Lush Gutters

Tom Barklamb is the worst kind of person.

Let’s look back to last season; a promising campaign featuring a bronze medal in the ProMax World Championship was undermined by a disappointing 5th place finish in the Classic Grand. What accounted for this discrepancy was simple: his defence, worst in the league, was absolute bin juice.

Tom could rely on a keen initiative for scoring goals and picking captains, finishing with league high figures in both categories. With the new season looming, he knew that the path to success was simple: pay attention during December’s fixture congestion, and find those clean sheets.

Did he?

Did he bollocks.

He let his standards fall in almost every category. Across the season he scored fourteen fewer goals, his captains picked up one-hundred-and-thirty-one fewer points, and he even (get this!) he somehow even managed to get eight fewer clean sheets! How is that even possible?!

His points total from last season – 2105, which would have been good enough for a silver medal this year – dropped to 2052, which, whilst hardly a colossal fall, is good only for a forgettable 5th in 2020. As for keeping on top of the festive fixture congestion, his forgetfulness is reflected in the stats: his points-per-week average over the middle third of the season – that’s November 30th til February 1st– was the lowest in the league.

And yet as I type this, Tom Barklamb sits proudly atop the ProMax Classic Grand as our champion for 2019/20. He wrapped it up with two games to spare. He didn’t fix a thing.

Tom didn’t listen, and the fates rewarded him. He’s the football equivalent of the dry-hacking 40-a-day smoker that outlives your whole family. He is what’s wrong with society.

Let’s see how he did it.

2nd comes right after 1st

Okay, okay, let’s be nice.

In truth, Tom’s was a very good season, though I stop short of saying ‘excellent’, for reasons I’m about to explore. The ProMax World Championship, unlike the Classic Grand, is a pretty good metric against which to measure overall consistency, and despite a 5th place finish, Srnicek ya bad self were only a measly eight points from snagging a second bronze medal in succession. Not bad.

However, as opposed to last season in which Tom claimed two end-of-season accolades in the form of the golden boot and the Captain Marvel award (for highest overall points gained by the skipper), this season, despite winning the league, he could boast no such individual titles. Everything just looked sorta… above average. Ignoring for a moment his laughably poor defence, his position in all the other key stats tables tells a story of a manager who was solid, albeit rarely spectacular.

First, the good stuff: Barklamb is tied 2nd for total bonus points, ended the game-week with the highest score more times than all but one player, and ended the game-week with the lowest score fewer times than all but one player. He also racked up the 2nd most points from his chips, one of only two players to break triple digits.

However, the remainder is where the ‘average’ bit comes in. He’s fourth on the goalscoring chart, fifth for captain’s points, and finished within six points of the national average in exactly half of his thirty-eight games. When we look at the overall points rankings in the World Championship for each individual month of the tournament, we get an even clearer picture of a team struggling to make much of an impact.

In August Tom was the 6th highest points scorer. In September he’d popped up to 3rd, and in October he finished 4th. But winter was coming: November saw him 9th, as did December. In January he finally hit rock bottom. A 3rd place finish in February seemed scant consolation. This was a team in trouble.

Only they weren’t. At least not in the Classic Grand.

You can only beat what’s put in front of you

Tom Barklamb himself is a vocal critic of the Classic Grand format, which is a shame since the format seems to f**king love him.

It is, of course, theoretically possible to win the Classic Grand by achieving the second lowest total every single week … as long as you keep getting drawn against the player who gets the lowest. This unpredictability is what we love about the formula; it keeps us guessing, and therefore interested. Lady Luck has a much bigger hand in deciding the outcomes, and subsequently we can see who she has a real f**king problem with. And it ain’t Tom.

If we were to calculate the average score of each player over each third of the season* and compare it with that player’s corresponding win/loss record, then we can see if there is a discrepancy between how well each team was performing overall, and whether that translated into victories in the Classic Grand. One would imagine that the players with the highest averages would secure a commensurate number of victories. For the first third of the season, all this rings pretty true:

(* For this statistic I grouped the season into three uneven thirds, as 38 does not divide by three. Therefore the first and last thirds consist of thirteen games, with the middle consisting of twelve. This allows for a decent sample size for each section of the season – beginning, middle, and end.)

Average score over opening third of the season (GW1-13) against win/loss record

Max – 59.4 – W10 L3

Tom – 51.5 – W9 L4

Jessi – 51.0 – W7 L5 D1

Nial – 50.8 – W6 L6 D1

Matt – 50.4 – W8 L5

Glen – 50.2 – W7 L6

Elys – 49.7 – W3 L9 D1

Scott – 47.8 – W2 L11

Colin – 46.8 – W5 L8

Amy – 46.7 – W6 L6 D1

There aren’t many surprises here. You do feel a bit for poor old Scotty, who is clearly unlucky to be registering four fewer wins than Amy, but generally speaking things look about right. In truth, considering that only 4.8 points separate 2nd from last, all this is pretty reasonable. But remember, Tom’s Wenger-esque winter slump is coming. Let’s see how badly he’s hit:

Average score over middle third of season (GW14-25) against win/loss record

Glen – 55.9 – W8 L4

Amy – 55.7 – W5 L7

Max – 55.0 – W4 L8

Jessi – 52.9 – W7 L5

Matt – 52.4 – W7 L5

Scott – 51.8 – W6 L5 D1

Elys – 50.8 – W5 L6 D1

Colin – 50.1 – W8 L4

Nial – 49.7 – W4 L8

Tom – 45.4 – W5 L7

Here it is. Here’s the key. Despite averaging almost ten points less each week than The Rhythmic Schism, Barklamb somehow managed three league points more than his closest rival. Over the first section of the season, an average of 51.5 was enough for nine solid wins for Srnicek ya bad self, and yet The Schism’s average over the middle third, 3.5 points higher, returned only four.

