By Andy Reynolds
May 13 2005

Well the season is over; we finished a creditable fourth. Heineken Cup qualification in the bag, but there's no rugby to look forward to until September. Oh, unless you count the small matter of the Lions, and (much more important) the second appearance of ERE RFC at the Fat Bloke 7s in July!

Fantasy League Week Twenty-Two

The end of the ZP season brings with it the end of ERE Fantasy league for 2004/5.  Let's take a look at the final standings.

Before naming the winner (you can skip to the table if you prefer), I thought it might be interesting to look at a few stats for the season.

 ERE Dream Team 2004/5

1 Duncan Bell (Bath) 72Pts

2 Steve Thompson (Saints) 59Pts

3 Tim Payne (Wasps) 41Pts

4 Alex Brown (Gloucester) 68Pts

5 Martin Johnson (Leicester) 97Pts

6 Neil Back (Leicester) 115Pts

7 Corne Krige (Saints) 82Pts

8 Isaac Feaunati (Bath) 85Pts

9 Matt Dawson (Wasps) 89Pts

10 Andy Goode (Leicester) 330Pts

11 Marcel Garvey (Gloucester) 55Pts

12 Olly Barkley (Bath) 182Pts

13 Henry Paul (Gloucester) 189Pts

14 Tom Voyce (Wasps) 145Pts

15 Shane Drahm (Saints) 87Pts

Subs

16 Terry Sigley (Gloucester) 27 Pts for Tim Payne (Wasps)

17 Bruce Reihana (Saints) 36 Pts for Marcel Garvey (Gloucester)

18 Mark Van Gisbergen (Wasps) 180 Pts for Shane Drahm (Saints)

Total Score: 1,939Pts

Players of the Season by Club

Backs

Tigers - 330Pts Andy Goode (3T 50C 42P 6DG)

Wasps - 264Pts Mark Van Gisbergen (5T 29C 32P 0DG)

Saints - 223Pts Shane Drahm (1T 12C 42P 3DG)

Bath - 202Pts Chris Malone (1T 10C 28P 9DG)

Glaws - 189Pts Henry Paul (3T 14C 30P 1DG)

Forwards

Tigers - 115Pts Neil Back (7T 0C 0P 0DG)

Wasps - 88Pts Lawrence Dallaglio (1T 0C 0P 1DG)

Bath - 85Pts Isaac Feaunati (2T 0C 0P 0DG)

Saints - 82Pts Corne Krige (3T 0C 0P 0DG)

Glaws - 72Pts Adam Balding (1T 0C 0P 0DG)

 Top Try Scorers by Club

Wasps - 11 Tom Voyce

Tigers - 7 Neil Back

Glaws - 6 Terry Fanolua, Marcel Garvey

Bath - 5 Mike Tindall

Saints - 3 Corne Krige, Mark Tucker, John Rudd, Wylie Human, Ben Cohen

Top Drop Goals by Club

Bath - 9 Chris Malone

Tigers - 6 Andy Goode

Glaws - 5 Duncan McRae

Wasps - 2 Alex King, James Brooks

Saints - 3 Shane Drahm

Most Starts

Wasps - 22 Mark Van Gisbergen (264Pts 5T 29C 32P 0DG)

Glaws - 22 Jon Goodridge (91Pts 3T 0C 0P 0DG)

Tigers - 21 Martin Johnson (97Pts 2T 0C 0P 0DG)

Bath - 21 Isaac Feaunati (85Pts 2T 0C 0P 0DG)

Saints - 21 Bruce Reihana (84Pts 1T 0C 2P 0DG)

Super Subs

Wasps - 14 James Brooks (58Pts 0T 1C 0P 2DG)

Bath - 11 Lee Mears (52Pts 1T 0C 0P 0DG)

Tigers - 11 James Buckland (42Pts 0T 0C 0P 0DG)

Glaws - 9 James Forrester (51Pts 2T 0C 0P 0DG)

Saints - 9 Damian Browne (55Pts 0T 0C 0P 0DG)

Hardly surprising that Tigers have the two highest scoring players and this is reflected in their final standing in the ZP.  Wasps feature well.  The relative positions of Bath and Wasps in the try scoring and drop goal leagues speaks volumes about our back play.  Shame  we can’t Voycie back!  Interesting to see how high up the league Shane Drahm is - oh how the Saints will regret letting him go.  And I'd forgotten about that outrageous drop goal by LBND against Leeds.

Allegiance Mini League

A one horse race for most of the season.  Once the Tigers got their collective noses in front there was no stopping them.  Bath closed the gap early on, but that was as close as any of the teams got.  Congratulations you Tigers.  We will be saying that after the weekend?

The Final Table

There was plenty of movement in the mid table on a weekly basis.  CoochieCoo lost his private battle with Ajack; "Stade de Coochie" finished 172 points and 13 places behind Jacksmen at 24th.  He did however get the better of Hamptonite; "One game at a time" finished in 34th place.  The best thing to be said for Bath Fan Stuck in Glos is that he is far better player in real life than he is a manager in the fantasy league.  Good team name too: "We're Aiming for Second Place" finished in the bottom 4! Better luck next year Sir.

For long periods at the top of the table it was nip and tuck between "Ramblin Men" and "Wherefore the Beast". Towards the end of the season Bath Fan Jack looked favourite to retain the bottle of champagne that he so generously offered as a prize, but just like the Wasps of the last 2 years, "Punters Gamble II" have come up along the rails to make life interesting ...

Yes, the ERE FANTASY RUGBY 2004/5 CHAMPIONS (with a score of 1,874Pts) are "PUNTERS GAMBLE II" managed by bath_mp. Congratualtions Bath_mp, I'll be in touch to arrange the safe delivery of your prize.  I hope the rest of you fantasy managers out there enjoyed the competition. I thank you for taking part.

Next Season

I have agreed with Glen to run the Fantasy Rugby League next year, but I will changing the format somewhat, with more frequent substitutions, to give managers more of chance to make tactical subs.  Watch this space in August for details.

Click here for the final table