2018/19 Prediction League; Game 39 v Burton Albion (away)

Div3North · 22-03-2019, 01:43

Burton Albion

v

Accrington Stanley

2018/19 Prediction League; Game 39 v Burton Albion (away)

Since the Football League was established in 1888, Burton-upon-Beer (which isn’t to suggest that the Trent is really a River of Ale, merely that the town is built on brewing) has had four different clubs as its League representatives.

1. Burton Swifts became members in 1892, and were joined by
2. Burton Wanderers in 1894; the Swifts played at Peel Croft, whilst Wanderers’ home ground was Derby Turn. Wanderers left the League in 1897, and the two clubs merged to form
3. Burton United in 1901. United were then voted out of the Football League in 1907, and folded in 1910. Burton All Saints were by now left as the town's main club, becoming Burton Town in 1924, but they in turn folded in 1940.
4. Burton Albion was formed in 1950; having moved to the Pirelli Stadium in 2005, they became the town's fourth Football League club in 2009 by winning the Bananarama

…… and this Saturday we visit Burton SwiftsWanderersUnitedAllSaintsTownAlbion

Back in those days, of course, the game wasn’t as advanced as it is now; they didn’t, for example, have goal nets – the Victorians’ equivalent of VAR – until 1891 (first game to use them was in Nottingham), and lots of goals were scored – PNE, for example (who took the League title in 1888/89) won some of their home games 5-0, 5-2 (twice – Burnley and Wolves) and 7-0 v Stoke, and away they won 4-0, 5-0, 5-2 (Bolton) and 7-0 at Notts Co; the biggest win of the season was Villa’s 9-1 thrashing of Notts Co, who conceded 73 goals in 22 games, one fewer than PNE scored in their 22 ...........

Back in the day, they had smaller Leagues too, but six sides had the same number of points at season’s end – Bolton and the Baggies (1880’s version of Chorlton and the Wheelies) both had 22, Accrington and Everton had 20, and Notts County and Stoke each had 12, although both they, and Burnley (9th) and Derby (10th) were re-elected. So logically it shouldn’t be a surprise to look at the League One Table (aka Billy’s Weekly Liar) and find two sides (Southend and Walsall) on 42 points, two more (Oxford and Shrewsbury) on 43, and FIVE sides (The Iron, The Gills, Us, Wycombe and BrizzleRov) on 44 .................. the bottom three (Bratfud (36 points) having now sunk like the lumps in the custard to bottom place, two points behind the RochdaleDoodles (who have 38 and a game in hand) and three behind the Wombles) are within six points and quite a lot of goals of 21st place, and Plymouth lying 12th on 45 points ........................ and the Greasy Pole of Quasi-Oblivion (“Quasi” because, even if you do tumble head first into the merde, it’s still EFL merde, albeit League Two) beckons, possibly, any of the teams from 12th down to 24th ................ perm any four from 13! Burton are probably safe, on 49 points, and with eight to play, the top five sides (Luton (80 points), Barnsley (75) – and they’ve, unhelpfully to their cause, played out goalless Desmonds at home to the BlackMoggies and away to Donnie, having had four shots on target at home and three on target away – Slumberland (73), Pompey (71) and Chorlton (without Wheelies) with 67 points) are between ten and 23 points clear of the chasing pack ..................... Sunderland and Charlton are the form sides, with 3 wins and 2 draws in 5; Donnie (of the top 7) are the Current Country Bumpkins (D2 L3), Posh have lost four of five, and lower down, The Chairpersons have one point from 15, Southend have 2/15, Bratfud have 3, Rochdale, Scunthorpe and the Stanley have 4/15 (W1 D1 L3), and the Wombles have 10!

Given their Plucky Late Dash for Salvation, you sort of hope that the Wombles might make it ................. Bratfud have been in big trouble since forever, Rochdale will be nervous – no, they’ll be thrutching, Southend have lost form at the wrong time, and Walsall have fallen from grace so swiftly that they’ve nigh-on forgotten how to win, which is a nightmare scenario this near to May.............. but it’s still 4 from 13 – or maybe 2 from 11 plus Bratfud and the Doodles ................

