Ed ache

Good afternoon, all. Another memorable game to report on today, as we all try and Get On With Things despite the best efforts of the imbeciles out to terrorise us. Here are your two teams from last Friday:

Yellows: me, Bristol Paul, Steve, David, Adolpho, Mario, Charlie and Simon Gas

Blues: Ian Gooner, Nick, specialist goalkeeper Ed, Alessandro, Will, Liam, Geoff (and not Vitaliy)

The last player mentioned there, Yev’s mate Vitaliy, failed to show, which meant that the Yellow team had a man advantage once David arrived at around eight minutes past seven.

Despite this numerical superiority the Yellows managed to sieve three goals in the first ten minutes, all of them coming from defensive mistakes that were punished with cool and clinical precision by Alessandro, Will and Liam – I won’t name names here, as the Yellows’ lack of defensive cover for all three goals was as much to blame as the individual errors.

At the other end Ed made the first of what even by his own standards were an array of extraordinary saves as I let off what looked like a great shot only to see the lithe young ‘keeper claw it out from under the top left corner of the goal.

Liam managed to charge down an attempt from myself to lob the ball over his head and into midfield, the wee striking sprite racing onto goal unopposed and calmly slotting the ball past the goalie and into the far corner, which made it 4-1 on the night. I then took my turn in nets and hoped to see our team regroup, although the next goal came from Will and not anyone wearing a Yellow (or orange) bib.

All that said, the scoreline was somewhat misleading of the game itself, as although the Blues were worth their lead in terms of quality – I think we’d all forgotten just how good a player Will is, (for my money, he is, pound for pound, year for year, the best player to grace the Coram Fields arena when one factors in age, work-rate, all round skillset and the fact he will pass to people who might not be as good as him), while Liam was in mean form – the Yellows did enjoy plenty of the ball. Some of you might say that this is because they had the extra man (hello Ian!), but in Mario and Adolpho they had two wonderful players who worked tirelessly to recover both possession and position to try and get the bloody ball past Ed.

Ah, the headache of a specialist goalkeeper… for all the Yellows’ effort and determination there is something genuinely dispiriting about trying to find a way past a shot-stopper as effective as Ed. Time and again he thwarted the Yellows best efforts to score, parrying, pawing and tipping the ball away to safety, over the bar, and onto his own defenders. After a while you start to overthink things; rather than striking the ball you take an extra touch, consider squaring to someone else who may be better placed, or just shank the chance. Even someone as naturally gifted at shooting as Mario is affected, let alone a duffer like me – countless opportunities were squandered, with posts struck and hands clutched to heads. Steve’s miss was a great example: having seen an initial shot saved, Steve uncharacteristically tried to lift the ball high over Ed’s head (rather than closing his eyes and putting his foot through it) and succeeded only in spooning it over the bar. Mario did something similar a few minutes later, while I had one chance tipped round the post and suffered an embarrassing brain fade for another.

Will got one more from the penalty spot after Simon Gas craftily handled a goalbound effort from Liam (not so craftily that it was not spotted by the Blues), but Mario and Adolpho both managed to finally find a way past Ed (Mario’s goal coming from a trademark swivel and low drive) to lend a modicum of respectability to the final score.    

           

The last action of the evening saw the ball come loose to me on the edge of the box as the final whistle was peeping; I hit the ball on my laces and it soared over Ed’s head, but not past his fingertips and it crashed down off the crossbar and down off the goal-line whereupon it was hacked to safety, which rather summed up the night.

Final score: Blues 6 – Yellows 3

And thus to the pub, for three much needed and wholly refreshing pints of Yardbird. I failed to shift my spare ticket for Depeche Mode on Saturday at the London Stadium (who were spectacular, should you be interested), but got more interest among the assorted middle aged men then I got on social media all week. Other topics under discussion were the wonderful FA Cup final, Geoff’s upcoming theatrical performance as Colonel Pickering, the general election and Simon Gas’s imminent journalistic assignment in Lousanne. Which means I am in charge on Friday; bibs, subs and all.

Until then…