Last Post of the Season

At last the final whistle has now been blown on our historic 38^th  Season of Golden Goals and another covid season has passed without too much trouble. I am very glad that this season has passed the winning post. But it was not the season that we managed to beat our highest ever recorded number of entries of 149 players. The success of this season was all down to you. The good news is that we do not have to wait long for the next season to start. Although we once again lost a few friends this season, we have also gained some new ones. Lets hope that we can continue with this nice run as we have had a lot of success over our full 38 year history of Golden Goals. 

This season even with the virus, we did have a couple of records that have been broken this season, but more on this later. I hope that you have had a lot of fun watching your name go up and down the table and as shown above is where your combination of teams have left you standing in the final position of the season. But before we go all into that, lets take a look at what happened to the last few games of the season. 

Championship Play-Offs

We had had three of the four teams playing for a place in the Premier League. BRENTFORD lost their first leg game against BOURNEMOUTH 1-0 away to pick up their eleventh blank score sheet. They then won the second leg game 3-1 at home to win 3-2 on aggregate. Bournemouth finished on a total of 84 goals which is their highest score with us. They have beaten their previous 2002/03 Season score of 79 goals. In the other play-off game, SWANSEA won 1-0 away to Barnsley in their first leg game and then drew their second leg 1-1. Swansea won 2-1 on aggregate. In the Final, it was BRENTFORD who are promoted to the Premier League for the very first time after they won 2-0 against SWANSEA. Brentford have finished the season with 96 goals which is their best score beating their highest score of 95 goals from the 1998/99 Season. They had a total of 18 votes. Swansea picked up their thirteenth blank score sheets and finished on a total of 64 goals and had just one vote. 

League One Play-Offs

We also had three of the four teams here with OXFORD UNITED losing 3-0 at home to Blackpool in the first leg and that was their sixteenth blank of the season. With their second leg game they drew 3-3 at home and lost 6-3 on aggregate. Oxford United finished their season on a total of 83 goals. LINCOLN CITY won their first leg game 2-0 at home to SUNDERLAND. That was Sunderlands eighth blank of the season. In their second leg game they lost 2-1 away. Lincoln won 3-2 on aggregate. Sunderland finished their season with a total of 72 goals. In the Final, Lincoln City took on Blackpool and lost 2-1. Lincoln City finished on a total of 88 goals which is their best end of season score with Golden Goals. They had just one vote this season. 

League Two Play-Offs 

Only one of our teams made it through to the play-offs here and they were TRANMERE ROVERS. They lost their first leg game 2-1 at home against Morecambe and drew their second leg game 1-1. Tranmere lost 3-2 on aggregate. Tranmere finished the season on a total of 61 goals and had one vote. 

So it’s Congratulations to (Me) STEVE REEVE as I now becomes our 38^th Champion with Golden Goals staying at the top for the last sixteen weeks of the season. This is the second time that I have won and the last time was back in the 2008/09 Season with 290 goals. So I am back in our history book and in the Champions League where I finished in 22^nd place on 307 goals. I had the winning combination of  BRENTFORD (96) MANCHESTER CITY (106) and Rangers (105).  All three of my teams finished as our top three teams. I picked up three blank score sheets throughout the season In the end I finished just 9 goals clear of  Michael Fisher who finally finished in second place with a total of 298 goals. 

ROAD TO CHAMPION

So our new Champion’s name, STEVE REEVE is now back in our history book, but what about the other people who managed to get to that magic number one spot. We had a total of six players that made it there is season. We already know that I was at the top for sixteen weeks and the longest. JED WEARDEN came next with a total of 13 weeks staying there in weeks 9 to 14 and then again from weeks 16 to 22. We then had LINDA ADKINS with 5 weeks and KEITH THOMSON with just two single weeks. We then had two players that had just one week and that was FIONA CARTHY with the very first week and BOB SAWYER in week 3. 

Below is the list of our top five champions of  Golden Goals. 

