GW 7 – Review

Things seem to have gone a bit pear-shaped after what was a promising start to the new Ultimate Goals season. A quick glance at the stats page will show you just how much of a drop-off in form that most players have seen. Last week’s figures were so incredibly dire I had to wait until this week’s review to even mention them! While GW7 did improve on last weekend’s miserable return of scores, the statistics remain in the ‘poor’ category as far as most gameweeks go. Let’s have a look at what happened…

In a bid to stay as cheery as possible we’ll remark at Ian Mitchell’s very respectable and table-topping score of 85 in a gameweek where goals seemed hard to come by. Stirling Albion (just 17 selections) reeled in the most points for him with 4 goals on the X6 multiplier, while Queen’s Park (47) and Liverpool (68) bagged 3 apiece on X4 and X7 respectively to further boost Ian’s score. Of course, a high score of 85 means Club 100 was deprived of diners for a second week running after GW6’s disappointing points returns. 

High-scoring teams were at a premium at the weekend making it even harder to rack up a substantial number of points, as well as keeping the Perfect 7 at a lowly 146 points. Just four sides managed to bag more than 3 goals; Sutton Utd (0 picks), Stirling Albion, Dagenham and Redbridge (1 selection) and Blackburn Rovers (again just 1 pick), the latter two finding the net 5 times apiece and making up the pointy end of the P7 matrix! So the goals were out there to be seized but the selection stats prove that very few players saw goals in these teams.

Popular choices were, of course, Rangers (the highest picked side with 81 selections), Kelty Hearts (55) and Celtic (56) from the Scottish divisions and each netting just once, while Liverpool and Manchester Utd share the title of most picked English side with 68 selections apiece, with United failing to score at home in a shock 1-0 defeat to Aston Villa (all but written off with just one selection!). Liverpool’s opponents, newly promoted Brentford (just 1 selection), have been one of the surprise packages of the season and held the Reds to a 3-3 draw – maybe their selection rates will go up as the season progresses!

Utd were responsible for 19 of the 29 minus scores and certainly blocked many of your points totals progressing to any substantial points total as they were a popular selection across the multipliers. Such a low scoring weekend meant an average score of just 14 was reached, which admittedly is a marked improvement on the average of 3 that was recorded the week prior – not to mention the 43 minus scores recorded!

Let’s hope GW8 provides us with more than enough goals to pack Club 100 to the rafters and give us a dizzyingly high Perfect 7! The early kick-offs will certainly require some careful thought – Manchester Utd host Everton and Fulham travel to Coventry City for what could be two very close encounters. Select them at your own risk!

 

Sam Brooke-Wilkinson