Despite being up against some very stiff competition, our Get Well Soup campaign for Heinz won both Best Social Campaign of the Year and Best Engagement Campaign of the Year. We were also shortlisted for the overall Agency of the Year title, but were narrowly pipped to the post by our friends at AKQA.

We were in a pretty good mood anyway, but the evening’s entertainment certainly added to it. Russell Kane’s excellently inappropriate comedy performance kept people on their toes and there was also some unexpected entertainment in the form of an unmoderated tweet wall. This kept everyone amused for the first hour of the night as different tables pushed the limits of what is acceptable. Very little wasn’t, but it was hilarious and although unintentional, added to the atmosphere of the night.

It was great to see some fantastic work on display from agencies across the board, so a big congratulations to all the other winners and nominees. Let’s hope this quality of work is a good sign for the rest of 2013!

The most talked-about brands on Facebook
Socialbakers has produced a list of the top-10 brands on Facebook by the ‘people talking about this’ metric, both in the US and on a global scale. Interestingly, New York-based ‘DealDash’ top both categories, despite a much smaller audience than other pages, suggesting that people enjoy talking about low-priced offers to an extent that even Coca Cola and Walmart cannot replicate.

Tesco top for Twitter customer service
UK Supermarket giant Tesco has been ranked as the top brand in the world for Twitter customer service by Socialbakers, answering a volume of 7,129 questions. In terms of response rate and time, however, Halo BCA are the winners, responding to 95.06% of questions, with an average time of just 3 minutes.

The finance industry ranked highest of all sectors for response rate at 62.8%. Considering their equivalent for Q2 2012 was 27.4%, that also amounts to the biggest year-on-year increase.

Social media users attempt to perfect their persona online
Social media users seek validation from others and look to attain this through massaging the truth in their online personas, according to research from the Future Foundation. 34% of social media users agree that they hold a “strong desire” for recognition from others, which has led to certain ways of behaving online, including 68% of drinkers admitting to de-tagging themselves from at least one photo. In total, 44% agreed with the statement “I wish I could be more like the person I describe myself as on social media.”

6 in 10 UK residents own a smartphone
According to eDigitalResearch and the IMRG, 60% of all UK residents now own a smartphone, with women accounting for 58% of these.

Yahoo to purchase Tumblr for $1.1 billion
As has been rumoured for the last few days, Yahoo is set to purchase Tumblr in a deal worth $1.1 billion, as announced by both parties today. For the full low down on the deal, and what effect it’s likely to have, check out our full blog post on the subject.

Facebook bringing structured updates to mobile
Facebook’s structured updates, which allow users to share how they are feeling or an activity through a set of pre-ordained emoticons, are being rolled out on mobile. Available to some desktop users since January and more widely rolled out in April, the feature is now accessible via m.facebook.com, though not yet on the platform’s iOS or Android apps. Constructing one of the new status updates will look as follows:

Then, once it’s been posted, you’ll see something like the following:

Twitter strikes deals with ESPN and Fox
Twitter is looking to grow its connection with the TV industry through two new deals with ESPN and Fox. The first will see ESPN host highlight clips of major sporting events within its tweets, an opportunity for both rich content and mutually beneficial advertising opportunities; ESPN will sell ads within the clips and have also agreed to purchase a minimum number of ‘Promoted Products’ from Twitter. Fox, meanwhile, are set to feature show previews, recaps and more.

YouTube introduces new functionality to allow purchase of goods
Google last week announced a new ‘channel gadget’ for consumer goods brands. The plan is to allow users to seamlessly move from watching, say, a video about hair straightening, to looking at featured products, browsing retailers and checking prices and availability, then purchasing the product online. Unilever are set to be the first to use the system, for their TRESemmé haircare range.

The new Google+
Google+ has made a number of updates to its service, specifically in stream, related hashtags, hangouts and photos. The updates to stream are intended to create a more visually immersive experience across all devices, with changes including a multi-column layout, larger photos and animated elements, such as the sharebox bouncing and cards flipping or fading.

Related hashtags look to enhance your ability to enter conversations about the topics you love. So, whenever you write a post about, say, your favourite sports team, Google+ will determine what it’s about and tag it accordingly. The system can then identify and rank conversations and allow you to click on the relevant hashtag for more opportunities to browse related content.