CHAMPIONS LEAGUE 

                                   NAME                   M/W           W/E          TOTAL 

                              1. L. KING                   116            239              355      2001/02

                              2. P. DAVEY                 132            216              348      2013/14

                              3. J. WOOD                   92             252              344       2016/17     

                              4. M. PEPPERRELL      91             247             338      2002/03

                             5. C. BOLBERY             95             239              334      2009/10 

So what happened to our past Champions. Well we had our largest field ever with a total of sixteen that played in this season. Only two finished in the top twenty-five and they were STEVE REEVE our 2008/09 Champions in 1^st place and TOBY BICKNELL our 2014/15 Champion finished in 6^th place. We then six more that finished in the top 50 and they were me CHRIS BOLBERY who won in our 2017/18 Champion in 28^th place followed by last seasons 2019/20 Champion BRADLEY CLARK in 32^nd place. We then had our 2002/03 Champion MICHAEL PEPPERRELL in 35^th place. In 37^th place came KELLIE STRATTON 2018/19 Champion and KEAUS SETNA 2005/06 Champion in 41^st place. RICHARD WILLIMS 2015/16 Champion was next in 43^rd place. Our lowest Champion finished in 90^th place who was our 2016/17 Champion JOHN WOOD. 

At the other end of the table, we had seven players that landed on number 116. The player who finished rock bottom this season was JOHN NICHOLLS. John was there for the last twenty-two consecutive weeks of the season. Over the season John picked up eight blank score sheets. He had the combination of  BRISTOL CITY (57) FULHAM (32) and WEST BROM (42) total of 131 goals. John’s combination finished in 38^th place in our losers league and we can now add his name in the history book as the lowest scorer ever. John has beaten our previous record of 146 goals by a pub team called RU SHAW in the 1995/96 Season. John has also finished bottom for three seasons now equaling Freda Hillier record.  John’s other seasons were 2008/09 and 2014/15. Jacqui Rattle was the second longest with a total of nine weeks. She had a run from Weeks 8 to 16. Ryan FC came next next with three weeks from Week 4 to 6. We then had four players with one week each. They were Peter Wellard with our very first week, Robert Fuller in the second week and Scott Clark in our third week. Rebecca Harrington was in our 7^th week. GRAEME BRITTON holds the record for the highest score of our losers league with 214 goals from our 2004/05 season. 

100 MIDWEEK GOALS JACKPOT

The Prize Money for the 100 Midweek Goals Jackpot was worth £40 this season and it was shared between two players. They were RAYMOND HARROD and CHRIS SETFORD in week 28 by reaching 100 midweek goals first. We had a total of 63 players to hit 100 this season and that is a Golden Goals record beating last season total of 51. But we did not end up with the highest midweek score. The honor went to Michael Jacobson with 126 goals for this season. Daryl Nicholls holds the highest midweek record with 136 goals from our 2016/17 Season. 

BEAT THE SCORE

The fantastic sum of  £65 cash prize money for BEAT THE SCORE has not been picked up once again this season. The prize money will go to the first person who scores 19 goals or more at the weekend. So I hope that we can add more cash to the pot next season. The holder of this record is Mark Rymer with 18 goals scored way back in our 1998/99 season, so it’s about time that some-one beat that score now.  

THE TOP THREE TEAMS FINISHED AS 

MANCHESTER CITY (106) RANGERS (105) BRENTFORD (96) Total of  307 goals. 