Of their last 15 games (since the turn of the year) Burton have only lost 3 ............ but then, they’ve only won 4 ............. and they’ve drawn eight times (4 goalless, three half-Desmonds, and a Desmond Proper). They got four unanswered goals away at SpottyDogLand, and have managed to score three in five other games; they’ve drawn a blank ten times (League only), but have kept ten clean sheets as well................. 48 scored in 38 games (44 conceded), plus 11 more scored in the Cups and 20 conceded – a figure made worse by a 10-0 aggregate hammering (9-0 and 1-0) by Man City in the EFL Cup semi finals ............... although, to be fair, The Screwers – sorry, Brewers - did put Villa, Burnley, Forest and Middlesbrough to the sword on the way to that semi-final annihilation. Leading scorers are Liam Boyce (for whom they paid Ross County £500,000 after he (Boyce) had finished the 2016/17 Scottish Premiership as leading goalscorer with 23), with 10 (7 in the League), followed by Scott Fraser and Luke Akins, each with 6 (five in the League), although Boyce won’t trouble our defence by virtue of being in the Northern Ireland Squad for the Euro 2020 Qualifiers against Estonia and Belarus over the weekend ................

They contrived a 12th place finish last season, their first back in League One after GreasyPoling from the Championship the year before ............... GreasyPoling, by the way, is favourite to be added to the list of new sports selected for the Olympics sometime in the next Century, as well as being an offence contrary to Common Law ............ In the Winter Transfer Window (if I had one of them I’m keep it shut to keep the cold out) they ProperSigned two left backs, Kieran Wallace from Matlock Town and Colin Daniel from the Posh; well, as My Old Mother used to say, you can never have too many left backs. They also LoanSigned RB Josh Clark from Brentford (just for a bit of balance), and a CMF called Alex Bradley from the Baggies .......................... no, I haven’t heard of them either.

They parted company with four; RMF Colin Hodge was given a free transfer to Unattached (truly, that’s what it says ...................), CB Ben Turner went Stagging in the Midlands and winger Nathan Morley went to Matlock to hang his kit on what had been Kieran Wallace’s peg. The fourth departee was a Bulgarian GK called Dimitar Evtimov .................... and this week’s starter for ten is this; the Stanley signed Dimmy from the Brewers, but which club was he actually on the books of at the time we signed him? They let various players go out on loan, but the only one whose name you might recognise is striker Marvin Sordell, who’s played for Bolton, Burnley, Burton, Colchester and Coventry to name just those at the top of the alphabet

Burton – the town, not Richard – is famous as being the place in whose window some bloke was going to show his bum if a specific player scored from a specific distance, as in “If he scores from there I’ll show my Bum in Burton’s window” (which is close to General Custer’s famous last words – “Indians? They couldn’t hit a barn door from that dist..............................”) .................. “Showing your Bum in Burton’s Window” was actually a coded criticism of the standard of workmanship of a certain Gentlemen’s Tailors, whose suit trousers reputedly disintegrated very quickly, thus showing a reflection of their owner’s nether regions in shop windows whilst out walking in the Town. The Club’s nickname is The Brewers (because they start to droop after half time), and at one time they had on their books one Philip, Lord Sunbeds, but he’s gone to Bury. Who with, or what he’s gone to Bury for, isn’t mentioned

Deadline for entries is, as always, scheduled kick-off time, which is 3.00pm on Saturday 23rd March. We drew one each apiece all round at ours in early September, Billy Whizz’s 84th minute penalty cancelling out the Droopers’ 11th minute goal; their leading scorer is still Billy Kee with 37 in 95 over the years 2011-14, and he’s one of four players to have scored League hat-tricks for them (the others being Shaun Harrad, Greg Pearson and Lucas Atkins); second starter for ten; who did Burton play in the game where Billy Rodney (Kee) scored that hat-trick, and what was the final score?

They’ve nothing really much to play for; we’ve got everything to play for; we’re missing Paul Smyth, they’re without their main scoring talisman; they do lots of “Burton Albion Nil” over a season (which used to be part of the Gunners’ name – for a couple of years they were always referred to as “Arsenal Nil”), we do rather less; Darren Stride played 646 games for them in a career which lasted from 1993 to 2010, scoring 124 goals (in the days ‘afore computers Clubs had to employ a little man with a flat cap and a notebook, you know, noting down who was in the team, and who scored. We don’t do flat caps lads, do we? Sithee, we don’t! But three points on Saturday might well make me wear a little flat hat on me little flat head ...................... Either that, or show me Bum in Burtons’ window

And, if anyone cares, Dimiktar Evtimov was on the books of Notts Forest when we signed him .................. and when Billy Kee scored his hat-trick back in early September 2011 (a Proper One – three consecutive goals) Burton were playing Barnet at the Hive, and Billy Whizz's XI beat them 6-3 ..............

Good luck to everyone! ........................ Keep the Faith! ...................And thanks for playing!