Hangouts have been expanded as stand-alone apps on desktop, iOS and Android for sharing not just live video, but also text and photos. Additional features such as a conversation history and notifications synced across devices attempt to produce a more seamless overall experience.

Finally, photos have been upgraded with four different ‘auto’ features. Assuming permission is granted, Google+ will ‘auto-upload’ your images to the network, preventing them from being left on your phone and ensuring that they’re backed up online. ‘Auto highlight’ helps choose the best images in any given album by emphasising or de-emphasising on a number of factors, from the people and landmarks present to the quality of image or fact that it’s a duplicate. For those photos that aren’t as high quality as others, ‘auto enhance’ will fix things like the light and focus. Finally, there’s a feature called ‘auto awesome’, which looks to automatically create exciting content from the photos you upload. Say you upload in a series of similar photos, for example, Google+ will try to create an animation from them. If you post a few different family portraits, the feature will choose their best smiles and compile this into one image.

Pinterest release new brand-friendly pin
Pinterest have produced a new type of pin, which allows for additional information to be shared beneath the pin when a user clicks on it, with different variations for food, retail and films. The first will include a recipe list, the second a list of purchase locations and the third additional information such as cast, ratings etc. Whilst these pins will currently only link to an initial list of partner sites, they already include big names such as eBay, Etsy, WalMart and Netflix, and the list is certain to continue growing.

Blackberry to launch BBM on iOS and Android
Blackberry are planning to launch their ‘Blackberry Messenger’ (BBM) service on iOS and Android this summer, which will include a “social engagement platform” called ‘BBM Channels’ that is looking to connect users with their favourite brands and celebrities. According to Blackberry, BBM has more than 60 million monthly active users and over 51 million daily, with daily active users spending an average of 1.5 hours a day on the service. Around 10 billion messages are sent via the service each day, suggesting that it will be interesting to see BBM go up against competitors like WhatsApp and WeChat.

Polyvore’s success for indie fashion brands
Fashion social network Polyvore released a mentorship campaign earlier this year, aimed at promoting less well-known designers to a new audience. Judging by their latest results, it seems as though it has been a success. For example, an accessories brand named Meredith Wendell was picked up by Shopbop, a retailer owned by Amazon, with Polyvore continuing to drive 20% of sales. Shoe designer Madison Harding saw overall sales increase by 2,250%, with 70% of traffic through Polyvore. This goes to show the extent to which social engagement can be used to grow indie brands; indeed, Polyvore are planning to make the campaign a yearly affair, with a new set of designers each time.

Facebook bans ‘Social Roulette’
Social Roulette, an application that offers a 1 in 6 chance of deleting a user’s Facebook account, has been banned by the network. The idea of the game is to connect to your Facebook profile and ‘spin the barrel’. 5 out of 6 times this will just post a message on your behalf saying ‘I just played Social Roulette and survived’, but if you’re unlucky (or lucky, depending on how you look at it) the app will delete your entire Facebook presence. Or it would have done. Facebook has removed the application for ‘violating its platform policies’.

We Are Social’s ‘Tweet & Shoot’ campaign with Jo-Wilfried Tsonga
We Are Social has partnered with Jo-Wilfried Tsonga to create a ‘Tweet & Shoot’ campaign for BNP Paribas, sponsors of the French Open for the last 40 years. This Thursday, in the build up to Roland Garros, Tsonga will take on tennis balls fired by a machine in a secret location somewhere in France. However, this isn’t just any tennis machine; the campaign is using brand new technology that fires balls based on encoded hashtags from Twitter. Fans can enter a competition in advance to become one of 40 ‘VIP trainers’, who are guaranteed to have a ball fired and receive a ‘Tweet & Shoot’ tennis ball as a memento. Many others will also see their tweets turned into tennis shots through the system explained below:

Oakley, Sunglass Hut and Shaun White’s ‘Gold Rush’
To celebrate the launch of Oakley’s new Shaun White collection, the sunglass manufacturer has produced a Facebook campaign that encourages users to match a Shaun White quotation with one of their own Facebook pictures. The 5 photos judged by the man himself to best summarise the pictures will win a pair of gold-plated sunglasses.

