Jocks not away

As the unseasonably mild Autumn / late Summer weather continued, some more players yet to take to the the field this term returned to the fray last Friday, namely the c/Celtic pair of Liam and Mark, (fresh from the hustings, no doubt). 

The Bristolian Chef de Corps selected the following two teams - 

Blues: me, Steve, Liam, Mark, Paul, Yev, specialist goalkeeper Phil

Yellows: Simon Gas, Mario, Daniel, Ian Gooner, Tony, Andy, Danny, Ross

As you can see, there was a distinctly Caledonian feel to the appropriately attired Blue team, with three Scotsman in the seven man side. A bit like Liverpool in the 80’s (with Steve as the Graeme Souness-style enforcer and Liam starring as Kenny Dalglish. I’m seeing Mark as a Steve Nicol box-to-box type). Sadly, that is where the similarity with the all-conquering Scouse side ended.

As is custom, both Tony and Yev were slightly late, with Tony arriving just before the Ukrainian. This incremental arrival of the full roster of players meant a slight bit of jiggery pokery as the Yellows had a momentary two man advantage, with Daniel moved over to the Blues for all of about 15 seconds before Yev finally arrived, scampering across the pitch complete with cycling helmet. 

The Yellows raced into a four goal lead, with the southern European combination of Mario and Daniel combining well and communicating in some sort of romance creole (it may well have been Italian, to be fair), which confused the Blues’ defenders almost as much as their intricate footwork and passing. With Ross joining them up front it made for a very taxing hour’s play; so taxing that I didn’t realise that they actually had an extra man, which explained why Andy kept finding himself unmarked, (much to Liam’s consternation).

In amongst the goals were both Mario and Daniel, with the first goal arriving just before Tony and Yev. Andy smashed in number two from the edge of the ‘D’ and Daniel and/or Mario went on to add two more before the Blues started their impressive comeback. Mark grabbed the first for the Blue team, scoring with a crisp shot from the outside of his right boot; Yev got one from around a yard to the side of the left hand post after Liam had his shot deflected off the ‘keeper and onto the post and Liam grabbed the other two for the Blues. 

Unfortunately at 4-2 down the Yellows scored again, Daniel playing a neat one-two and forcing the ball past Phil in goal from close range, despite my forlorn efforts to stay goalside of him. With the Blues being deficient in the man stakes to the tune of one and staring at a four goal margin, the final score of 5-3 to the Yellows felt like something of a moral victory.

A word must go to Tony, whose convalescence from his Alpine sports injury continues apace – this week he sauntered out of goal and strolled around the back four, alternating between kicking Liam and shouting at people, rather like a splenetic pensioner patrolling his rosebushes for loose footballs left abandoned by the errant boys from down the close.

And once more to the pub, as the incongruously warm weather meant that there were more chairs inside the Skinners than outside. With Ian Gooner calling it a night fairly early on (he’d been up ‘til 3.00 am the previous evening), talk oscillated between the weekend’s football fixtures, terrorism and acts of bravery, Charlie Nicholas and the fallout from the Scottish referendum. 

The final action of the night involved Liam and I trying to avoid talking to a ghastly man from ‘Rhodesia’, (presumably he’d arrived directly from 1975) who was on his way, somewhat surprisingly, to a dub reggae evening at the Scala complete with red, gold and green t-shirt, pre-prepared chumba party pipes and an annoying voice. The dirty bastard turned around to leave the pub and promptly dropped his guts in mine and Liam’s body space – too much biltong, no doubt.

Until Friday….