relegation – The Jeff Kenna League

Heads roll in the drop zone

Cigar cutter — Gruesome end: While those at the top of the Kenna reach for the cigars, the bottom three managers face the chop (photo courtesy of double gauss)

AS THE SPORTING Lesbian manager bathes in the success of winning the Kenna title on his debut, time has run out at the other end of the league.

Vasco De Beauvoir, victors of the inaugural Kenna league in 2005 and double winners in 2010, rounded off a dismal season to be relegated after eight years in the top flight.

The Vasco manager’s disastrous campaign is being pinpointed to the moment he lost a £40m Sergio Aguero under the Titus Bramble ruling at the August auction. The strike force of Leroy Lita and Fabio Borini offered little recompense.

Aguero went on to the snapped up for £12m and became an integral component of Sporting Lesbian’s team.

Speaking to Sky Sports News this morning outside Vasco’s Shoreditch Park ground, which was as far he got when it turned out club wallahs had already ordered the locks to be changed, the outgoing manager said: “Is it opening time yet?”

Licked

In south London, the Kenna diversity police are hot on the trail of another manager with a P45 fresh in his in tray.

No one expected Wandsworth Window Lickers to put up much of a fight this season considering their registered status as intellectually disabled.

But the team bus with rainbows on the side and disproportionately high number of grab handles at their home ground was just a ruse, the whole team turned out to be physically fit athletes who possessed all their mental faculties – with the exception of Peter Odemwingie, who was mostly a knob.

The Wandsworth manager was last seen boarding a plane to South America on a ‘scouting mission’. Club bean counters are said to be keen to speak to the errant manager over missing disability allowance funds.

Crime spree

The Woking manager is still AWOL, and has been since the mysterious death of Sky Sports News presenter Natalie Sawyer on Chobam Common.

Surrey Police were believed to have made a breakthrough in the manhunt when an early-hours 999 call from a club admin girl claimed the manager’s car was parked outside her Worplesdon flat.

A response was dispatched, but officers arrived to find the property empty and ransacked. Two days later the girl was fished out of the Basingstoke Canal with a broken neck.

The search continues.

Big do

Managers will flock to a central London pub on Friday for the Kenna end-of-season awards night.

The Chairman said: “It’s been a long season and for all that hard work managers deserve nothing less than to buy me a beer. There’ll also be a short quiz to see how much people remember from the campaign’s shenanigans.”

Final league table

Week 38 - 21 May 2013 — Week 38 – 21 May 2013

Weekly scores

		Manager	Points	Goals
1	Spartak Mogadishu	Abdi	47	6
2	Northern Monkeys	Hugo	43	1
3	Just put Carles	Carles	40	2
4	Lokomotiv Leeds	Ben S	37	1
5	Piedmonte	Phil	35	1
6	Headless Chickens	John N	34	3
7	PSV Mornington	El Pons	34	1
8	Woking	Mike	32	3
9	Dynamo Charlton	Alex	32	0
10	Bala Rinas	Lewis	31	2
11	Hairy Fadjeetas	Aiden	30	1
12	Judean Peoples’ Front	Sholto	30	0
13	Pikey Scum	Jack	26	2
14	Vasco De Beauvoir	Stix	26	2
15	Still Don’t Know Yet	Pete	25	2
16	FC Testicluadew	James N	24	1
17	Wandsworth Window Lickers	Will	24	0
18	Sporting Lesbian	Ben M	23	1
19	Greendale Rockets	Stu	20	1
20	Newington Reds	Dudley	8	0

Podium race bursts into life for final match

Beach volleyball — Difficult to focus on the game: Many Kenna managers have had one eye on the beach for some time (photo courtesy of k1studio)

DIMITAR Berbatov and Loïc Rémy responded to accusations from these very pages last week that they had one eye on the beach to both notch for FC Testiculadew.

The two goals, alongside a Steven Pienaar assist and John Ruddy clean sheet, put defending champions FCT to within 56 points of Sporting Lesbian.

The 19th goal of the campaign from Lesbian’s £2.5m midfielder Michu puts one hand on the title for the debut manager.

The chasing pack with one week to go:

Judean Peoples’ Front
Another all-action display from the defence – Joe Hart, Ashley Cole and Jose Enrique have scored over 400 points between them – and a brace from Emmanuel Adebayor put the club just 15 points off second place. An excellent season from the Anders Breivik doppleganger manager whose previous league best was ninth.

