UK Football Weekly – Gurgler’s Own Goal

Welcome to the Gurgler’s UK Football Weekly. We discuss things UK Football, and it doesn’t begin in Manchester and finish in London. We care about all four leagues and below if we have time. All your favourite stars are here too with the exception of Ariaga II. Enjoy the finest.

The English football world takes a breath this weekend with the return to a normal full round of fixtures throughout the four divisions.

After Cambridge United held moneybags United on Friday night UK time, we thought we had seen the upsets of the round.

To be fair with Chelsea up 2-0 against third tier Bradford City and Manchester City still drawing with high flying Championship side Middlesbrough it seemed that it would remain the upset of the round.

That’s not how it eventuated though, with Bradford stunning Chelsea with four unanswered goals, and Middlesbrough with half that many. Some calling the Bradford result the biggest upset ever, it is hard to argue it’s one of the best of recent times, or of all time.

That knocked out the top 2 of the EPL, and with 3rd placed Southampton handed an exit by Crystal Palace, along with Spurs and draws for Man Utd and Liverpool requiring replays, the Cup remains as open as ever. Even for Cambridge who may not progress past Man Utd in the replay, but quickly sew up almost a year’s budget in two fixtures. Quite a pointed remark on the vast difference between EPL and lower leagues.

A nice statistic from UK Football is that the top 4 divisions have now gone 20 days without sacking a manager, which is close to the record for 2014-15.

Down a peg to the Championship, which is the tightest contest for many a year. Usually by now one or two teams have skipped away from the rest, however this season currently has just 4 points separating the Top 6, with new boys Bournemouth and Brentford mixing it with perennial underachievers or midfield certainties Derby, Ipswich, Middlesbrough and Watford.

Lower down in the third and fourth division, away from the FA Cup giant killings and regular fixtures, there is the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy, which is a knockout competition just for third and fourth division teams. The semi finals were run during the week with Walsall and Bristol City  winning their way through to the final in March.

Just in case you forgot what happened last time due to FA Cup fever, here’s the most recent results.

[soccer-info id=’2′ type=’results’ style=’blue_light’ title=’EPL RESULTS’ limit=’10’ /]

[soccer-info id=’20’ type=’results’ title=’CHAMPIONSHIP RESULTS’ limit=’12’ /]

[soccer-info id=’21’ type=’results’ title=’L1 RESULTS’ limit=’12’ /]
[soccer-info id=’22’ type=’results’ title=’L2 RESULTS’ limit=’12’ /]

Here’s the best of the upcoming fixtures in the Football League and EPL.

EPL SAT – Liverpool v West Ham
EPL SAT – Chelsea v Manchester City
CHAMP – Bournemouth v Watford
CHAMP – Brentford v Middlesbrough
L1 – Sheffield Utd v Swindon
L2 – Newport v Shrewsbury
L2 – Burton v Bury

And here’s the rest of the matches.

[soccer-info id=’2′ type=’fixtures’ title=’EPL FIXTURES’ limit=’10’ /]

[soccer-info id=’20’ type=’fixtures’ title=’CHAMPIONSHIP FIXTURES’ limit=’12’ /]

[soccer-info id=’21’ type=’fixtures’ title=’L1 FIXTURES’ limit=’12’ /]

[soccer-info id=’22’ type=’fixtures’ title=’L2 FIXTURES’ limit=’12’ /]

Here’s our best bets for the weekend in UK Football. Why don’t you spoil yourself, spoil yourself.

[ultimatetables 1 /]

[ultimatetables 2 /]

[ultimatetables 3 /]

[ultimatetables 4 /]