We had just two teams that picked up 100 or more goals this season. They were MANCHESTER CITY who ended the season with a total of 106 goals. City have played in 48 games this season which gave them an average score of 2.2 goals per game. They were our top English team with 71 votes and they picked up just four blank score sheets throughout the season. Last season they finished on 127 goals and although this is their worst season for four seasons, they have now scored over 100 goals in their last four consecutive seasons.  This is their 7^th Season out of 27 that they have scored 100 or more goals scored by the end of the season. Over the 27 seasons, they have scored a total of 2323 goals which now gives them an average score of 86 goals per season. In second place was RANGERS with 105 goals and they had a total of 16 votes. They picked up just one blank score sheet once again in the 43 games. This is their best score in five seasons as last season they finished on just 77 goals. This is their 16^th Season out of 37 that they have scored 100 or more goals. The third team finished with BRENTFORD who finished on a total of 96 goals which is their best end of season score. They have been with us for 19 seasons now and over that time they have netted a total of 1397 goals. That now gives them an average score of 73.5 goals per season. They had 18 vote this season and they picked up a total of eleven blank score sheets.

So lets see what has happen to our other teams although it seems a bit harsh with what has happen to the fixture they had to play this season. So here are a few of them. LIVERPOOL with 30 votes finished with 81 goals which is their lowest score in five seasons. Last season they finished on a total of 96. PETERBOROUGH with 13 votes finished with a total of 86 goals which is their best in their last five seasons with us. MANCHESTER UNITED with 12 votes finished on a total of 87 which is the same as last season. ARSENAL with 11 votes finished on just 60 goals which is their lowest score ever. WEST HAM with 2 votes finished on a total of 76 goals which is their best in their last five seasons. SALFORD CITY were in their second season with us and they have beaten last seasons total of 51 goals with 56 this season. CHELTENHAM beat their previous score of 55 goals in 1999/00 season with 71 this season. CELTIC’S run of ten consecutive season with 100 or more goals, which is a Golden Goals record, has finally came to the end as they picked up just 81 goals. This is the worst season since 2006/07 Season on where they finished on the same number of goals. New Boys HARROGATE TOWN with one vote finished on a total of 55 goals. 

THE WORST THREE TEAMS FINISHED AS 

FULHAM (32) SOUTHEND (32) STENHOUSEMUIR (36) Total of 98 goals 

Once again our worst teams were probably not our worst teams for this covid season but as their season was unusual we had FULHAM in their 16^th appearance with Golden Goals and it will go down as their worst season as they finished on their lowest score of 32 goals. They had just three votes. Next came SOUTHEND with 18 appearance’s. They finished on a total of 32 goals which is their lowest recorded score. They had just one vote. Our third worst team was STENHOUSEMUIR finishing on 34 goals which is their lowest score in their 14 appearance’s with us. They also had just one vote this season. Other teams that picked up their lowest score on record are ABERDEEN with 40 goals. BIRMINGHAM with 37 goals. NOTTINGHAM FOREST with 39 goals and WOLVES with just 38 goals. Other teams with their lowest scores include BRIGHTON, FALKIRK, FLEETWOOD TOWN, LUTON, MOTHERWELL, ROTHERHAM and SCUNTHORPE. 

Our biggest result in our 38th Season came from MANCHESTER UNITED as they won 9-0 at home against  Southampton in the league in Week Twenty-Three.    

SOUTHEND have picked up the most number of blank score sheets this season with twenty-six after forty-eight games played.

Well that’s it, another season of GOLDEN GOALS has finally finished. I still can not believe that I have been doing this competition for 38 year’s and after a hell of a lot of work this season not only with 116 players taking part, but also with the virus that hit our football again in the early part of the season, I will still be looking forward to the next one and hoping that we can beat our record of 149 players from the 2017/18 Season.

Here are our top winners for this season H=highest L=Lowest positions.        

