GW 5 – Review

After last week’s turbulent weekend of goal scoring action, complete with surprises and upsets, you wouldn’t have thought things could get more exciting – well, they have! The goals were utterly flying in throughout GW 5, which meant that an astonishing 32 players hit triple figure points for the week (that’s nearly 20% of you!) However for some players (myself included!), it was agony to see so many others profit from a weekend awash with goal scoring, after backing the wrong team(s) to do the business.

By tradition we will begin with ‘the cream of the crop’; a huge congratulations to Ally Jessop and Matt Kokins on topping the weekly table. Both players used wise combinations of 4 goal Man City and 5 goal Gillingham on x7 & x8 respectively, as well as solid selections such as Ipswich Town, Woking & Cove Rangers to score an impressive 126 points. It’s safe to say that any team currently facing Bolton Wanderers is going to be popular as they have conceded a dire 15 goals in the last three games. So third placed Alan Chalmers will be gutted he didn’t put Gillingham on a higher multiplier than x6, as he trailed the top scorers by just 4 points, despite his picks scoring a combined total of 23 goals – the same as the joint leaders. He did, however, sit comfortably in the prestigious Club 100 along with 31 others who were ‘in the green’, the highest amount so far this season! Well done to each and every one of you!

There were some big scores across all divisions this weekend, with Man City (picked an astounding 132 times!) and Liverpool (a ‘mere’ 88 picks by comparison!) dismantling Brighton and Burnley respectively, scoring 7 goals between them. Fellow Premier League outfits Chelsea (picked 96 times) and Sheffield United shared 4 goals at Stamford Bridge, whilst elsewhere West Bromwich Albion edged Blackburn in a 5 goal thriller at the Hawthorns, East Fife v Raith and Elgin v Edinburgh City both resulted in 6 goal thrillers up in Scotland and in the National League only two teams in the entire league failed to score; Harrogate Town & Sutton United.

Unfortunately, not everyone shared the delight of seeing their score rocket to the top, or at least hit the average. There were a punishing 15 minus 20s this week and 3 sorry minus 40s, with Leeds United, Sunderland and Wycombe Wanderers the main culprits for the downfall of the 18 minus scorers. All of this meant that this week’s average score was a respectable, if not spectacular, 47 points.

Now, despite the international break looming like a bruising centre-half, there is still plenty of Ultimate Goals action to be enjoyed. We may be forced into losing some leagues, but stepping into the fold and taking their place will be the National North and South divisions (historically providing plenty of fun and games!), as well as fixtures in the Scottish Challenge Cup. If the Scottish League Cup drama of GW 3 was anything to go by, there will be plenty of goalmouth action to be enjoyed so don’t go anywhere and be sure to get those selections in!

– Samuel Wilkinson