Evening all. As we hid the mid part of the season, it is probably worthwhile giving you a quick stats review for the last 6 months… Drum roll please…

BUT FIRST

We played a game vs. Beckenham. It was pretty good. We won by 16-11. Bedford showed up and moaned about his knee. It was like we were playing in 2018 again… Nick was Man of the Match for his 7 goal haul. Dan and Nick got equal votes for moment of the match – Dan: for a wonderful lob were he teed himself up and tippity-tapped it over the on-rushing keeper. Shute also got moment for a super length of the pool swim (past 2 opposition players) rounded off with a push shot. Sadly for him, Stef got fluffer for a dreadfully executed man up pass… Tut.

Anyway… Stats.

June 30th Stats (2019) June 30th Stats (2018)

Shute is way out in-front with 58 goals from 11 games (5.27 a game). This means he is ahead of where he was last year (54 in 13 – 4.15 per game) and also by virtue of games played, ahead of 2018 Dan Bedford (64 in 13 – 4.92 per game). Interestingly enough, this is in stark contrast to this time in 2017 when Shute was on 34 in 15 and Bedford was on 23 from 7. Clear year on year progression there.

On the goal scoring charts, Messers Ogg, Finch Snr and Gamble are also out-performing where they were this time last year. Even so, it seems there is little competition for Mr Shute, the Manchester City of goal-scorers. Another year, another golden shower… I mean hand.

Majors wise, the landscape has changed massively since 2018 and 2017. The traditional front runners of the contest John “Punchy” Holah and Gary “Fists of Fury” Bowen are nowhere near the top of the rankings. Perhaps they have cleaned up their act… more likely the Portuguese police have stepped in. The under-performance of these titans of brutality has left a gap for new blood to compete for the Catas-Trophy.

Zac “mid-pool major” Finch has (literally) pulled back the competition to surge up to the top of the charts. His 13 majors in 14 games gives him a Major per Game ratio of 0.93 and a frankly embarassing Brutality Rating of 4.33. Nonetheless, this puts him at the top of the Catas list. Compared to last year, he has excelled himself, beating his previous 8 from 14 (0.57 / 4.00).

The only heavy-weight to be challenging Finch Jnr at this stage is current Catas trophy holder Gimli Weeble, destroyer of rings. This years 10 from 11 (0.91 / 1.00) is a weak performance compared to last years 14 in 10 (1.4 / 2.33) but he is still in second place. New boy and vicious northerner Rob Dickinson is challenging in 3rd with 7 majors in 10 games. He needs to try harder if he wants a trophy this year!!

As a team, we have scored fewer goals vs. this time last year (178 vs. 204) and our goal difference is significantly lower (12 / 70) but I would put that down to quality of opposition. Majors wise, we play 66 vs. 89 – Holah and Bowen’s drop off in form clearly impacting out numbers there. Comparative number of trips to Portugal stays steady at 32 in 6 months.

The challenge for the Fluffer DVD and Where’s Wally stays strong with the usual suspects leading the field. With a busy 6 months of the season remaining, who can “last the distance” and “keep it up” to the finish line?

Until next time…

Forza Narwhali!!

[Edit: Apologies for the delay… I am sooooo busy. This report is from our epic encounter against Enfield back on June 10th where the mighty Narwhals staged a 4th quarter comeback to win in the last few seconds. At one stage we were 3 goals down in the 4th – a huge effort led to a resounding 12-11 victory.]

[Master Shute this week gives us the match report – a quick practise of his Groom’s speech to thank everyone for their attendance. He would appreciate any feedback you have…]

Firstly, I’d like to thank all of you for attending the game, especially those who travelled from the depths of south London all the way up to the top of the Northern Line. I know it was worth the trip, with an epic battle that went goal for goal all the way to the last 10 seconds, and the Narwhals emerging victorious by a single goal, 12-11.

Thanks to Gary for travelling all the way from Portugal to attend, I hope you had a safe trip home.