We Are Social launch #beginwithabulmers
We Are Social have produced a campaign for Bulmers, encouraging the cider brand’s drinkers to share their experiences of starting off a great experience with a Bulmers, in exchange for a number of rewards throughout the summer. This includes a #beginwithabulmers Facebook app, where fans can share their ‘good times that begin with a bottle of Bulmers’ – We Are Social will also be tracking all mentions of the hashtag across Facebook and Twitter, whose volume will contribute to unlockable milestones and prize giveaways. On top of this, digital outdoor displays will display the best entries in real time across the UK, while XFM will produce a guide to what listeners are doing on Friday evening based on the campaign tweets.

Nike ask football fans to put their country first
To celebrate the launch of their first ever England shirt, Nike are producing a campaign called ‘Country First Club Second’. Running through social media, Nike will encourage fans to show pride in the new shirt, to be worn by England for the first time against the Republic of Ireland next Wednesday. The timing is certainly good, as the domestic football season draws to a close to be replaced by a number of International friendlies and World Cup qualifiers and it will be interesting to see if Nike manage to capture a wave of patriotic sentiment. The shirt itself was first shown via Twitter, with England international Jack Wilshere posting:

Like this kid, my England dream began here, so he was first in #theshirt – England’s new kit from @nikefootball twitter.com/JackWilshere/s…

— Jack Wilshere (@JackWilshere) May 20, 2013

F&F and We Are Social’s ‘Seven Days of Summer’
F&F are promoting the launch of their Summer 2013 range with a ’7 Days of Summer’ campaign, created by We Are Social. Revealing a new trend each day for seven days, F&F are asking fans to upload a photo of their take on the look to Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest, or a video via Vine. One winner from each social channel will be selected to receive a £75 voucher and the best will be featured on the ‘Inspire Me’ section of the F&F site. We Are Social’s own Deola Laniyan said:

This campaign will show off F&F’s summer collection in a lighthearted way that will appeal to fashion fans. F&F is all about making fashion affordable, and we’re looking forward to seeing how imaginative people are in pulling together their looks.

Volvic Juiced produce games for Facebook and digital billboards
We Are Social has produced a Facebook game for Volvic, in which fans attempt to align similar types of fruit in a row, incentivised by prizes including surfing and zorbing sessions. This is being supported by activity on digital billboards in Bluewater shopping centre, where fans can play a game attempting to crush virtual apples. Every player will win a bottle of the drink, whilst some will be selected for other prizes such as Frisbees, Super Soakers and underwater cameras.

Guardian celebrate 1 million followers on Twitter
UK newspaper The Guardian has reached the 1 million follower milestone on Twitter and is celebrating with a #1msides campaign, playing on the idea that there are ’1 million sides to every story’. The newspaper is looking to find out more about its followers by asking them to tweet a picture of where they are with the relevant hashtag. They also posted a Vine of their journey from ‘The Manchester Guardian’ to today:

Historical journey through The Guardian in print to 1M followers on Twitter #1Msides vine.co/v/bEbqFI1W029

— The Guardian (@guardian) May 15, 2013

The Guardian are lightyears ahead of their British news rivals on the platform, with even their closest rival, the FT, on 789,000 and no other paper above 300,000. Activities like this are clearly the work of a paper embracing the age of social media.

Discount for tagging on Instagram
The ‘Sweden Calling’ pop up store has offered shoppers a 5% discount for uploading a photo to Instagram using the hashtag #swedencalling, or by checking in on Facebook. The idea displays both the growing importance of Instagram, as well as a nice way for a small business to create a cheap social campaign.

Colin was here
Sky News followers were surprised last week to notice a tweet reading simply ‘Colin was here’. By the time it had been deleted and blamed on a hack, a number of others had managed to get in on the joke:

#Colin was here too — Comment is free (@commentisfree) May 14, 2013

Colin drinks IRN-BRU.

— New From IRN-BRU (@NewFromIRNBRU) May 14, 2013

Has anyone seen Colin?

