Sunday 25 March 2012

Holy Toe


After a two week lay off owing to extensive toe-knack I resumed footballing action last Friday evening and was duly asked not only to select the sides, but was also given the responsibility – and what a responsibility – of writing the post-match blog.

With Simon Gas was away watching some Russian theatrics, (my feelings on Russian playwrights are consistent with Withnail’s – old women moaning about ducks going to Moscow), we were shorn of our spiritual leader, but nevertheless enough chaps showed up to make for an enthralling six aside game.

Lining up for the Bibs were me, Dan, Alan, Simon Inkpen, Wing-Commander Will and Ian the exiled Gooner

Playing for the Colours were Boro Dave, Alex, Paul The Guvnor, the late Geoff who was early, Sam and Danny.

There then followed a nineteen goal extravaganza containing great finishing, appalling defending and some very tired legs by the time the rattle went at twenty to eight. The final score was 11-8 to the Colours, although the Bibs had taken an early lead and lead again at 2-1 after Alex had equalised. The scores were reasonably close for the first third of the game, before Boro Dave embarked on an orgy of merciless finishing, the majority of his strikes fizzing off his left foot and nestled snugly in the bottom right hand corner. I think the disparity between the two teams was at least five goals at one stage, with Alex and Boro Dave running riot and various Bibs players failing to track back. One goal Dave scored felt particularly galling, as he nutmegged me around the halfway line and then tore through on goal and slammed the ball past the last vestiges of the Bibs’ defence, leaving the keeper with little chance. I asked Dave how many he’d scored after the game and he said he’d lost count, which tells its own story.

Other notable incidents were a goal Dan scored direct from the restart to make it, I think, 2-2, and a fine poacher’s goal from Alan after I’d robbed Geoff and saw my shot come back off the post via Sam’s fingers.

I managed to bag a late hat-trick to restore a modicum of respectability to proceedings – the first was the best, Dan tapping a free kick sideways whereupon I pushed it high into the top right hand corner. The second was a speculative toe-poke and the third a scruffy finish, but what proved remarkable was that all three goals came from right foot, which was still feeling somewhat tender. Before the game I’d bought a toe protector, labelled ‘Toe Foam’, from Superdrug for the princely sum of £1.99.

Danny opined that said toe foam looked a) like a waste of money and b) like a hindrance. I am inclined to agree, as I had to roll it over twice to fit it onto my already swollen toe and after a few minutes of running around I could feel it unpleasantly squeezing my big toe like an elastoplasted python. Still, you can’t argue with the statistics – all three goals, including the toe-poke, came courtesy of the swaddled digit and I am now faced with the prospect of having to squeeze the tube-like object around my right foot-thumb next week, too. The holy toe foam is here, (above); behold its magnificence as it sits majestically in my back garden.

And so to the pub, for five of us at least. This week’s theme was that people in their twenties don’t know how to behave in a pub; witness two girls at the bar, paying by card (which should be a capital offence), fiddling in the purses for plastic when they should be primed with cash at the moment the barman confirms the tariff of their round; a lad braying to his phone at the bar and getting in Ian’s way, thereby causing him to spill beer; people ordering complicated drinks and not moving away from the bar quickly enough once they’d taken delivery of them.

Next week’s episode of Grumpy Old Men will come to you in association with Ronseal and a quarter of Everton mints.

Monday 5 March 2012

Hey Porter


I was handed the poisoned chalice of team selection last Friday following the previous week’s mismatch, but it was no easy task. This was due in part to the fact that from a veritable orgy of goal-scoring talent available on the 24th February, Friday March 2nd saw an altogether more sterile line-up, with Boro Dave being the lone gunslinger on a field of misfiring cowboys. The other factor which made selecting two even teams something of a challenge was that one of our number had prepared for the game by sinking seven pints of Porter – that’s right, Porter - in a bender which had started at around 12.30. Presumably this was 12.30 pm on the 2nd March 1837. If I tell you that the imbiber of this vat of neo-stout was Ian Gough you will appreciate that the impact this amount of alcohol would have on his performance was difficult to gauge.

As it was, he took to the field slightly late alongside namesake Ian Geary and settled in what would I would probably describe as an outside-left position (left outside the pub, perhaps) and provided the x factor in the eternal equation if

(Beer + football) = x+ Goal

Vomit?

Laudably, Ian did not need to redecorate the side of the pitch with the contents of this stomach, but instead provided a lovely retro cameo which included two goals and a brief spell in goal. He also terrified the two young ringers who were drafted in to make up the numbers – Khaled and young Sam – to the extent that I don’t think they came within a radius of 15 feet of him. It was as if the ghosts of George Best and Garrincha were hovering on the edge of play, swaying giddily in the cold night air and bringing the mischievous spirit of football times past to bear in this brutally modern age.

What of the other goals, I hear you ask? Well, it finished 9-6 to the team that included both Boro Dave, who bagged a two minute hat-trick, part of a four goal haul, and the aforementioned Ian Gough. Making up the numbers were myself, although my contribution was stymied following a 50-50 challenge with Simon ‘Rockfeet’ Gas, who has left my big toe looking like an aubergine, in addition to young Sam, Alex and Danny.

Shamefully, neither myself nor Danny could find the net on an evening when even a man who’d got through seven pints of Porter (who drinks Porter in 2012? Was this some sort of tribute to the bicentennial of Dickens’ birth?) still managed to bag a brace, although Ian’s second was a comedic moment when he drunkenly shied at the ball and the other Ian G in goals cocked his leg up and allowed the ball to trundle underneath and into the unguarded net. Alongside Ian Geary wearing Bibs were Dan, Khaled, Simon Gas, Steve A and Joe, relieved of team selection for the week.

There were few other memorable moments, although all the goal scorers will fondly recall their own contributions. Ian Gough tottered off victorious at the end, although how much he will recall is a moot point.

Just the four chaps made it to the Old Fountain’s Head – me, Simon Gas, Danny and Steve – and once again it was packed to the rafters. I expect that it’s a sign of getting old, but the clientele seem to be getting younger every week, with lots of pretty girls with pixie haircuts and retroussé noses alongside young blades with thrilling facial hair and shoulder bags. What’s wrong with that? Nothing at all, although quite what they’d make of a man who’d quaffed seven pints of Porter and played a game of football is anyone’s guess. Amazeballs, as the young people say.