Seeded 11th of 12. That Feels About Right.

MEET THE TEAM

Let’s address the elephant in the arena before a single ball, car or rocket-powered anything gets touched. The Lossie Phantoms went into their first competitive outing of the 2026 campaign seeded 11th out of 12 entrants. Essentially cannon fodder. A team assembled, presumably, so that the other eleven would have somebody to warm up on.

Having watched what 2025 actually was, this is, in fairness, a completely reasonable piece of seeding. Nobody at BFBS HQ owes us the benefit of the doubt. We haven’t earned it yet.

I won’t pretend it didn’t sting a little. I will, however, pretend that it definitely wasn’t extra motivation, because I’m contractually obliged by the spirit of this club to undersell everything we do right up until the moment the scoreline makes that impossible. The scoreline, this week, made that impossible.

THE LINE UP QUESTION

Lucas is in the Falklands. Not “stuck in traffic on the A96,” not “internet issues, allegedly” – the actual Falkland Islands, a genuine eight thousand mile alibi that not even the Official Secrets Act could improve on. So the Holy Trinity took an enforced sabbatical and, in his place, arrived Kaleb Poff-Harrison. A recruit from 6 Squadron, said to be “class,” whose actual name will be etched into lore by the end of the night, possibly in paint pen on a desk somewhere.

Meanwhile Anthony arrived a full sixty minutes before kick-off, which under normal circumstances would suggest a man who has finally, after an entire season, got his technical affairs in order. It did not suggest that. With ten minutes to go he had no wifi and a headset that had apparently unionised overnight. An hour of prep time, spent doing something that was certainly not preparing. Some questions are better left unasked. This is one of them.

Round 1: RAF Hurricanes 1 – 2 Lossie Phantoms

(0-1L, 1-0W, 1-0W)

Down after game one, the way the script insisted it should go, before the Phantoms simply declined to read any further. Two straight wins to close it out, against a side seeded sixth. Not the warm-up act anyone expected.

Round 2: Lossie Phantoms 2 – 1 BAES Sparrowhawks

(1-2L, 4-2W, 5-2W)

A 4-2 followed by a 5-2 is not a scoreline, it’s a statement, delivered slowly so everyone in the room has time to read it twice. The Sparrowhawks came in seventh-seeded and left looking considerably more seventh-seeded than they had going in.

Round 3: BAES Kestrels 2 – 0 Lossie Phantoms

(0-1L, 0-1L)

Every good week needs a reminder that we are, in fact, still the Lossie Phantoms. The Kestrels sit second in the group for good reason, and this was the one fixture of the evening where the gap simply refused to close. Tight scorelines, correct result.

Round 4: RAF Mustangs 2 – 0 Lossie Phantoms

(0-5L, 1-6L)

And here is the other half of that reminder. The Mustangs finished the week unbeaten, top seed, eleven scored to one conceded across the match, and treated the Phantoms accordingly. No shame in it. Some fixtures exist purely to keep everyone honest.

Round 5: Lossie Phantoms 2 – 0 RAF Tornados

(1-0W, 1-0W)

Tidy, professional, over quickly. The Tornados finished the week without a single point to their name, and the Phantoms made sure of it with the minimum of fuss required. A perfectly sensible way to end a very silly evening.

THE TABLE DOESN’T LIE, IT JUST UNDERSELLS

Pos	Team	P	W	L	F	A	GD	Pts
1	RAF Mustangs (3)	5	5	0	10	1	9	5
2	BAES Kestrels (2)	5	4	1	9	2	7	4
3	Lossie Phantoms (11)	5	3	2	6	6	0	3
4	RAF Hurricanes (6)	5	2	3	5	7	-2	2
5	BAES Sparrowhawks (7)	5	1	4	4	8	-4	1
6	RAF Tornados (10)	5	0	5	0	10	-10	0

Third. Out of six. Seeded eleventh out of twelve overall, sat comfortably above two sides seeded sixth and seventh. There was a poster doing the rounds earlier that day declaring, with more confidence than the seeding strictly justified, that WE ARE BACK. Turns out that wasn’t marketing. That was a forecast.

ONWARD

The Phantoms have qualified for the Main Event – the Swiss Stage, Wednesday 8th July, 19:30, against the best of Groups A and B. A genuine superstar line up, and somewhere in the middle of it, seeded 11th, a team that isn’t supposed to be there.

Lucas, presumably, will hear about all this from several thousand miles away and wonder what on earth he missed. Everything, mate. He missed everything.

Lossie Phantoms Week 1 Line Up: Ryan Beesla, Anthony Kariuki, Kaleb Poff-Harrison