— Nando’s (@NandosUK) May 14, 2013

An interesting method of dealing with complaints
‘Amy’s Baking Company’ from Arizona last week gave an absolute masterclass in how not to deal with complaints online. Having featured on an episode of ‘Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares’ in which the chef claimed they were beyond help (see clips from the show here), ABC received a number of complaints on social. They responded in the most vitriolic fashion, including posts like:

Eventually, they released a statement claiming that all of their online presences had been hacked simultaneously, but never fear! They had the FBI on the case.

Their comments, naturally, led to a huge response from trolls, including many coming in from Reddit. The number 1 response to their FBI tweet? This.

As has been rumoured for the last few days, Yahoo is set to purchase Tumblr in a $1.1 billion all-cash deal, which has been announced in blog posts by both parties. First of all, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer announced the move, using the provocative image above in her post and discussing the various improvements that Yahoo hoped to see in terms of audience and traffic, whilst reassuring those concerned that David Karp would remain CEO and that “we promise not to screw it up”. A similar message came from the other side, with Karp himself ensuring Tumblr users that the system was not set for any wholesale changes, like turning purple or hiring a different set of staff. Despite these concerns, the deal could prove to be hugely positive for all involved. In April, Tumblr saw 117 million visitors and has a total of 107.8 million blogs and 50.6 billion posts. Indeed, in terms of users it ranks around the same level as Twitter and well above Instagram and Pinterest, with current total user figures of somewhere between 150 and 200 million.

Nevertheless, the caution displayed in both blog posts is as a direct result of real fears amongst Tumblr users, based on Yahoo’s history of unsuccessful platform purchases, from Geocities and Flickr to Delicious and Konfabulator, amongst others. Moreover, Mayer has confirmed that Yahoo is planning to run more ads on the platform. On monetisation, she stated:

On Tumblr, there’s a number of different places where we think we can monetize in a way that is meaningful and really addititive to the user experience.

For example, Tumblr has what’s called the “dashboard”, which is their version of the newsfeed — or in old school terms, an “inbox” for the blogs you follow. So basically different bloggers that you follow can all appear there in your feed.

And today, Tumblr already does some advertising, though minimal, in that feed. We would like to look at them and understand how we could introduce ads — in a very light ad load — where the impact is really created, because the ads really fit the users’ expectations and follow the form and function of the dashboard.

We also see some opportunities to possibly work with bloggers who want ads, to provide ads on their Websites. That would always be done with the blogger’s permission.

All in all, the deal presents both a great risk and an exciting opportunity. The $1.1 billion amounts to roughly 1/5 of the $5.4 billion that Yahoo still own in cash from sale of stocks in Alibaba Holdings Group, a Chinese internet company. Nevertheless, as Tumblr’s figures above show, this money could prove to be well spent, especially if it manages to push Yahoo’s share price up to $33, the figure for which co-founder Jerry Yang refused to sell the company to Microsoft five years ago.

To sum up, when talking to The Drum about the issue, We Are Social’s Robin Grant said:

With Yahoo’s entire ad sales team now likely to be selling Tumblr ads, Mayer will need to walk a tightrope between the clear need to monetise and, on the other side, upsetting Tumblr’s users by showing them too many ads, especially bad ones. Mayer will also need to give Karp the freedom to grow and inovate the Tumblr platform, something they seemed unable to do in the past with their Flickr acquisition.

As you may have read in Creativity, Campaign or Creative Review last week, we’re working with BNP Paribas to help train Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, French No. 1 and World No. 8, through Twitter ahead of the French Open.

This exciting campaign marks 40 years of partnership between BNP Paribas and Roland-Garros – The French Open. It enables members of BNP’s We Are Tennis community – as well as tennis fans and social media users everywhere – to enjoy a unique and memorable sporting moment, which unites them in a common goal: to help a world-class tennis player achieve victory at one of the year’s biggest tournaments!

The big day takes place in France this Thursday, the 23^rd May, at 5pm CEST (11am EDT, 4pm BST). At a tennis court in a top secret location, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga will take on shots fired at him that have been carefully chosen to challenge him by tennis fans worldwide.