   FINAL     LAST                                                                            M/WEEK    W/END    TOTAL       

   WEEK    SHEET          H         L             NAME                           GOALS      GOALS   GOALS             

       1              -                 1        43             S. REEVE (2008/09)        110             197          307

      2             3                 2        74             M. FISHER                        105            193          298 

      3             2                 2        70             C. WEBB                           101            196          297

      4              -                 3        56            S. MARSHALL                 97              195          292            

      5              -                2         38             M. JOHNSTON               101             191          292           

      6             7                 4       111            T. BICKNELL (2014/15)  113             175          288 

      7             6                 4        66             G. PHILLIPS                     97               190          287

      8           10                 7      106             D. ZENIOUS                     123             162          285

      9           13                 8        87             A. EYLES                          113             170          283 

    10             9                 4        46             R. HARROD                   121             162          283

    11             8                 1        16             J. WEARDEN                  90               192          282           

   12              -                 8      108             P. COLLINS                    114             166          280           

   13           20              10      113             TIM WOOD                     109             169          278            

   14           21              13      104             G. HARRIS                      114             163          277            

  15           16                 9      114             C. DICKER                     122             155          277            

  16           11                 8        79             D. HUGHES                    108             168          276            

  17           25              20      110             S. KEMP (1)                     110             166          276            

 18           19                 5        39             M. LIDDLE                     116             159          275            

  19           26              14        81             B. BARNES (1)               108             166          274            

  20           29              12      107             M. CORBETT                  108             166          274            

 21           18                 7        66             M. GREGORY                116             158          274            

  22           24              22      113             G. BROWN                      104             169          273            

  23           14              14        68             D. BARRETT                   112             161          273            

  24           15              10        65             J. SOMERVILLE             118             154          272            

  25           28              11        65             T. WARWICK                   90               181          271 

  26           23              12        68             M. JACOBSON               126              145          271            

Last of the Premier League Games

Sorry that this post is late going out but here are the very last results for the English Premier League. Our Covid season is nearly over with just the Play-off finals still to come.

Champions MANCHESTER CITY won their final game 5-0 at home to EVERTON and they have now won the title a total of seven times. They also finished as our best team with a total of 106 goals. Everton picked up their eleventh blank score sheet. Second place MANCHESTER UNITED won 2-1 away to WOLVES. United finished on a total of 87 goals, while Wolves finished on 38 goals. LIVERPOOL finished in third place after they won 2-0 at home to Crystal Palace. They finished on a total of 81 goals and had scored in all of their last ten games. CHELSEA finished in fourth place after they lost 2-1 away to ASTON VILLA. Chelsea end their season with a total of 76 goals. Villa end on 62 goals. LEICESTER CITY fell down to fifth place after they lost their last game 4-2 at home to TOTTENHAM. Leicester finished on a total of 81 goals and a goal run of ten games. Tottenham took their end of season total up to 87 goals. WEST HAM have had a great season as they win their last game 3-0 at home to Southampton. They have finished on a total of 76 goals. ARSENAL end their season with a total of 60 goals after they won 2-0 at home to BRIGHTON. That was Brighton’s fourteenth blank of the season. LEEDS UNITED won their last game 3-1 at home to relegated WEST BROM. Leeds finished on a total of 63 goals while West Brom ends on 42 goals and had scored in all of their last six games. FULHAM are also relegated as they lost 2-0 at home to Newcastle to pick up their twentieth blank of the season. 

League One Play-Offs SecondLeg

In the League One Play-Offs OXFORD UNITED lost their first leg game against Blackpool 3-0 and in the second leg game they drew 3-3 away. That means that Oxford United lost 6-3 on aggregate and will remain in league one next season. They end their season on a total of 83 goals. 

League Two Play-offs

In the League Two Play-offs 1^st leg games in which we only have TRANMERE ROVERS playing in, they lost their first leg game 2-1 at home to Morecambe. Rover’s single goal means that they are on a total of 60 goals. 

Liverpool in Fourth Place

In the Premier League LIVERPOOL move up to fourth place after they won 3-0 away to Burnley and they are now on a total of 79 goals and have now scored in all of their last nine games. ARSENAL have taken their goals total to 58 goals as they win 3-1 away to Crystal Palace. EVERTON won 1-0 at home against WOLVES to pick up goal number 69 while Wolves picked up their fifteenth blank and now two in a row. Its 60 goals for ASTON VILLA now as they win 2-1 away to TOTTENHAM. Tottenham picked up their 83^rd goal of the season and fell down to seventh place. WEST HAM won 3-1 away to WEST BROM after going a goal down. West Ham have taken their goals tally up to 73 goals and up to sixth place while West Brom hit goal number 41. 

