Friends in fútbol,

We averaged THREE correct picks in the Pick'em. Three.

In Survivor, somehow only 56% of us were eliminated. "Only." Could easily have been much worse.

Villa lost to Forest. Liverpool tied Luton. Sheffield actually won (in an absolutely brutal finish - see below). Spurs played Chelsea 9 v 11 for funsies and it was not fun.

We've entered the Chaos SZN stretch of the EPL calendar, apparently...

COMMISH COMMENTARY

Our big loss - Sheffield over Wolves - has to rank as one of the most brutal endings in SZN history.

At the absolute death - the 7th minute of stoppage time in the second half and what was very likely the final possession of the game - Sheffield was granted a penalty kick (that they then converted to win, 2-1).

Soccer rules state that any foul in the penalty area is the same as any other foul in the penalty area - they all result in a penalty kick.

But soccer fans know that egregious tackles from behind - or blatant hand balls to prevent a sure-fire goal - are simply in a different category from questionable calls that don't feel nearly worth the steep price.

In this case, Sheffield had nothing. The guy with the ball had his back turned to the goal in the absolute far corner of the penalty area, with TWO Wolves defenders on him. This was NOT going to result in a goal. The game was going to be over.

The Wolves guy clipped the Sheffield guy. It was probably a foul, even if it was a light/harmless one. But man... for that to determine the game and end so many of our Survivor runs... brutal.

Just how tough was Matchday 11 to predict? Our previous worst was 4.2/10 average in M7.

So, our 3.23/10 in M11 was a full loss worse, and ranks among the worst pick'em performances in SZN history, across any sport.

It's been a trend, though. This EPL SZN has gotten progressively harder to predict.

Here's our average correct pick total per week (rounded): 6 5 5 6 7 6 4 5 7 5 3.

First six matchdays: 5.83 correct picks per matchday.

Last five matchdays: 4.8.

But the average almost obscures the trend, as our four worst matchdays have all come in the past five weeks.

Yours in show dives,
The Commish