Match reports

Red: Jack, Ed, Tufan, JP, Oz, Gerald +John*
Yellow: Richard P, Daniel, Paul, James, Jeremy +Gerald*

First things first. Let’s draw your attention to a name in that Red squad. Ed. Let that sink in. Ed. When has he last played? It’s so long since his last game I bet even he doesn’t know. I do!
December 18th, 2011. That’s 355 weeks since his last game, blowing Finbar’s record of 284 weeks between games clean into the stratosphere! Take a bow, sir. Not very committed though.

Anyway, once again I scrawled some notes just after the game, this time on a scrap of cardboard from a strawberry, raspberry and cranberry infusion Sainsbury’s teabag box (the one my mum likes and I have to take 20 boxes of to France every time I go as a result) and it’s only taken me two months to get round to transferring those scribblings to this report. It may lack depth as a result.

James and Paul both hit the post in an opening 10 minute barrage and helped to put Yellow 3-0 up in no time at all. They were a potent twosome for the whole match. John then sauntered over habitually arriving 15 minutes late, joined Red and Gerald moved to Yellow*. Ed swept in the first goal for Red. Jack got an own goal. Gerald got an own goal. Daniel decided to dribble out of goal in a rush of blood to the head, was dispossessed and watched helplessly as Tufan chipped in over the aghast covering defence. Ed’s boot fell apart. The same boot he wore all those years ago….unwashed. Probably unleashing some hitherto inactive toxic contagious virus like the type they find when they defrost a 5000 year old eskimo corpse. Or maybe the dormant eggs of those horrible bitey flies we dealt with some years ago. Anyway, he took his sock off, put it back on over his boot and tied a lace around the end to hold it all together. A bit like scrapheap challenge for cobblers.

I’ve written nothing else and can recall nothing else apart move-of-the-match coming from Gerald….he watched as a long ball forward come steeply down over his left shoulder from behind, volleyed a chip back over his head taking the ball away from the attacker, took a touch to bring it down and distributed with such nonchalance that everyone thought he was showboating.

Final score: Yellow 11 – 6 Red

Red: John, James, Daniel, Oz, Colin, Jeremy,  Mehmet (Ahmet’s 9 year old son)
Yellow: Paul, Tufan, JP, Jack, Gerald, Jim, Mark (Gerald’s friend)

Some vague recollections jotted down on my phone on the journey home, blurred after two shandies in the pub after the game, doesn’t justify a good and eventually close game. I subsequently did nothing with those jottings so here are they.

Jim bundle. James and Paul duel. Competitive.  Colin foul throw. JP own goal. Mehmet (Ahmet’s son) got a goal. Red had most possession but Yellow took their chances. Jack overhead scissor-kick. Big thanks to Oz who now washes the bibs, organises the keys and brought along a world cup ball, which has a microchip in it! If only we could download our individual post-match stats. 3-1 to Yellow at half time. Up to 5-1.

Final score: Yellow 5 – 4 Red

I also asked from each of you, one sentence picking a moment from the game that stands out in your memory. Good. Bad. Funny. Serious. Whatever….

JP: A good spell in goal from Jack in second half. A few crucial saves.

Gerald: James seeming to be stopped by Gerald (in goal for yellow) but suddenly disapparating and reappearing on the OTHER SIDE of Gerald to score a dogged goal for red, thus pulling red’s deficit back to 5-3 yellow… We need a serious discussion at our next AGM about whether to permit teleporting or not during a match (answer: we should not, but let’s at least get this issue on the table and talk about it).

James: Agreed! The same happened with Jim in the first half, but multiple times through our defence!

John: Got to be the academy player [Mehmet]. Though Jack’s double nutmeg should not go unrecognised.

Jack: MOTM award: Mehmet. Scored. Hit the crossbar. Couple of big challenges with Paul Mac. 9 years old.

James: T’was fun! My favourite memory has to be setting up our 9-year-old striker to slot in after a number of completed passes! Also Jeremy needlessly handballing a long throw to score…. Old habits die hard! And Oz’s POWER HEADER to score and set up a great last 5 mins!!

Colin: Thanks Dan, for me Mark just nipping me as I went on one of my many runs, resulting in a strange bruise on my left love handle that my wife suspiciously felt resembled a love bite!

Red: Jeremy, Richard P, Gerald, Oz, James, John
Yellow: Jim, Wilkie, Jack, Daniel, Tufan

Red: Tufan, Richard P, Daniel, Oz, Matt, Jack
Yellow: Paul, Kevin, Gerald, Jeremy, Jim, John

Admittedly I’m writing this long after the game. I initially made numerous mental notes to include in this report but few have lasted the distance. 6-a-side (good turnouts this year – thank you and well done y’all). Kevin again tried unashamedly to skew the teams in his favour. Tufan got a hat-trick. Red pulled away to a three goal advantage. Paul got the goal of the game, driving forward down the right channel, passing to a teammate in the box and then arcing around the edge of the area, a run his marker (me) didn’t follow, allowing him to receive the ball back and fire in first time…tasty. Yellow clawed the score back but the comeback was not to be. Man of the match goes to Richard P who rode/bulldozed/bundled/skilfully dodged countless tackles when he had the ball and tenaciously never giving up when not in possession, constantly breaking up Yellow’s flow. Stirling work sir, take a bow.

