A giant-like performance (with long shorts)

Right, in absence of a match report, you will have to read Elite's here - including description of our 'giant' striker who scored the first goal with his shoulder. Giant? I think not.

Some funny shit did happen in that last game:
- Graham (feeling striker-like) ordering poor Spencer to go get the ball for a throw in. Just pointed and yelled, while blowing harder than the normal stallion.
- Tangihaere surging forward with a classic 'REFEREE!' Elite players just laughed, and one said 'Referee, I'm a diver!'
- After the final whistle Graham turning around and yelling 'Ref' thinking he was penalised.
- Rauru's little push and shove. How many times have we seen that this season, are we ever going to see anything more?
- Paddy constantly blaming the bobbling ground for his crap shots.
- Paddy runs to the wrong side to deliver a corner

Ok, Fantasy points:
Paul 3 (+60, +3 saves)
Joe 3 (+60, 1 bp)
Lloyd 10 (+60, 1 assist, 1 mf goal)
Paddy 5
Robin 12 (+60, 2 goals, 2mvps)
Graham 9 (+60, 1 assist, 3mvps)

Everyone else 2

Leaderboard:
Paddy 77
Rauru 60
Panda 56
Lloyd 55
Robin 50

Fantasy Stallions Vs Elite

Gots to do this early before I forget who played and did what.

This week its real easy - everybody gets 2 points for participation (appropriate huh), except for these 3:

Paddy 1 (60+, 1 assist, 1bp, -5 oggie)
Lloyd 4 (60+, 2bps)
Panda 9 (60+, goal, 3bps)

 Fantasy Analysis:
If Lloyd is the Stallions fantasy Lampard, Panda has become the Malouda - 3 consecutive hauls of 9 points has seen heavy investment and significant price rises. Meanwhile the price of our regular strikers seems to be dropping! While Stallions have the best defence in the league, punters are still holding back from investing - the players are doing damn well, but clean sheets are hard to come by, and with the popular fantasy target, goal scoring defender Corey/Leighton Baines still on the sidelines ...

As for the grand totals, I'm just going to do the top 3, cause its pretty embarrassing for the bulk of the team who work hard and only get 2 points a game:

Panda = 34
Logan = 25
Lloyd = 23

Photo: his haircut may be better, but Malouda's goal scoring celebrations are crap compared to Pandas  (yesterday's was class - the now patented running behind the goal, but this time with the twist of pointing to the ball lodged in the back of the net). Love it.

Game week 1

Arrgh, an annoying one huh Stallions - 2-0 up at halftime whopping it up, but then ... no match report (can you be bothered doing them Corey? Anyone else?), but not a bad start, made some good chances, and it was great to be out there running around in green & gold again (and extra good to have Nick there running wild).

Nice to have a beer after the game, but we got to start with the awards etc. Hows about this - people should nominate Stallion/pony moments and we can vote on them, and I say we let the ringins Ben B & Gus decide on MVP points (email them to me).

For me:
Stallion - Nick - the returning Stallion
Pony - Panda - a hell of a game, but that open goal was terrible (not that one, the earlier one) ...
Pony - Paddy - our first kickoff of the season calling for the Stallions move.
Pony - Paul - forgetting the headband & pony on his return to the team - disrespect.

Anyone else got anything?

Lots of draws in the grade - Raiders got hammered, looks like Lower Hutt are shaping up as contenders. Results here

Div 7 Yellow Fever forum up and running if anyone wants to contribute. Interesting to hear that the Uni 4th team has a few disgruntled ex-elite players.

Update - here's the Elite match report - and once again, its full of crap: 'As the game kicked off we were all over them like a fat kid on a cupcake', 'This led to the Stallions grabbing two very cheap goals' - No wonder Corey hates them, and their players left ...

Fines vs Elite

Now, I'm not doing this cause I was in the points for a change, but with both finemasters piking on Saturday I had to step back into the role, have the book on me, and think that ben's been pretty crap in terms of posting fines - such a good way to have a chuckle at ourselves. Was a good night too - great to have Robin back and firing up at the fine session. Its fair to say perhaps a couple of drinks too many were imbibed. When we reconvened for the nix game the following day there was not too much interest in drinking ...

Anyways, a good win for the Stallions. It went a little like this:

Stallion - Aaron
Pony - Spencer - Family arrive just in time to see a monumental shank roll over the sideline, and have a good old family laugh at crap daddy. This including finger pointing and possibly tears (of embarrassment?).