Thanks to Matt Finch for a solid performance in goal. A classic combination with Shute to get the winning goal.

Thanks to Geo Demari for bringing some Italian fighting spirit to the game. A punchy performance, with 2 majors to his name and a solid goal to add to his name.

Thanks to Tim Young for a solid performance for the team. Cruelly disallowed a bouncer in off the post by the ref giving a reversal in the pit.

Thanks to Dr Loveless for his goal contribution to the victory. It will go down in history as a perfectly executed palinka penalty, despite your claims it slipped out of your hand. Only losing out on moment due to the circumstances of the victory.

Thanks to Oggy for an excellent performance in the pit. They couldn’t handle it and a big 4 goals for the team.

Thanks to Best Man Gamble for his man of the match performance. 2 goals and some solid defending with no majors was enough to catch the eye of the fans.

Thanks to Shute for his 4 goals. Special thanks for his last second push shot that won us the game, for which he is awarded moment of the match. What a hero – the bride is lucky to have him.

Thanks to Zach for booking the table at Nandos before the game. Your contribution of 1 major, moaning about it and you own team telling you it’s the new rules wins you the award of fluffer for this game.

Forza Narwhali

We played Avondale twice in the space of two weeks. It was close, with the aggregate score 18-17 to Avondale. At times we played well, at times we didn’t. Our man-ups were awful, our man-downs were pretty good actually. Dubious refereeing on all fronts both home and away made for some interesting games.

The first fixture was the home leg at Whitgift. We snuck a last minute winner after a shot on goal was blocked with two hands by an Avondale defender. Up stepped Oggy to bury the winner with 14 seconds to go. What a hero!! Game was categorised by some great saves from Finchy (including 3 penalty saves) which earned him Man of the Match. Shute and Oggy shared Moment – Nick for a wonderful parabola lob (again) and Oggy for the aforementioned last minute penalty winner. Rob Loveless sadly won fluffer for wayward passing and shooting. (“who me?” you hear him ask…). Gamble was in close contention for a penalty/wobble double whammy – giving one away and then crying about it. Overall, it was nice to actually win a game – even though we made it super difficult.

The return leg game a week and a half later. This game was just as close and was characterised by Bedford getting beaten up in the pit with little/no return. The game became quite scrappy and fighty and despite Mr Shute’s claims of innocence, he probably did punch someone at some point… Sadly we lost by two goals, the final score 10-8. Man of the Match went to John Holah for some good fighting in the pit, moment of the match went to Shute who loves a lob vs. Avondale (you think they’d learn) and fluffer went to Finch Senior for some awful passing from goal…

Also, shout out to new boy Gio who has started his Narwhals career strongly. Our first Italian recruit, taking the Narwhals brand global!!

Until next time – Forza narwhali!!

[EDIT – a short but sharp match report today. The editor recognises there have been very few posts recently and apologises profusely. Finch Senior took time out of his 15 jobs and 32 redundancies to write the short blurb below…]

There was a game at some point last week. I got the dates wrong, it was a shambles. No-one was surprised!!

It was all somewhat overshadowed by the revelation that one of our team members was a Viscount (and had kept it very quiet). We lost the game. By lots. A depleted Narwhals played a 1 ½ Penguin team who had some very handy Eastern Europeans. However in the words of Mr Robert Dickinson, this was the “best 18 – 4 defeat he’d ever played in” and to be fair we didn’t play badly, they were just a lot better than us!!

Man of the Match went to Zach for being for only person on either team that could score a penalty

Moment of the Match went to Andy W in goal for saving what could only be described as a rocket, with his face and then needing a little time out afterwards (not surprisingly either)

Fluffer was yours truly having scored 0.003% of my shots and failed to pass to a wide open Rob D on 3 of them… Shooting practice required!!

For those who are interested: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_of_Kingston

Stats will be updated in full once all match reports have been completed.