What a win/loss record doesn’t tell you, however, is how those wins and losses came about. And, dear reader, there is a run of fixtures that requires our attention…

A Closer Look

Four games. GW16 up to and including GW19. It was during this time that Lady Luck finished her wine, pushed back her chair, and got down on her knees to gently fellate our champion. Let me take you back to the weekend of Saturday 7th December, and the start of some serious silliness…

GW16: Barklamb is drawn against Glen Woodbridge’s in-form Mooseheads. It’s a tough assignment: a quick glance above will alert us to the fact that Glen would boast the highest average out of everyone for this section of the season. Sadly for Glen, Mooseheads would rack up one of only two scores lower than Tom’s that week. Barklamb’s first choice captain – Sadio Mane – didn’t feature, one of only three games he’d miss all season. His vice captain? All two goals and three bonus points of a certain Mr. Vardy. W. Ahhh, yes, right there…

GW17: Barklamb finishes with the week’s lowest score, although Lady Luck is desperate to let him off the hook: he loses by a solitary point to the Shuai Ge Tigers. L. Oh, you tease, don’t stop now…

GW18: The big one. Srnicek vs The Rhythmic Schism. With half an hour left to play in the GW’s final match, Selby is heading to a comfortable, if modest, victory. In the blink of an eye, everything changes; Heung-Min Son and Antonio Rüdiger tussle for control of the ball. Son – Max’s captain – is bowled over by the Chelsea defender, and as he rolls over backwards appears to kick out at his opponent. The foot barely scrapes Rüdiger but, smelling an opportunity, the muscular German goes down as if drop-kicked from a nearby tower block, pausing his flamboyant writhing only to glance at the referee. VAR gets involved. Red card. Max goes from winning by four points, to losing by one, which is how it ends. Was it a red card? Probably. Was Rüdiger play-acting? Definitely. Is Selby still bitter? Reports are murky, and unsubstantiated. What matters is that Max’s would end up being one of only two scores lower than Tom’s that week. Reverse this fixture alone and the title goes to the Schism. W. Oooh, ohmygodohmygodohmygod hoooooooly shiiiiiiiit!!…

GW19: Tom’s run of awful scores continues. This time he manages a feeble 41 points, eight lower than the national average. He needn’t have feared. His opponent, Jessi Parker, can only manage 38, the only score lower than Barklamb’s that week. W. F****K! … oh … oh wow … f**king hell, that was … that was something …

Four games, nine points, despite achieving no higher than the eighth best score in any of them.

The fates wanted it. Hope you enjoyed that, Tom. Pancakes for breakfast.

When you gonna give me some tiiiime, Corona?

By the start of March, things were looking bleak for Barklamb. He’d won only three of his previous nine games, and was languishing mid-table in the ProMax World Championship. However, by the miracles mentioned above, Tom found himself only two points away from the Classic Grand summit.

And then the world ended.

Covid strikes, everything is cancelled, and all we can do is sit inside and wait it out. Months pass, spring becomes summer, jogging becomes mysteriously appealing, but eventually, after 100 days, football returns. And lo, as if energised by the massive casualties and catastrophic economic downturn, a determined Tom decides to get his act together and make an assault on the summit. And in truth, it is here, finally, that we should start to pay Tom Barklamb his dues. Because once he started properly trying, he was unstoppable.

Tom had had the foresight (or laziness, it depends who you ask) to save two of his chips and one of his Wildcards for the run-in. Add to that the bonus wildcard enjoyed by everyone for GW30+ and Barklamb found himself wielding a deadly arsenal that he immediately put to good use.

Boom, straight out of the gate, Tom goes for the double whammy of Wildcard and Triple Captain, smashing out an immediate 101 points, the season’s 2nd highest GW score and the equal-third highest triple captain in Classic Grand history. Only two weeks later he pulls out his back-up wildcard; another revamp, nine more swaps, followed by three consecutive game-week scores in excess of 70 points, a total he’d managed only once pre-Covid. On only one occasion between the restart and the season’s end would his captain get fewer than double digits. He wins manger of the month for June, and is a measly three points from winning it again in July. In amongst all of this is a record equalling nine straight victories, eight of them occurring after the restart. Nobody can say this was luck. Once Tom decided to pay attention, he paid in full.

Under a Tom Barklamb moon

Look, luck happens. It would be churlish and wrong to suggest that Tom doesn’t deserve the Classic Grand title; having found the wind blowing his way he had the smarts and the initiative to see the job through. We mustn’t ignore the fact that when football was cancelled there were five – five! – teams within three points of first. After the restart Tom lost a single, solitary game, and by then he was already mathematically champion. By the season’s end, Tom possessed a winning record against all but three managers, and nobody – not one opponent – beat him more than he beat them. Nobody wins a championship by accident. He deserves our congratulations.

Tragically, the lessons Tom’s victory teaches our nation’s schoolchildren are these: it’s okay to be late. It is not important to learn from your mistakes. There’s no need to try hard until the end. It’s fine to just kludge it all together at the last minute.

Meh, I’ll do it later.

Nah, you know what, I’m gonna call my team Srnicek ya bad self.

Whatever, mum.

Tom Barklamb is the worst kind of person.

Enjoy your trophy, you f**king troll.