Balmy Friday

Welcome back to the Friday night football blog after a two week lay-off. This month’s unseasonably mild weather – never mind what the pub trade apparently call ‘Blackeye Friday’, this was more like Balmy Friday - continued as Simon Gas organised and picked the sides for the final time in 2015. Here’s what the Muswell Hill Soccer Chieftain came up with, (despite being beset with snot):

Blues: Mario, Alex, Sanhab, Danny, Liam, Andy (the Ulster version), Mark, Simon Gas, Joseph

Yellows: specialist goalkeeper Ed, David, Yev, Alan, Mick, Patrick, Ian Baggies, Steve, me

Despite committing the cardinal sin of putting Mario and Alex on the same team, Simon managed to ensure that a decent – and even – game of football ensued. There was slight issue with two large gaggles of young lads congregating at the bottom and side of the pitch; the young scamps had been able to enjoy a free kick around before 8.00 pm as there was no other side on the pitch.

Although they cleared the pitch reasonably uneventfully, one group in particular stuck around in a what you might call a passively provocative stance, gently encroaching onto the field of play every couple of minutes, with one youngster theatrically falling onto the astro turf until his mates carried him off. Eventually the little bit of attention which they were craving arrived in the form of a polite exhortation from Mick –“Boys, get off the fucking pitch, please”, which saw them reluctantly traipse off into the night whilst shouting back at anyone and everyone, so that they sounded exactly like a flock of squawking parakeets.

Onto the goals, (the first one took around 20 minutes to arrive). In trying to clear the ball upfield I inadvertently steered it straight to Mario who took a touch to steady himself and then sent a fierce drive past the otherwise excellent specialist goalkeeper Ed to make it 1-0 to the Blues.

In a relatively low scoring game both Ed and his opposite number, Simon Gas, made a series of splendid stops to deny Liam, Danny and Alex on the one hand and Patrick and Yev on the other. Perhaps unsurprisingly with both Danny and Alex playing in midfield for the Blues they enjoyed the lion’s share of possession and this combination saw Danny swap passes before steering the ball into the bottom far corner to make it 3-2 to the Blues – I believe that Liam had grabbed the second Blues score after steering the ball through a thicket of players.

At the other end the Yellows’ main threats came from the filial duo of Patrick and Mick, with some decent support from the recovering crock, Yev. The Kavanaghs were responsible for all three goals for the Yellows, with Patrick scoring a sensational equaliser to Mario’s piledriver and Mick flipping the ball over a phalanx of Yellows defenders before nudging the ball past Simon in goal. That effort from Mick was the final goal of the evening and we finished with a suitably festive, deep and crisp and even score of 3 – 3.

And so to the Skinners, where the ridiculously temperate climate saw us drink outside until we realised that, equally unseasonably, the pub was so quiet that there were tables (note the plural) going spare inside.

Discussions focused on gameshows past and present, the merits of Challenge TV and this clip from youtube. On the other table the night ended with a series of impressions of the young squawkers responsible for the early drama and a round of best wishes for the season. I understand that we return to action on Friday 8^th January 2016 for a game of football and a fake Christmas buffet in the Skinners.

Who said that January was a bleak month?

Vote Curry

Hello, good evening and welcome back to the Friday night football blog, brought to you in association with Senor Gaz productions and Yardbird Pale Ale.

Apologies for the recent hiatus in match reports – this was due in part to a pretty disastrous trip to Cornwall to visit my, um, ‘eccentric’ in-laws and a nasty bout of Masculinis Snotgripus Maximus, which I’ve thankfully shaken off. I understand that the past fortnight saw two decent and reasonably contested games, even without my stats-system. Apparently last week’s match was contested by fewer than nineteen players - whatever next.  

As I return, so does the heavy responsibility of team selection and here’s what I managed to come up with on Friday, unknown quantities and all -

Blues: Charlie*, Simon Gas*, Tom*, Liam, Tim, Mario, Joseph*, Ed, Tony

Yellows: Danny, Andy, me, Ian Baggies, Ross, David, Peter*, Jaime*, Michele (pronounced Mikaelly), Simon Ink

*(denotes being employed by Morgan Stanley)

And so we kicked off, with the Yellows having the player advantage. The ‘Ed’ mentioned in the team sheet turns out to be a specialist ‘keeper and he periodically switched places with Tony, who is still recovering from injury, rather like Bristol Paul, Yev and most of Arsenal’s first XI.

With so many people on the pitch, many of them under 35, space and time were at a premium, but quality will out and there were a number of spectacular and high-class goals on the night. Liam, as he was keen to tell me in the pub, may have only had two shots in the match but both counted, leaving him with a 100% strike rate. After the Caledonian hitman opened the scoring for the Blues, the Yellows then unleashed Danny from his berth in goal and the game assumed a more even tempo. 

With Peter winning 99.9% of all headers and decent support coming from Danny, David and Jaime (with Ross and Michele up front), the Yellows nevertheless found themselves against a well-drilled defence and some excellent goalkeeping. By contrast, the Blues looked to have rather more joy against the Yellow’s defence, which was perhaps not quite as mobile, (or well marshalled).

As the lead changed hands with a basketballesque frequency – Michele levelled things up for the Yellows - it was clear that it was going to take something special for the Yellows to get past the Blues’ assorted defensive kingpins and something special is what we got from David, with his party piece making it two-all on the night. Collecting the ball in centre midfield, the sprite-like Oxford graduand skipped across the astroturf and spotted Ed loitering on the edge of his area, well off his line. He chipped the ball high into the night sky with a degree of curl and it eventually plopped back down a few yards from goal, where Ed could only scrabble at it forlornly as it trickled gracefully over the line. One of the goals of the season.

Peter made it three apiece with a ridiculously hard shot that sounded – and moved – like a shotgun cartridge and quite possibly broke Tony’s finger en route to the net. That spelled the end for the north London cineaste and with the Blues two men short, I crossed the Rubicon to make the final stages of the game an eight side affair.

Shortly after this switch Tim nodded the Blues 4-3 ahead from a corner, with Andy and Simon Ink’s Chuckle Brothers routine on the goal-line largely to blame for the Yellows conceding. Charlie then received a short corner from myself before unleashing an unstoppable shot into the top left corner to complete the scoring.

Final score: Blues 5: Yellows 3

And thus to the pub, where the pre-Christmas works drinks activity looked to have begun in earnest, young people supping what looked like anti-freeze from wine glasses and all. I oscillated between one table with Danny, Andy and Simon Gas, who was bending the landlord’s ear about some sort of post-Christmas buffet (terrible idea) and the younger phalanx of Liam, Tim, Simon Ink, David and Ross, who were discussing Jamie Vardy, Troy Deeney and the bearded songstrel John Grant.

I’m missing this Friday’s match for a gig, but will be back on the 18^th for end of year festivities and hopefully a curry, if we can persuade Simon that eating in a restaurant needn't be a social minefield.

You know it makes sense. Vote Curry.