Final score: Red 6 – 5 Yellow

As I lay here in my budgie smugglers whilst sunning myself on the dalmatian coast with the waves lapping gently on the shore and numerous admiring glances being cast in my direction (well it’s me or the somewhat rotund hausfrau), my mind wanders back to Sunday morning back in blighty.

Red: JP, Daniel, Oz, Jim, Jeremy, Mark
Yellow: Tufan, James, Paul, Gerald, Richard N, Matt

6-a-side!

Red scored with virtually the first attack of the game, the ball ping-ponging between Gerald and Richard before rolling over the line for an own goal. Jeremy doubled the lead shortly afterwards turning in a cross with his knee. Quality from the off. It calmed down a little after that. JP held up the ball on various occasions with teammates contemplating if they’d ever receive a pass, yet with the ball at their feet, he demanded a faster one-touch-and-pass kind of game. James scored shortly before the interlude after defenders Jeremy and Jim were both drawn to the attacking Richard who evaded their attention and threaded the ball to a totally now unmarked James who made no mistake. Jeremy had the audacity to try and blame JP for not having made the save!

Half time: 2-2

Both teams concluded that total football was the answer. It worked better for Yellow with a low cross running to Tufan who feinted a touch, let it roll across him and side-footed in. Paul struck a shot which hit the bar and bounced down but the red defence declared it hadn’t gone over the line so he punished them shortly after. James added the third of the half and they would have romped away with it had Matt not skied his shot and Richard’s attempt hadn’t gone out for a throw. However, JP eventually got a reward for his early morning venture from Winchester and Gerald’s friend Mark, who’s skewed a couple wide finally buried a loose ball. Oz is getting back to the effective distributive self of yesteryear and Daniel popped a surprising number of good crosses into dangerous areas. There was no one there but they were good. Unfortunately for Red, the comeback was not to be.

Final score: Red 4 – 5 Yellow

Man of the match – a subtly but dangerously marauding James who walked away with an almost unnoticed hat-trick! And someone’s annual quotient is looking very healthy.

Now, where has that hausfrau gone? “Cooo-eee! Entschuldigung.”

Red (7): Matt, Tufan, Oz, Wilkie, Gerald, Keith, Jack
Yellow (7): Jim, James, Paul, Kevin, Daniel, Richard N, Richard P

Red: Kevin, Jeremy, Richard P, Paul, John
Yellow: JP, James, Tufan, Daniel

Three months after the game and the things that stick in my head are:

A well-balanced quintet against four attacking-minded folk. Who chose the teams? More than a whiff of football quotient tampering.

JP lauding it up after a defensive tackle. With the emphasis in the ‘a’.

Kevin’s ‘control’ from a throw in.

JP & Mr Piper turning up….a joint 230 mile (minimum) round trip for 80 minutes of football. We doff our caps.

Gerald turning up to take photos. Where is the evidence?

A predictably one-sided game.

Final score: Yellow 5-11 Red

Red: Daniel, Paul, Jeremy
Yellow: Tufan, Matt, JP

No shows: James, Colin, John (an hour late). When did this section become a regular addition to our reports?! Shame on you.

It’s ages since the game and there’s only one thing that stands out. With such low numbers, we implemented the one touch rule, ie: once your team gained possession, another teammate had to have a touch before you could score. This lead to several occasions with JP in front of an open goal but having to pass….you could see his brain malfunctioning.

Final score: Red 17 – 18 Yellow

So we had ten. Then John dropped out the night before with food poisoning. Then an hour before the game Gerald saw a physio (must be more expensive on a Sunday morning) who said he’d be out for four months. Then at 10am Kevin, who lives 5 minutes walk away, discovered he couldn’t change a puncture [piss off Dan, what a load of bollocks. Kevin] and James mentioned something about a book launch. On the plus side John had a lazarus-esque recovery and came along. A 30% drop in attendance….and we even moved the game a month to help. With a guaranteed game every week without any of this kafuffle, why do I bother (rhetorical). For those of you that did come, thank you.

Anyway….

Red (3): Tufan, Richard N, Daniel
Yellow (4): Jeremy, Richard P, Paul, John

Now let’s be clear, if we had archive films of all our games, the loss of footage from this one wouldn’t be a great loss. And if it had been made clear at the beginning that someone would swap at half time then yes, Red tactics may have been a little more defensive. However, if the half time score had been close, then a swap of a player wouldn’t have happened and therefore a full-time critique from Yellow lacked significant merit.

Red opened the scoring and all seemed to be going well as 10 minutes into the game the score was a respectable 2-2. But then the rot set in. Yellow packed the defence and after the breakdown of most of Red attacks, they passed well and racked up a sizeable score with little reply, 9-3 to Yellow at half time.
Mr Piper kindly swapped teams but for the first 20 minutes there was no dent in the six goal deficit, it even got worse at 13-5. But then, Red concentrated, used the extra man and prevented a tiring Yellow threesome of scoring again. They broke down attacks and ruthlessly broke forward in numbers and finally discovered how to score. 13-6, 13-7, 13-8, 13-9, 13-10….
Unfortunately for them the time ran out before the comeback was complete.

Final score: Red 11 – 13 Yellow

Winner of the day? No, not Daniel, who after a nine game drought had been stuck on 399 goals since June 12th, finally scored his 400th goal. No, Richard Piper’s your man. He came all the way from St Albans and was on the winning side for both halves and therefore personally won the game 17-7!