The Blue Ninja

The nights are drawing in and the weeks are hurtling toward the inevitable onset of Winter, but the air around Coram Fields remains balmy and the turn out for each Friday night is as plentiful as the leaves starting to fall from the trees.

But enough of the pseudo-poetic Autumnal preamble and on with the football. This week Simon Gas once more pre-selected two teams, albeit featuring two teams both with himself in. A somewhat schizophrenic choice, you might say.

The aforementioned teams were as follows:

Bibs – me, Alex, Danny, Simon Ink, goalkeeping Phil, Paul, Ross, Kiwi Nick (eventually), Tony

Colours – Simon Gas, Steve, Andy, Kiwi Nick, old Phil, Alan, Liam, the even later than usual Yev, Paul’s mate Paul

For the first time in the 2013/14 season the game was won by the odd goal – the odd goal in seven, to be precise.

Alex scored the opener in typically swashbuckling fashion, beating three or four players before slamming the ball into the bottom right hand corner - a goal that he seems to score every week. Paul, who spent the majority of the game lurking quite literally in the shadows like a bespectacled, blue-bibbed ninja, got the Bibs’ second goal following Alex’s closing down of Andy in goal. The ball broke to the edge of the area where Paul suddenly materialised, wraith-like, and methodically larruped the ball home. 

On the score sheet for the Colours was Alan, clad in green and white hoops like his celtic (note the absence of a capital letter there) team-mate Liam, who was wearing a, err, Celtic shirt. (That’s why grammar matters, kids). One of his goals came via a blocked tackle that deflected in – Alan knows how his other finish came. 

With the scores level at three apiece, (©Tony Gubba), enter the beast from the east, Yev (initially in goal). As the Bibs’ legs were getting steadily heavier in the unseasonably muggy night air the prospect of the Colours having a man extra and that man being Yev prompted a rare moment of pragmatism and Kiwi Nick switched sides to help shore up the Bibs defence. The winning goal came from Simon Ink – 4-3 it finished, and we all trudged back to the upstairs deluxe changing rooms, complete with roaring radiator.

A veritable bumper crowd at the Skinners Arms this week, with topics under consideration including the moral vacuum that is FIFA and in particular the 2022 Qatar World Cup, mobile phone contracts, the woes of Sheffield United and lovebites. Nothing if not dull, eh?