just so happens, though, that on my birthday weekend they've made an exception for one match, so I've chosen that as the game for my initial turn. [I'm not saying I was in Dublin to offer the FAI a bribe, but only because I don't want the forum to get into legal trouble.] We've also reached crucial stages of both the English and Portuguese main knockout competitions. In the former, I was going to include Harrogate Town (second-highest ranked team in at this stage) going to fallen giants Bury but that's been brought forward to lunchtime for TV, so we've got the on-form Glovers' sojourn to Surrey instead, to face a side who've been knocking on the door of the competition proper for a while now. Lastly, there's been an unwelcome change to the format in Portugal this season, since clubs in European competition (so The Big Three + Braga + surprise holders Torreense) all get a bye to the fourth round now. There are still multiple former winners in the Round 3 draw though, plus one ex-champion in the form of Belenenses, so it's still worth featuring. The tie in question involves Rio Ave, from whom English also-rans have been known to poach managers, getting a late holiday to the Algarve as they travel to the city of Loulé. Week 10 fixtures Premier League Brentford v Liverpool Fulham v Hull City Newcastle United v Aston Villa (17:30) Leeds United v Manchester United (Sunday 14:00) Nottingham Forest v Arsenal (Sunday 16:30) FA Cup last qualifying round Leatherhead v Yeovil Town Irish Premier Division Sligo Rovers w/Fog Dude v Dundalk (19:45) Ligue Un Strasbourg v Paris St Germain (16:15) Olympique Lyonnais v Nice (Sunday 19:45) Portuguese Cup Round 3 Louletano v Rio Ave (17:00) All games kick off on Saturday and at 3pm unless stated. Times are given in BST. === FPL Cup group stage matchday 2 To follow later this month. === Week 9 results Premier League Aston Villa 2-2 Brentford Chelsea 5-1 Bournemouth Ipswich Town 2-1 Fulham Sunderland 0-2 Brighton & Hove Albion Manchester United 1-1 Tottenham Hotspur Liverpool 0-3 Manchester City League One Huddersfield Town 2-2 Sheffield Wednesday w/MVP RULZ German Bundesliga Augsburg 2-2 Bayern Munich Mainz 3-4 Bayer Leverkusen Women's international friendly Liechtenstein 3-0 Gibraltar