MVPs:
3- Aaron
2 - Rauru
1 - Gus

Best fines:
Ben B - Ben throws short ball to Mike - never should that combination of names and words be uttered again.
Jason - Got sat on.
Jason - stepping up to take a free kick with the steely gaze - 'I do this all the time'-like. Umm last time we saw that face was before THAT penalty!Politely told that his services were not required.
Mike - The return of the Butch - a few very dodgy early moments.
Ben H - glorious defensive header - off one of our attacking corners.
Lloyd - Meh, played well - but didn't live up to marquee status.
Aaron - 'is it 6 minutes yet - I won't get fined if I sub now'.
Aaron - Shit celebration after talking it up all season.
Robin - the sell out uniform fine - yes, those who were not there - Robin played in sports shorts (admittedly pretty long ones).
Robin - Not quite the old Rob (perhaps you should have worn the old shorts).
Gus - Upsetting the marquee player.
Gus - Playing with shirt around shoulders - cue much hilarity and 'nudie man' from Spencer's kids.
Robin - the whitest knees ever seen on a football field.

Nice work

U.S 2 v 0 Wgtn Elite Nairnville pk 15th August 2.30pm

Two goals in the 2nd half were enough for The Stallions to take 3 points in the 2nd round of the "cup" series

The 1st half was pretty even throughout each side having chances i think we had the better of it though judging by the amount of corners we claimed and pressure we applied and how well we were defensively shutting them down early and not giving them room to shoot.

A nasty head clash between Ben Hodges and an elite player who came off worse for wear caused the half to come to a premature end the lost time to be made up in the 2nd half, the elite player was taken off to hospital for observation via an ambulance.

The 2nd half
It took 2mins and 7 seconds into the second half for the Stallions to take the lead Aaron drilling a ball into the net from within the 18 yard box to the amazement of the elite side and the ecstasy of the Stallions. 1-0 (47.07mins)

Elite were their own worst enemies for the 2nd they were caught offside about 20 yards into our half and the resulting free kick by Tangi ? went up the field bounced between the two central defenders for elite who then let Rauru run after it unchallenged for the easiest of tap ins giving U.S a 2-0 lead and left the elite defenders abusing me for their useless defending claiming Rauru was offside nobs 2-0 67minutes

They had their chances the best coming from a penalty they received after Tangi brought down their striker in front of goal the resulting penalty hit the left hand post at speed and cannoned out into the right hand side of the field where we cleared

after 52 mins of play in the 2nd half the game was over the Stallions victorious and Elite wondering about what might have been a top effort from everyone who played and it was great to see Nick White there supporting U.S along although he must be fined for not bringing his boots and calling a sub.

Stallions : Ben Brooks,Mike,Tangi,Corey,Graham,Aaron,Ben Hodges,Lloyd,Spencer,Rauru,Gus
Subs : Jason,Robin,Dan

Goals : Aaron 48min Rauru 67mins


This week Stokes Valley @ Delaney #1 2.30pm

Elite Match report

At least they beat us to something this season - and got a match report up - here

Bit of frustration here I think - sure they could call us 'ponies' last year when they actually managed the odd win, now that we have done the treble on them we are 'donkey's' - sure.

A couple of odd things: apparently they dominated the first 20, one of their players totally 'wasted' his player down our left side - umm, can't remember that sorry. And worst of all they call Hodges 'one of their best players'. Obviously full of crap.

Until next season chumps ...

Elite Match report

Here
Photo: Corey 'who did a very good job of coming out and making himself as big as possible to stop the shot.' Its really former Sheffield United and England goalkeeper Willian Foulke.

Even Elite mention the Stallions great balls to feet. Must have been cause Aaron was away huh Tristin?


Oh yeah, and here is Spencer after his postmatch pie in the Elite clubrooms.

Elite Match report from a couple of weeks back

Here

The expected complaining about the ref. Whatever.

And talk about 'their big old fashioned striker' who 'smashed a screamer from 25 yards'. A weird amalgam of Rauru and Tristin? I guess Tristin is more in that mould than rauru, but he smashed no screamer.

Here is a rather different talk - the Magpies dissecting their 8 goal hammering of Elite. Probably the refs fault ...

'A little odd'

From Elite's match report against the Marist Cobras: 'their prematch
huddled mantra 'cobras - cooobrassssssssss' was a little odd!

Rest of the match report for this week's stallion opponent here (about half way down). A lot of respect for the Cobras.

So, new finemaster, what's the fine for the fines not being posted all week? Would never, never have happened last season.

The Electronic Vote vs Elite

Warning - this is going to be a long post ...

Awards:

And your democratically voted mvps are:
3: Robin (combined 14 points)
2: Nick G (10 points)
1: Mike B (6 points)

Honourable mentions to Panda and Tristin (if they had voted and given each other points this line up would be very different).

As for pony and stallion - I have nominations - look to the poll to your right. You have until Saturday morning to vote. Now (this is especially for you Nick) lets be honest here - 1 vote per poll per person.

I will run through the candidates now - although it should be stressed almost everybody struggled for nominations - a pretty meh game all round. I have dropped off some of the nominations that have no chance of being supported - ie the 2 people who nominated themselves for pony because 'I played like shit'. And for the pony all references to the second goal - since Nick G, Paddy, Jason & Corey were all blamed - the f**ken butler did it!

