The Thorns Prediction Game: Reading the PTFC Leaves – Matchday 20

To nobody’s great surprise, the Thorns lost to North Carolina in Cary. Two of our players predicted the exact 2-1 score, plus one goal-scorer for 9 of a possible 20 points. The wild prediction award went to Ted Servata for dreaming of red card revenge for J. Hinkle. But the savant-of-the-week award goes to Constant Weeder, who got six points the hard way — predicting two of the three goal/assist combos exactly!

The Thorns yet again travel cross-country. This time to the Orlando Pride on Saturday at 4:30 Pacific time. The Pride are coming off a poor 2-2 draw at home against Sky Blue. Of course, the Thorns did even worse at home against that same sad sack of a team, so we should not be too critical. A Thorns win moves us to third place, passing Orlando, so this is essentially a six-point match. Both teams should have their first-choice elevens available and rested. The kickoff weather forecast is for 84 degrees with 70% humidity. Veteran Katja “Let ’em Play” Koroleva will hold the whistle.

How this works:

Add a comment to this post. In the comment title, put your predicted result; for example, 3-1 Thorns.

In the body of your comment, start with the goals and assists, like so:

Lussi (Klingenberg)

AMC (Free kick)

Heath (Unassisted)

Morgan (PK)

Next, name the first yellow card recipient: First yellow to Marta

Then reds, if any. (NOTE: No points are awarded for correctly calling a red-card-free match, so take a guess.) Weatherholt gets a red for tripping Lussi on the edge of the box.

Make your fun prediction:

Ashlyn Harris shows why she is not the USWNT starting keeper, allowing 100% of Portland’s shots on target through.

Lastly, please recommend one of the other players’ fun prediction.

Scoring:

· Correct score: 5 points

· Correct result (draw/win/loss): 3 points

· Each clean sheet: 2 points

· Each goal-scorer: 1 point

· Each FK/PK/assist/lack of assist: 1 point

· Goal/assist bonus: 1 point

· Player with the first yellow card of the match: 1 point

· Each player with a red card: 1 point (Cannot earn points for predicting 0 red cards)

· Most recommended/most outrageously accurate prediction: 2 points

Some ground rules and explanations/clarifications (the fine print):

Comments must be posted before kickoff, but you can edit or amend an earlier prediction right up to the starting whistle.

Keep your scoreline predictions realistic. No crazy scores just to pad out your odds of getting goals and assists.

The goal/assist bonus is an additional point if you predict the correct scorer and assistant on the same goal; for example, you say Onumonu scores from an Horan assist, and that is exactly what happens.

Be clear whether you think a goal will be unassisted, assisted, or from a PK/FK. Unassisted = no assist, run of play; Assisted = player who got the assist; PK/FK = not in run of play. For the purposes of this thread, Penalty Kick and Free Kick are the same thing. No entry means unassisted.

Have fun, tell your friends, let me know if you have any questions or if I screw up your score.