So what, you might ask? Well, there’s a big twist… We’re using technology that’s never been seen before – a social media-controlled robot, connected to the internet and Twitter via 3G, which is able to fire tennis balls based on encoded hashtags in Tweets sent by social media users.

That’s right – social media users will actually be able to determine the trajectory of the shots, with each one mapped precisely to the positioning of the user’s choosing. All they need to do is go to tweetandshoot.wearetennis.com, and log in via Twitter, then they can drag-and-drop a tennis ball on a virtual on-screen tennis court and adjust the positioning of their shot to challenge Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, adding a personal message of encouragement to Tsonga before their Tweet is sent.

If you’re a die hard tennis fan and don’t want to leave anything to chance, I’d suggest getting involved early to be in with a chance of becoming one of our 40 ‘VIP Twitter Trainers’, who will be selected from BNP Paribas’ social communities through a competition we’ve been running on the Tweet and Shoot site.

These lucky people are guaranteed to have their balls served LIVE – and they’ll get a cool souvenir ‘Tweet & Shoot” tennis ball to help them remember their day. But don’t worry if you miss out – it’s not just the VIP Twitter Trainers that’ll have their shots played out on 23rd May. All those who sign up on the Tweet & Shoot website will be in with a chance of having their shots selected – so keep trying!

We’ll also be building up the excitement even before before Jo-Wilfried Tsonga arrives on court. From 11am CEST on Thursday, there will be a series of mini challenges where users can test out the capabilities of the robot by trying to hit targets placed on the court, using the same encoded hashtag format that will be put into play in the training session at 5pm. It’ll give users the chance to see how this futuristic technology works as well as having a bit of fun warming up the robot before he shares the court with one of the world’s biggest tennis stars.

So that everyone can keep track of what’s going on and fully experience the event, the whole day’s action will be streamed live on on the Tweet and Shoot site.

As you can imagine, this campaign has involved the use of some really complex technology to achieve something that’s never been done before. But despite this,it is still incredibly simple for everyone to get involved, making this innovative social media activity accessible on a global scale.

So, do you fancy trying your luck against the French No1? If the answer’s yes, visit tweetandshoot.wearetennis.com and help Jo-Wilfried Tsonga triumph in the French Open!

Time spent on Google+ far behind Facebook
Google+ users spent an average of 6 minutes 47 seconds on the network during March, a far cry from the 6 hour 44 minute average on rival platform Facebook. Whilst this does represent growth from the 3.3 minutes spent in February 2012, in contrast to Facebook’s dip from 7 hours 9 minutes in March 2012, the rate at which G+ is catching up can be, by these figures at least, dismissed as negligible. Figures reported by Nielsen also revealed 20 million unique US users of the G+ Android and iPhone apps, a 238% increase from March 2012 and 28 million desktop users, up 63% in the same period. However, there is likely to be some crossover between the two groups. In fact, accusations have come in that Google+ is essentially a ‘desolate wasteland’, based on the activity of the top 100 global brands. According to research by Millward Brown, 40% of these posted to Google+ either infrequently or not at all, with seventeen (including Nike and Pepsi) not having posted anything for over a week. McDonald’s, as shown below, have never had a single post.

How much Vines are shared
Research has been produced into how much branded Vines are shared to celebrate the app turning 100 days old. They discovered that branded Vines are shared 4x as often as branded online videos and, of the top 100 most shared, 4% of Vines were branded, compared to 1% of online videos. In total, 5 Vines are shared per second; more of these come during the weekend than the rest of the week combined. Time-wise, Vine frequency peaks from 10am-11am Eastern Time.

75% of top US retailers and restaurants are on Foursquare
Three quarters of the US top 100 retailers and top 100 restaurants are now on Foursquare, of which a full list can be found here. As for smaller businesses, Foursquare claim that over 1 million businesses have been claimed, but this includes some chain stores; only 17% have ever tried a promotion with the network. Larger businesses are seeing a positive effect from their campaigns; Bloomin’ Brands had 678 users redeem an offer for Outback stores in Richmond, VA, which gave a free appetiser for every second check in. Karen Soots, VP of media services at Bloomin’ Brands, praised the campaign’s effect, saying that if they were to do that nationwide at many restaurants over three weeks, it’s “millions of dollars in incremental revenue”.