Stallion Candidates:
- Nick G - Big game at the back, 'he saved our bacon a few times'.
- Paddy - Another dominating game in the midfield. Kept the team together.
- Mike B - A huge game in defence (well, most said an excellent first half, a rather more shady second!). The nomination though is really for standing up and being big on D after taking so much crap coming into the team.
- Panda - Came on and sparked team to life, always in game.

Pony Candidates (some of these names may be familiar):
- Ben B - A fall from grace, from 'legend' double stallion back to Ben B 2005.
- Paddy - General whining, aggro, fighting and a shocking Butchard-like tackle, followed by a cowering away when they guy got up ready to fight.
- Nick G - Last week hangover - not wearing hand-earned headband, continuing to screw up goal kicks.
-Tristin - Forgetting the post-match beers.

Fines:

A long list here. Heres how this will work - I'm listing all nominated fines. These can be disputed in the comment box. If not successfully defended all these fines stand. Unless stated otherwise, all of these fines are 50c.

Ben B:
- Fall from grace - playing (at times) like it was 2005 again (Jamie cracks a little smile somewhere).
- Screwing up coming out to take the cross. Just lucky that someone (Corey?) was there to put pressure on the striker that prevented him scoring.
- Crap goal kicks.
- Fumble in the box.

Ben H:
- Bad role model - swearing in front of his own kids.
- Transforming into wild beast by the zoo fine - Partner: 'I haven't heard him talk like that before'.
- No shot striker - or no shots worth remembering ($1).
- Central mids giving too much space.
- Trying to claim that the 'good striker' mentioned in the other teams match report was him, not Tristin.
- The loudest 'Nutsed' call ever made (ever beat out Robin's the week before!).
- Nutsed 2 minutes after nutsing someone ($1).

Robin:
- Feather-brained - general mental slowness in getting into the right
position.
- Two kind-of strikes - one was really prospecting from way outside the box
when we were scrambling at the end, the other was a limp header straight to
the goalie. ($2 - 2 missed shots).
- Not calling nutsed - nutsed fear after last game.
- Having got over his fear of zoo animals from last time in Melrose.

Aaron:
- Center-mids giving too much space.
- Missed shot ($1).
- Dr Phil fine - spending valuable game time analysing relationship between Ben and his partner.
- Must harden-up/get more involved.

Paddy:
- Graham emulation fine - calling "Rob" when he kicked the ball, and
completely fluffing it, the ball going in the complete wrong direction.
- Not calling nutsed.
- Multiple Angry man/ref abuse ($2).
- Missed shot ($1).
- Centre-mids giving too much space.
- Shocking Butchard-like tackle ($1).
- ALMOST gave Nick the perfect pass when completely free and through, but it got intercepted. Unlucky but he admitted it wasn't good enough so that's a fine.
- Responsibility for final goal.
- Telling Ben to turn with the ball only for me to turn straight in to a storming opposition player.

Corey:
- Think he was behind his man when the last goal was scored, though
that was a bloody well-timed strike.
- Kicked ball into opposition's hand.
- Horrid collision in box, opposition limps off.

Jason:
- Not the running man. Claimed he was incapable of running when told to jog up to half way with the defensive line.
- Missed shot ($1).
- Self claimed 'general shit'.
- Giving too much space.
- Left marker, who scored the goal ($1).

Nick G:
- Continued goalkick shockers ($1).
- Angry man/ref abuse ($1).
- No headband ($5).
- Extra special crap goal kick that flies out, followed by ('Where is everyone! - who wants that ball!'). Finemaster special - double that - Nick joked about fining the whole team for this incident ($1).
- Giving man too much space.

Mike B:
- Floating like a butterfly, stinging like a bee - floating throwins, ankle smashing tackles. (That's 2 fines me thinks - $1).
- A lack of any ball playing skills.

Tristin:
- Forgetting post-match beers. What's this worth? The same as forgetting the headband/pony? ($5?)
- Texting twice on game day - to find out both where and when we were playing ($1).
- The 'Not Willy' low workrate fine.
- No self fining.

Panda:
- Striker positioned in the defensive line.
- The smiling assassin.
- No self fining.
- No strikes, or nothing recalled ($1).

Right, I'm sure there are some errors/problems with this. Whatever. Can I go to work now?

Elite Match Report

We may have a new most hated team, well an old, returning most hated team.

Here is Elite's match report where we are called 'ponies', 'geldings', with much talk about how we were 'castrated' - all in basically the same para they laugh off the handball/goal.

Anyways, here it is ... Hardly an enjoyable read following the earlier, much more positive assessments of Stallions08 from opposition teams.

Funny, for someone rated our best player by the opposition, Tristin isn't riding high in our votes for MVP! Just kidding - but a reminder that all votes need to be in by tomorrow.