GWs 37 & 38 – Review
I’m delighted to say that after an unwelcome and unpleasant absence…..we’re back! The Ultimate Goals returned in glorious fashion at the weekend, after a 3 month hiatus caused by the Covid 19 pandemic, and it goes without saying that everyone here at TUG hopes that all of our players and their friends & family are safe and healthy. Some leagues may have changed, but one footballing certainty remained; GOALS! Two quick-fire gameweeks kicked off TUG’s return so we’ll get straight into analysing the action!
We’ll start off at the top of the Global League Table where Mike McNab sat on an impressive 105 points at the end of GW 37. Picked just 7 times in total, Stuttgart’s 6 goals on x6 gave Mike his biggest points return, while German Bundesliga Champions Bayern Munich (88 picks) handed this week’s table-topper 24 points with 3 goals on x8. La Liga outfit Celta Vigo (picked only once!) also netted six times, joining Stuttgart as joint top scorers in GW37’s ‘Perfect 7’ score, which reached a very healthy 168 points! Other high scorers included Wolfsburg (6 picks), Hoffenheim (16), Atalanta (51) and Osnabruck (0 picks!!) who each scored 4 goals. Selecting these sides along with any three-goal team on x2 would have secured the Perfect 7 jackpot of £1000 pounds (along with considerable bragging rights!) Duncan Elliot and Heather Roome were the only other players to register strong ‘green scores’ of 100 or more.
Predictably, Premier League champions-elect Liverpool were highly selected (64), so their goalless draw at Everton made for grim reading for many of you – especially if, like me, you relied on them to get your multiplier ladder going at x2! Other big-hitters who failed to find the net included the Championship’s top two Leeds Utd and West Brom, who were selected a combined 59 times, 11 of which were on x2. All this meant that GW37’s minus scores reached an eye-watering 33, made up of 24 minus 20s, six minus 40s and three very nasty minus 60s. Overall we saw an average score of just 15, but well done to the 37% of you who scored higher than that!
Trusting in teams from the newly available European leagues can be a no-brainer. It certainly was for Chris Keogh at least, as his magnificent score of 125 points sees him top the table for GW 38 (only just – Karl Norman was just a single point behind on 124!). Crammed with European footballing royalty, Chris’ multiplier ladder reads like a Champions League fixture list. But in a daring move, Chris left Barcelona (chosen 79 times), Liverpool (64), Real Madrid (90) and Inter Milan (66) lower down his ladder, preferring Red Bull Salzburg (just 11 picks!) on x8 – a stroke of genius given the Austrian Bundesliga champions hit 7 at second placed Rapid Vienna, a quite remarkable feat!
The Salzburg outfit unsurprisingly made x8 in GW38’s ‘Perfect 7’ with LASK (chosen 14 times and also of the Austrian Tipico Bundesliga) hitting 5 on x7. Any four-goal team in the remaining multipliers would’ve yielded a staggering 171 points! With the goals flying in across the continent in midweek, Club 100 was far busier with 13 cool customers sitting on green scores and a massive 51% of you beating the average of 48! Even the number of minus scores recorded in midweek was almost half of the weekend’s tally; just 17 of you unfortunately lost points. Reading through the stats it seems Leicester’s (17 picks) goalless draw at home to Brighton and Young Boys’ (29) 1-0 loss at Thun were responsible for most -20 scores, while I suspect use of the ‘randomise’ button held a few players back at the bottom!
That’s it from me this week. Don’t forget to make your selections ahead of the weekend’s coming fixtures! In England’s early kick-offs Aston Villa host Wolves in what will likely be a feisty West Midlands derby, while QPR make the short trip to Charlton. Other European leagues in play will also have fixtures kicking off before the Saturday deadline, so be sure to get your selections in nice and early!
– Samuel Wilkinson