Pinterest’s ‘Pin It Forward’ UK Initiative
Pinterest has taken a step towards international growth with its ‘Pin It Forward’ UK initiative. The system will ‘foreground’ UK content to UK users and also include a British English language option, attempting to optimize optimise the experience for UK users. The network has recruited 300 UK bloggers, who will be posting Pinterest-related blogs on their own websites in an attempt to attract British users. The step seems to be the start of a bigger programme, with plans to further improve the system in the UK and expand to other countries. France is apparently next on the horizon.

Littlewoods collection to be sold in Facebook Newsfeed
Fashion retailer Littlewoods will be selling their latest collection within the Facebook Newsfeed. Using a system called SeeitShopit, which allows full collections to appear within a single post, it will enable fans to browse, share and purchase items from Myleene Klass’s new swimwear collection. They have since posted further ‘SeeitShopits’ about their summer collection, as shown below:

Target launch deals with Facebook
Retailer Target has produced a set of offers, which will automatically generate Facebook posts when claimed, unless the user turns this feature off. Starting with around 700 discount offers and expected to grow to 1,000, the campaign is set to be hosted on a Target website called ‘Cartwheel’. Users can claim a deal at any point, producing a unique barcode that tracks every offer they claim. This barcode is then scanned at checkout. Cartwheel works seamlessly with mobile, meaning that a discount can be claimed at any point in the process, even as you’re walking towards the checkout.

AA’s first class lounge open to those with high Klout scores
American Airlines have decided to open their ‘Admirals Club’ lounges free of charge to those with high Klout scores, regardless of whether they’re due to fly with AA. Anyone with a score of over 55 will qualify for a free one-day pass in any one of 40 airports and can take advantage of the benefits including free WiFi and beer. The campaign hopes that these people will then tweet or post to Facebook expressing their gratitude, though this is not a requirement of claiming the offer.

Huggies ‘TweetPee’
This week, in weird app news… introducing ‘TweetPee’, a nappy sensor plus Twitter alert that tells parents when their baby needs changing. The campaign from Brazil also allows parents to keep track of the number of Huggies they’ve used and even order online when they’re running low. The campaign is certainly a fun and innovative one – we wonder how many parents will be hooking their children’s nappies up to Twitter.

Coke zero’s #motherpiece campaign for forgetful children
Yesterday marked Mother’s Day in many countries across the world, the day of the year that celebrates children forgetting to get their mum anything. Coke Zero to the rescue! They targeted absent-minded children (particularly boys, for some reason) and asked them to tweet their best excuses with the hashtag #motherpieces, pushing the campaign through a set of promoted tweets. The best entries were then selected to send in a personal photo, with 10 classically-trained painters on hand to create a ‘motherpiece’ of the winner. If they sent in their home address, they’d also receive a framed copy. Mother’s Day salvaged.

A social farewell to Sir Alex Ferguson
Last week, the news broke of Sir Alex Ferguson retiring after 27 years in charge of English Premier League football club Manchester United. Twitter was quick to react, with over 1.4 million mentions of the story in the hour following its announcement.

Sir Alex Ferguson retires. #thankyousiralex

— ManUtd_PressOffice (@ManUtd_PO) May 8, 2013

The hashtag #thankyousiralex, used in all of MUFC’s communication surrounding the topic, was mentioned more than 100,000 times in the first hour. The hashtag ended up being one of many trends – the story took up 8 of the trending spots in the UK and 4 worldwide. A number of brands managed to jump on the bandwagon, too; both Nando’s and Premier Inn poked fun at the idea of ‘Fergie time’, the inexplicable period of extra time added whenever Manchester United needed points.

In honour of Sir Alex Ferguson we’re proud to introduce #NandosFergieTime – all our Manchester Nando’s will be open 5 minutes later tonight.