In the other League One Play-Off LINCOLN CITY won their first leg game 2-0 at home to SUNDERLAND. Lincoln are on a total of 86 goals while Sunderland picked up their eighth blank of the season.

Champions City and 100 Goals

The Premier League Champions MANCHESTER CITY lost their sixth league game after they went down to ten men early in the first half. They lost 3-2 away to BRIGHTON. But the good news is that City has become our second team to score 100 goals this season. They are now on a total of 101 goals and have now scored in all of their last six games. Brighton have taken their goals total to 49 goals. MANCHESTER UNITED remained in second place after they drew 1-1 at home to FULHAM. As United picked up goal number 85, Fulham hit their 32^nd goal of the season. Its 60 goals for LEEDS UNITED as they win 2-0 away to Southampton. After failing to score in their last two games, CHELSEA won 2-1 at home to LEICESTER CITY and have moved up to third place. Chelsea have taken their goals total to 75 goals while Leicester picked up goal number 79. 

In the League One Play-Offs 1^st leg after a goal run of ten games OXFORD UNITED lost 3-0 at home to Blackpool and that is their sixteenth blank of the season. 

Championship Play-Offs 1st Leg

We are now at the stage of the season that we start playing the league play-offs.

In the Championship Play-Offs BOURNEMOUTH go a goal up in the first leg game against BRENTFORD with a 1-0 home win. Bournemouth are on a total of 83 goals after failing to score in their previous three games. Brentford picked up their eleventh blank score sheet. SWANSEA won 1-0 away to Barnsley in their first leg game and that is their 65th goal of the season. 

Week Thirty-Seven

In Week Thirty-Seven of the competition we had three players that picked up the most amount of goals over the weekend with 6 goals each. They are MARK JOHNSTON, KEITH THOMSON and JED WEARDEN. All three picked up their goals from Liverpool and Rangers. Mark’s third team is Manchester City and Keith is Bournemouth. Jed has Brentford. 

100 MIDWEEK GOALS 

Most of us picked up some goals this week as we are now looking at beat that highest midweek score of 136 goals set by Daryl Nicholls in the 2016/17 Season. But this week we now have a total of 51 players that are on or over the 100 goals mark. In the lead this week we still have MICHAEL JACOBSON with Bournemouth, Celtic and Manchester City with a total of 123 goals. In second place this week we have RAYMOND HARROD with a total of 119 goals. In third place we have this week CHRIS DICKER, SANSA-CLARA-LYANNA, CHRIS SETFORD and DEAN ZANIOUS all with a total of 118 goals each. 

WEEKEND RESULTS 

We had just fifteen of our teams that played over the weekend and out of them, just four failed to score any goals. The highest score that we had over the weekend was four goals once again and we had two teams that picked them up. They came from CELTIC and LEEDS UNITED.  

FA CUP Final We had both of the teams in this seasons final and it was nice to see some of the fans in and hear them singing once again. Our two teams were CHELSEA and LEICESTER CITY and although the first half both teams had their chances, the first half ended 0-0. In the second half the first goal came in the 63^rd minute when Tielemans fired a fantastic shot to the left corner of goal give Leicester the lead. Chelsea kept up the pressure after the goal and with just two minutes to go before the final whictle, Chelsea scored but VAR said that Chilwell was offside. Even with five minutes of added on time, Chelsea failed to score. So congratulations to Leicester City and to the two players that voted for them this season, for their very first win of an FA Cup final. Final score 1-0. 

