Season 7 (Fri Feb 27 09)
Simon Hutchinson and Steve Tucker won their Southern California Subbuteo Club Season 7 League Cup first round ties. Simon had beaten Munir Merchant in the first leg last week, beat his opponent in the second leg by the same score. In back-to-back games Steve's only goal in the first leg against Dominic Hutchinson came from a penalty. The second leg was more one sided as Steve found his touch and Dominic's defense was not as solid as it had been in the previous game.
In Season 7 league play Jason Mitchell crashed to two defeats losing to Kevin Nieman and Simon. Munir beat Kevin for his first win of the season.
Wayne Smith remains in first place in the table. Simon is in second, four points behind Wayne. Dominic is in third place, four points behind his father and one point in front of Kevin. Kevin, fourth, has one more point than Munir who has two games in hand. Jason's wretched run of results leaves him in sixth place with only a point. Steve and Adam Carlson have not played any league games this season.
Season 7»
Season 7 latest match reports»
Season 7 League Cup»
History from Wayne Smith (Wed Feb 25 09)
On Friday February 15 Wayne Smith played his 500th game with the Southern California Subbuteo Club.
Wayne is a cofounder of the Southern California Subbuteo Club and after this game we ask him what changes he had seen in the Subbuteo scene in So Cal... More history»
Latest ASA Rolling Rankings (Mon Feb 23 09)
The American Subbuteo Association published the latest Rolling Rankings yesterday, February 22. This is how the Southern California Subbuteo Club players are ranked:
| 6. | Wayne Smith | 68. | Jason Mitchell | |
| 14. | Steve Tucker | 75. | Edgar Flores, Ian Sayer | |
| 39. | Simon Hutchinson | 81. | Dominic Hutchinson, David Jensen | |
| 41. | Kevin Nieman | 86. | Edward Nathan | |
| 56. | John Carroll | 88. | Adam Carlson | |
| 62. | Munir Merchant | 123. | Sean Daly |
As these are pretty much the same as last month's rankings they do not appear to contain the results from our last ASA Open on January 25.
What are the Rolling Rankings?
Only the ranking points won in the last twelve months are counted. If the player has played in more than five ASA tournaments in that time period only the points
won in their best five finishes are counted.
Season 7 (Fri Feb 20 09)
Kevin Nieman and Munir Merchant started their play in the Southern California Subbuteo Club's Season 7 tonight.
Munir's opening game was the first leg in round one of the Season 7 League Cup at "home" against Simon Hutchinson. Simon won the game and carries a vital "away" goal to the second leg. In Munir's second game he was beaten by Wayne Smith, even though at the end of the first half the score was tied.
Wayne went on to beat Simon, who was at "home" for this game. The corresponding fixture is still the only game Wayne has not won this season.
Kevin was beaten by a surprising goal by Dominic Hutchinson, and then went on to draw with Simon.
Dominic's first win of the season puts him in third place, just a point behind his father and with a game in hand.
Kevin and Munir's final game was against each other in a supplemental (friendly) game, that Kevin won by a single goal.
Season 7»
Season 7 latest match reports»
Season 7 League Cup»
Season 7 supplemental»
New look Club shop (Thu Feb 19 09)
Dominic Hutchinson has created a new Club shop for the Southern California Subbuteo Club.
"I decided to redo the Club store because the other one offered nothing useful," he told us.
"I took it upon myself to make the store a little more light hearted and humorous."
To view Dominic's creations you can either click the link below, or click on the Club Shop section in the right hand column of the home page.
Two more pitches (Tue Feb 17 09)
Continuing our series describing our frequently used Subbuteo pitches we have the details of the two newest, Steve Tucker's Black pitch and White pitch. These pitches were first used during the ASA Open on January 19, with the Black pitch being used for the final.
You can learn more about the other pitches used by the Southern California Subbuteo Club in the Pitches section of this website.
League Cup first round draw (Sun Feb 15 09)
The draw for the first round of the Southern California Subbuteo Club's Season 7 League Cup was made by Jason Mitchell on Friday night. Each tie will have two legs. The player named first will be the "home" player in the first leg.
| Home first leg | Home second leg | |
| Wayne Smith | v | Jason Mitchell |
| Steve Tucker | v | Dominic Hutchinson |
| Munir Merchant | v | Simon Hutchinson |
| Kevin Nieman | v | Adam Carlson |
All first round ties must be completed by March 13.
