Lions WC 25 Campaign

After the infamous redraw which Total n Utter Insanity forgotten, the Lions were put into a difficult Group 9, which ultimately caused the qualifying campaign to end in disappointment. After an expected Matchday One victory over RyukyuDaitoKazanNampo (which the Lions won 4-1), talk about qualifying for the second World Cup in a row intensified in Nedalia. However, things started to drift out of control for the Lions.

Matchday Two saw a loss infront of the home crowd at the Kafra International Stadium to Spaam, with the final result being 2-1. Although disappointing, many Nedalians brushed it aside and hoped for better next go around. They would have to wait for a while. Matchdays Three and Four saw losses to Total n Utter Insanty and Eauz, respectively, home and away. Four games into the campaign, and the Lions were sitting at the bottom half of the group table. It wasnt until Matchday Five that they got their act together, defeating Da WhoseLine People 3-1 at home. By then, however, pressure had already started to mount on the team, and especially on the shoulders of manager Randy Gamman.

It appeared the the pressure, which the Lions never had to live with before, caused perhaps the lowest point of the qualifying campaign: a 1-0 home loss to lowly Adam Island. That had the critics, media, and the fans reeling with anger, and the Nedalian FA demanded that results improve. A 4-1 home win against Andossa Se Mitrin Vega caused some of the anger to quell a bit, but there was still a heavy sense of disappointment in the air, and things were not helped by the result on Matchday Nine. Hoping to have turned the corner, the Lions went to Hockey Canada with hopes of snatching 3 points. Instead, they conceded 3 goals and came away with nothing in a 3-1 loss. Rumors started springing up about the match costing Gamman's job, but he ended up keeping it, despite the fact that the team were heavily underachieving. The table at the halfway mark looked like this:

GROUP 9

 Pos  Team                    P  W  D  L  F   A   GD   Pts
 1  Total n Utter Insanity  9  6  2  1  15   9    6   20
 2  Hockey Canada           9  5  3  1  13   5    8   18
 3  Eauz                    9  4  3  2  13   8    5   15
 4  Spaam                   9  3  5  1  12  10    2   14
 5  Da WhoseLine People     9  3  4  2  10  10    0   13
 6  Yafor 2                 9  3  3  3   9   7    2   12
 7  RyukyuDaitoKazanNampo   9  3  2  4  12  14   -2   11
 8  Nedalia                 9  3  0  6  19  18    1    9
 9  Adam Island             9  2  1  6   4  15  -11    7
10  Andossa Se Mitrin Vega  9  0  3  6   9  20  -11    3