PREMIER LEAGUE 

Champions Manchester City are top with Manchester United in second place and Leicester City in third place. Chelsea are fourth with LIVERPOOL now in fifth place. They won 2-1 away to WEST BROM after going a goal down. Liverpool are on a total of 74 goals and they have now scored in all of their last eight games. West Brom picked up goal number 40. TOTTENHAM have moved into sixth place as they win 2-0 at home to WOLVES. Tottenham are on a total of 82 goals while Wolves picked up their fourteenth blank score sheet. LEEDS UNITED won 4-0 away to Burnley and they are now on a total of 58 goals. FULHAM lost 3-1 away to Southampton and that is their 31^st goal of the season. BRIGHTON drew 1-1 at home to WEST HAM and that is their 46^th goal of the season while West Ham are on 70 goals. ASTON VILLA lost 3-2 away to Crystal Palace and they are on a total of 58 goals. EVERTON lost 1-0 at home to Sheffield United. That is their tenth blank of the season. 

SCOTTISH LEAGUES The very last games of the Scottish Premiership have now all been played as RANGERS lift the the Scottish title for the 55th time, but it’s been a long time coming. Rangers won 4-0 at home to ABERDEEN to finished the season on a total of 105 goals and they had scored in all of their last 39 games. Aberdeen picked up their eighteenth blank with just two goals in their last four games. Second place CELTIC finished 25 points behind Rangers after they drew 0-0 away to Hibernian and thatis their eighth blank of the season. MOTHERWELL lost 2-1 at home to Ross County and they finish the season with a total of 48 goals and they had scored in all of their last eleven games. 

Our BEST three teams this week with Golden Goals. They are 

RANGERS (105) MANCHESTER CITY (99) BRENTFORD (91) Total of 295 goals 

OUR WORST THREE TEAMS ARE 

FULHAM (31) SOUTHEND (32) STENHOUSEMUIR (34) Total of 97 goals 

Our Best team this Season are RANGERS after they have now scored in all of their last thirty-nine league/cup games. They have scored a total of 105 goals which now gives them an average score of 2.4 goals per game. 

Our worst team this weekend is SCUNTHORPE who have scored just 3 goals in their last ten games played.

SOUTHEND have picked up the most number of blank score sheets this season with twenty-six after forty-eight games played.  

Our highest goal scorers in our 38^th Season are MANCHESTER UNITED after they won 9-0 at home against Southampton in the league in Week Twenty-Three.  

STEVE REEVE has remained at the top this weekend as I picked up a total of 11 goals through the week. I have now been at the top for a total of fifteen consecutive weeks. My teams are Brentford, Manchester City and Rangers. This week I have managed to move up to 29^th place in our Champions League by overtaking  Adam Porter’s score of 284 goals in the 2006/07 Season, Martyn Gent’s total of 289 in the1984/85Season, My own score of 290 in the 2008/09 Season and Ricky Wood/Gerry Kyei score of 293 goals in the 2007/08 Season. Colin Webb is still in second place as he picked up 11goals for the week. Colin is still five goals behind me this week. His teams are Manchester City, Peterborough and Rangers. 

At the other end at 116 we still have John Nicholls who has now been there for a total of twenty-one consecutive weeks. Johns teams picked him up just 2 goals from his combo of Bristol City, Fulham and West Brom.

As we come to a close on our 38th Season, here is how the final games now look.

          THIS      LAST                                                     M/WEEK       W/END        TOTAL               

 WEEK     WEEK           NAME                              GOALS         GOALS        GOALS       

      1             -               S. REEVE (2008/09)            108                 187                295             

       2                 -              C. WEBB                              99                   191                290              

       3                 -              M. FISHER                          102                 186                 288              

       4                 5             S. MARSHALL                    94                   188                 282               

      5                 9              M. JOHNSTON                    96                   184                 280                  

       6                 -              G. PHILLIPS                        93                   184                 277               

      7                 4              T. BICKNELL (2014/15)      111                 165                 276               

      8                 11            J. WEARDEN                        87                  185                 272                

     9                 10             R. HARROD                         119                152                 271              

              10              7                D. ZANIOUS                        118                152                 270