Smith reaches the 500 games milestone (Sat Feb 14 09)
Last night Wayne Smith played his 500th game with the Southern California Subbuteo Club. We know that he has played more, but many of the records from competitions before 2005 have been lost.
Smith started playing the beautiful game in 1985 and has become the best player in California. His dominance of the local Subbuteo scene is so complete that he has won almost every competition hosted in the Golden State.
Season 7 kicked off (Fri Feb 13 09)
There were four players at the opening night of the Southern California Subbuteo Club's new season, Season 7. This season the "away" player uses the smaller Subbuteo style goalkeeper.
In the first round of games Wayne Smith and Simon Hutchinson played out a draw, and the other game ended with the same score between Dominic Hutchinson and Jason Mitchell.
The second round of games also ended with the same scores as Simon beat Jason and Wayne defeated Dominic.
It was not until the third round that the games ended with different results. Wayne continued his winning ways beating Jason. Dominic scored a late goal against the run of play to tie his game with his father, Simon.
Vote for small goalkeepers (Tue Feb 10 09)
The votes have been tallied and the majority of the players taking part in Season 7 voted that the "away" player should use a Subbuteo or Zeugo goalkeeper, thereby giving the "home" player some "home field" advantage.
When the season starts, on Friday February 13, the "away" player will use the smaller goalkeeper
in all league and cup games, and the "home" player will use the goalkeeper of their choice.
The picture on the right shows, from left to right: a Zeugo goalkeeper, a metal goalkeeper (used by the majority of Southern California Subbuteo Club players), and a SportsFigure goalkeeper. Click on the photographs to see a larger version.
Season 7 starts on Friday (Sun Feb 8 09)
The Southern California Subbuteo Club's Season 7 will kick off on Friday February 13. The same eight players who took part in Season 6 will be taking part in the new season. You can see the teams they will be using on the Season 7 participants page.
This season will also have a League Cup competition. The draw for the first round of the cup will be made on Friday.
The only decision left to me made is whether the "away" players will use the small Subbuteo style goalkeepers. If you are participating in Season 7 and you have not already emailed Simon Hutchinson your opinion about this please do so before Wednesday February 11, or use the Contact page.
Thursday friendlies (Thu Feb 5 09)
There were only five Subbuteo games played tonight. The evening opened with a Steve Tucker victory over Munir Merchant. As he had lost his previous game Munir was given the choice of whom to play next. He picked Simon Hutchinson and they fought out a goalless draw, with very few scoring opportunities for either player. Steve played Wayne Smith, and for 14:30 both players described the game as "even". In those remaining 30 seconds of the first half Wayne scored twice in a burst of fast play.
As Munir and Steve had already played each other it meant that the for the last games of the night Munir would play Wayne, and Simon take on Steve. After an "even" first half Wayne went on to score twice to beat Munir. The only goal of the other game came from a "lucky" ricochet off Simon's hand and into his goal.
Photographs from Thursday (Wed Feb 4 09)
Photographs from last Thursday's Friendly games have been made into a slide show.
You can see the slideshow here»
ASA Open final videos (Mon Feb 2 09)
The video shot during January 25's ASA Open has been edited into highlights and uploaded to the internet. There are two clips, one of each half, and you can watch all the goals and saves from this exciting game by clicking on the links below.
On the blogs (Sun Feb 1 09)
Last week both the FISTF and Livre Indirecto Online Subbuteo blogs carried the following story about last Sunday's ASA Open.
National Open in California
On Sunday 25 January we played the first American Subbuteo Association Open in
the Golden state (California) in 2009. It was a very competitive affair with
perhaps more closely fought games than I can remember in any previous ASA
Open. Congratulations to all the competitors:
Open Winner : Wayne Smith
Runner up : David Jensen
Third : Steve Tucker
Fourth : John Carroll
Mary Jane Winner : Simon Hutchinson
Runner up : Kevin Nieman
Third : Dominic Hutchinson
Notable performances were by:
- David Jensen in reaching his first final having returned to playing Subbuteo
just five months ago.
- John Carroll for beating the second seed in the group stage. Thereby, making
it possible for David to reach the final.
- Dominic Hutchinson despite losing all of his games he played probably the
best any of us have seen in more than one game from him. Now only if he would
practice… A full report and all of the results can be found on
this page. 