Piedmonte
Frank Lampard isn’t the Kenna star performer he once was, but two goals on the weekend, and assists from Ricky Lambert and Adam Johnson have their manager just 30 points away from equaling his best league finish – runners up in the 2006/07 season

Dynamo Charlton
Goals from Oscar and Robert Snodgrass found the net. Nathan Dyer and Carlos Tevez helped others to do the same. Even Danny Graham’s drought and Per Mertesacker can’t stop the Olisadebe Euro 2012 winning manager from an outside chance of second place.

Just Put Carles
The Catalan manager dropped down the table, but all eyes will be on this weekend’s Canesten Combi Cup final against Spartak Mogadishu. Goals from Silva, Henderson, Maloney & co could prompt a cup win and podium finish come Sunday.

Lokomotiv Leeds
It would take a Herculean effort for Lokomotiv to make up the 39 point gap to third place. The manager doesn’t look like achieving the runner up spot debut of last season.

Meanwhile at the other end, the relegation dogfight looks to have fizzled out. Even with the Lukas Podolski double scored in tonight’s match (not included in this update), Vasco De Beauvoir are closer to digging themselves further into oblivion than the other way. The end of an eight year tenure in the Kenna?

Wandsworth Window Lickers are trying to guide themselves into the end of a awful season. Their manager has whisked himself off to Colombia for a jolly, under the guise of having a nose for new talent – a move being sniffed at by his critics.

Surrey Police have found an abandoned car in Runtley Wood, thought to belong to the missing Woking manager. The manhunt continues.

League table

Week 37 - 14 May 2013 — Week 37 – 14 May 2013

Weekly scores

		Manager	Points	Goals
1	Hairy Fadjeetas	Aiden	42	3
2	Judean Peoples’ Front	Sholto	41	2
3	Dynamo Charlton	Alex	38	2
4	Newington Reds	Dudley	35	3
5	FC Testicluadew	James N	35	2
6	Headless Chickens	John N	35	2
7	Piedmonte	Phil	31	2
8	Woking	Mike	31	1
9	Northern Monkeys	Hugo	27	1
10	Wandsworth Window Lickers	Will	25	1
11	Bala Rinas	Lewis	24	0
12	Just put Carles	Carles	23	1
13	Greendale Rockets	Stu	22	0
14	Vasco De Beauvoir	Stix	21	3
15	Spartak Mogadishu	Abdi	21	1
16	PSV Mornington	El Pons	21	0
17	Still Don’t Know Yet	Pete	19	0
18	Pikey Scum	Jack	18	0
19	Sporting Lesbian	Ben M	16	1
20	Lokomotiv Leeds	Ben S	16	0

		Points	Player
	Player of the week	17	Sturridge, D – LIV – STR
		Club	Newington Reds

Lezzers lose libido late on

A playful slime treatment — Spilt milk?: Sporting Lesbian are on the verge of messing it up (photo courtesy of Wet and Messy Photography)

BITING BANS and injury troubles have Kenna League leaders Sporting Lesbian limping towards the line with two weeks left of the football season.

Michu, David Santon, Kieran Gibbs and Maynor Figueroa are all on the physio’s table, a thought that has teammate Luis Suarez lurking nearby with the condiments as he sits out his 10-match ban.

The personnel crisis at Sporting Lesbian is a surprising twist in this term’s final act. In his debut campaign their manager has dominated to such an extent that league investigators claim to have found the ashes of any competition for the title in the living room woodburner of his country cottage.

The door has now been left ajar for defending champions FC Testiculadew. Not dissimilar to the Sporting manager’s debut this time, FCT’s authority over last season’s contest led to their manager being implicated in the ‘Kenna in the bag‘ scandal in April 2012.

In second place for most of the year, the FCT manager is also struggling to get the best from his team as strikers Loic Remy and Dimitar Berbatov rapidly lose interest in proceedings. Over his shoulder a host of clubs are queuing up for the spoils.

Led by Anders Breivik lookalike the Judean Peoples’ Front manager – whose team ironically has one of the worst returns at hitting the target – the chasing pack extends down to the Dynamo Charlton in seventh place.

Pikey Scum in fifteenth would appear most likely to escape a dreary performance with a mid-table finish. Below them two goals from ‘Release’ Bryan Ruiz and a second league notch for Gareth McAuley on the weekend have Vasco De Beauvoir exerting a modicum of pressure on those clubs just above the drop zone.

At the bottom, the Woking manager hasn’t been to work since taking a screen test at Sky Sports News three weeks ago. Surrey Police have appealed for any information related to his whereabouts, although they advise the public not to approach him.

