Season 121 - Are you ready?

[talisman]

Desert Rats FC start their 46th season at Level 39, having come close to all three major trophies last season.

Results not going their way had a big effect on their League campaign, as they recovered from a heavy first match defeat to rise to the higher reaches of the table, but eventually found themselves two points short and had to settle for second place.

Their progress through the Cup was fairly routine until the Semi-Finals, where they encountered a recent regular opponent, and came off worst, a narrow win in the home Leg being offset by a 3-goal blast midway though the first half by their adversaries in the 2nd Leg, and they had to bow out of the competition.

The Champions League found the Rats in a very competitive Group, but they had a couple of results favour them and a top of Group position saw them in the lower half of the draw against more equal opponents. They had a couple of scares on the way, but made it through to the Final and defeated an old regular foe on Penalties to add the Champions League trophy to their cabinet after a five year absence. They then went on to claim the Super Cup at their first attempt, taking revenge on their Cup vanquishers in the process.







This season, at Level 39, Desert Rats find themselves in a same-level Champions League, and again in their usual Group H berth.



Their playing squad at the start of the season, with their club records.



The Management is out looking for another AML and a DC/DL player to cover for older players at the end of their contract that were released at the end of last season.

Bearing in mind the tendency for Cup first round matches to be an occasion for the Nordus Troll to rear his head, the Management decided on an all-out-attack policy from the start, and it paid off, young 'keeper Florian Saskin chalking up his first Clean Sheet of the season, but backup striker Jiri Hrubsa became the first casualty of the new season.