— Nando’s (@NandosUK) May 8, 2013

As tribute to Sir Alex Ferguson’s 26 yrs at #MUFC you can request a #fergietime checkout this Sunday in Manchester to get 26 extra minutes

— Premier Inn (@premierinn) May 8, 2013

Our tribute to #siralex: Special Edition Packet: ow.ly/i/242tV #mufc #fergie

— Golden Wonder (@GoldenWonderUK) May 8, 2013

After finishing a respectable 3^rd in their first full season, We Are Social’s new-look five-a-side football squad were primed and ready for anything that could be thrown at them. The 2013-2013 season brought many new challenges: The new territory, new players (and most importantly a new local pub) should have made life difficult but the squad took to it like a duck to water. Despite a rusty defeat in the first game of the season, the ‘Social Warriors were not deterred and they began to grind out win after win. A month went by without defeat and word spread quickly. Before we knew it, faces were splashed across tabloid back-pages, challenges were coming in from left, right and centre from BBH and then Jaguar; everyone wanted a piece of the We Are Social cake. The fame clearly went to the heads of the inexperienced We Are Social squad and the resultant drop in concentration encouraged a mid-season drop in form.

A narrow defeat against the 4 men of Letzbe Avenue (league leaders at the time) sparked a barren run of 3 games without a win. A well-concealed Pandagirl trolling (aka Tarryn) compounded this negativity.

Injuries struck the squad; Rob had a grazed face and went to recuperate in the USA, Nick hurt his toe, Ed was getting some headaches, a ‘sober’ Tom H fell down some stairs and Andreas actually did get injured. Heads were down, and luck was out. Sitting 7 points back in second place, the prospect of finishing 3^rd was becoming a distinct possibility as the dream of adding to We Are Social’s trophy cabinet was fading fast.

However, when the chips are down, the real men emerge. We Are Social exploded back into the race with a 7-0 demolition of De Wolf and, with Letzbe Avenue losing their first game of the season, the cat had been thrown well and truly amongst the pigeons. It was plain for all to see that the pressure on Letzbe Avenue was too much to bear. With We Are Social constantly breathing down their necks, any slip-up was magnified and before the press could print ‘dark-horses’, We Are Social had overturned the 7 point deficit and now sat high and mighty atop of the Kennington 5 a side table.

With just 3 games remaining, We Are Social were not to be denied. With Letzbe Avenue’s dramatic plight fresh in the memory, there was a ruthless mentality from all on display. The squad was competitive, and with that there were players keen to taste the Champions glory (special unrelated shout-out to Ollie O and Gareth…). A fiercely fought 3-3 draw confirmed We Are Social’s place in the Hall of Fame and wrote the names of 13 men into the history books.

The remaining fixture allowed for some samba-style exhibition football with tricks and flicks galore alongside some wonderful quotes: John “You can’t say ‘mine’, ref”, and the opposition’s optimistic “let’s try and concede a good goal tonight lads”. The 6-1 destruction of league new-boys AA Athletic showed the We Are Social at their best however, despite the performance being one of the highlights of the season, it was insignificant – this was party time.

The post-season tour kicks off on the 15^th May against BBH. It’s time to strut our stuff away from Kennington and take on the world.

For the fun and games this season – a big thank you to: Joe Weston, Nick Mulligan, Rob Hyde, Ardel Amani, Tom Hargreaves, John Crozier, Andreas Plastiras, Jerome, Jake Lee, Ed Kitchingman, Joe Seymour and Joe Faul. Also, big thanks to Jim, Robin and Nathan for bankrolling our success!

End of season mentions (as voted by the team):

• #Fail of the season: Ardel Amani – trying to be clever (gave away a penalty, which lost us the 3 points)
• Goal of the season: Andreas Plastiras’s thunderbolt against De Wolf
• Poorest goalkeeping of the season: Rob Hyde
• Top Scorers: Tom Kelk (15), Tom Hargreaves (8), Ed Kitchingman (6)
• Best injury of the season: Andreas Plastiras
• Least photogenic: Joe Faul
• Most pointless member of the 5 a side chat: Matthew Davies (?) – followed by Dom Vieira and Tom Ollerton
• Best foreign import: Andreas Plastiras
• Worst Excuse to avoid playing: Tom Hargreaves – “It’s pretty cold”. Followed by Joe Faul’s cat problems
• Most improved player: Ed Kitchingman
• Poorest shooting accuracy: Joe Weston – (followed by everyone)
• Clubman of the season: Tom Kelk