League table

Week 35 - 7 May 2013 — Week 35 – 7 May 2013

Weekly scores

		Manager	Points	Goals
1	Just put Carles	Carles	46	1
2	Judean Peoples’ Front	Sholto	40	0
3	Bala Rinas	Lewis	35	1
4	Dynamo Charlton	Alex	35	0
5	PSV Mornington	El Pons	32	2
6	Vasco De Beauvoir	Stix	30	3
7	Lokomotiv Leeds	Ben S	30	1
8	Wandsworth Window Lickers	Will	28	1
9	Piedmonte	Phil	28	0
10	Headless Chickens	John N	26	0
11	Newington Reds	Dudley	22	1
12	FC Testicluadew	James N	22	0
13	Hairy Fadjeetas	Aiden	22	0
14	Woking	Mike	21	1
15	Greendale Rockets	Stu	21	0
16	Spartak Mogadishu	Abdi	21	0
17	Still Don’t Know Yet	Pete	20	1
18	Pikey Scum	Jack	15	1
19	Northern Monkeys	Hugo	13	0
20	Sporting Lesbian	Ben M	11	0

		Points	Player
	Player of the week	12	Agbonlahor, G – AVL – STR
		Club	PSV Mornington

Lining up survival

Coke: Heart problems not a concern for Lurliners boss

AS UNSPECTACULAR debut seasons in the Kenna go, Lurliners‘ has been textbook.

Floating around the bottom half of the table since an early charge in autumn, the club have made a dwindling impact.

Goals this week from the unlikely duo Franco di Santo and Steven Fletcher alleviated relegation fears hanging over the outfit for the last few weeks.

Concern was beginning to emerge after long-term injuries to Steven Taylor, Kieron Gibbs and a Fabrice Muamba cardiac arrest, but the Lurliners manager hasn’t been letting pressure get the better of him.

“Relegation? Relegation? There’s not chance I’ll be relegated. My team will definitely stay up. Definitely! If I find anyone talking about relegation at the club I’ll tie them to a tree and put a gun to their head, see how they like pressure. The only thing we’re going out is to town, and we’ll have a great time. A great time! You’ll see. When are the girls getting here? Get on the phone!” said the Lurliners manager while pacing up and down his office, ice tinkling in his Jack and Coke, ordering Bradley Johnson to rack up another line.

Meanwhile, Papiss Demba Cissé is ridiculing his £0.5m January price tag.

“Yarrrr! He be a fine purchase,” said the Spartak Mogadishu manager, preparing his war chest to retain the striker in the summer auction.

Download the full scores, tables and much more from the ‘Details’ box on the right hand side of the page.

Weekly scores - 3 May 2012 — Weekly scores – 3 May 2012

Elokobi leaves Seduction on loan

Nottingham Forest have signed The Dan Terry Seduction left-back George Elokobi on loan until the end of the season.

The 26-year-old Cameroonian has scored only 18 points for the struggling club this season, with just three starts in the Kenna League.

Elokobi told BBC Radio Nottingham: “It hasn’t worked out for me this season. There’s just not enough to eat in the club canteen.”

The defender’s departure leaves the Seduction in a bitter fight against relegation.

“We hoped the fuss around the England job would distract the media from this embarrassing development,” said the Seduction boss.

“We’re doomed. The only thing left for us to do now is stash as much complimentary Kenna stationery as possible into the lock-up before our official relegation at the end of the season,” he continued, while backing the club’s Bedford Rascal into a Dalston industrial estate.

Bottom pressure

Whiskey — Early doors: how will managers handle 'drop zone' pressure?

Three managers will be reaching for the bottle in their bottom drawer a little earlier today as the Kenna table now contains a ‘relegation zone’.

Quite what will happen to managers who face the drop is unclear, so rumours abound.

“Here at Kenna HQ we have a long-term plan to introduce more statistics into the league,” said the Chairman in a corporate Betamax video filmed on the Norfolk Broads. “We want to make managers’ careers more transparent.

“We’re also looking at various options, but I think the possibility is emerging that those in the relegation zone at the end of the season will have to come back at the helm of another club next year….(cough, cough)…and pay an increased entry fee.”

One club currently under pressure is Polonia Forsyth.

The manager’s unorthodox man management methods drew a lot of profile to the club last season.

Local reports claim that the manager has divided her time between Michael Essien’s physio table and pining for the talents of Johan Elmander, and so the team’s performances have slipped.

“These rumours are totally unfounded,” said the Polonia manager, emerging from her office with a framed photo of the club’s top scorer last season and wearing a Black Stars shirt.

Week 7's round up — Demba Ba's hat trick was a boost to Newington Reds