Another blog

Hot on the heels of the most recent blog comes… another one!

With the 8/9-0 shellacking meted out last week still fresh in everyone’s minds – an example of the perils of last minute line-up meddling if ever there was one – I was keen to ensure that we had a much closer game this Friday and lo and behold, that’s what happened. Before we move on from the aforementioned thrashing, a word for both Steve and Simon Ink, who were well in amongst the goals (a maiden hat-trick for Simon Ink) and in Steve’s case well in amongst pretty much everyone else, too. 

With the combative Scotsman taking a week’s sojourn this week’s game featured no fewer than twenty people, with all three Kavanagh men playing. (Stan drew the short straw and played on the same side as his Dad. Unfortunately, he left his ear plugs at home.)

Here are your teams - 

Yellows: me, Nick (beard), Danny, Ed, Patrick, Johannes, Morgan, Kanat, Alan and Tom

Blues: Mark (welcome back!), Mick, Stan, Will, Joe, Theo, Nick (smooth face), Yev, Callum and Simon

What followed was a marvellous exhibition of how football can be played despite there being plenty of people on the pitch, with the superior touch and technique of Patrick, Morgan and JoJo on one side and Will, Stan and Nick on the other resulting in a nine goal thriller.

I’ll have a go at recalling all nine goals, but first some general colour. With precious little moaning, complaining or whingeing we definitively Got On With It, possibly knowing it would be the only football we watched this weekend, (or indeed, for some time). The Blue team had a setback on the half hour, as Yev was forced off with a strain, but this only served to redouble their efforts.

The Yellows took the lead through [insert name of rangy six foot plus player with deft ball control] before Yev restored parity. The Ukrainian marksman took advantage of some slack marking from me to nod the ball over Danny from a throw-in on the right. Johannes was once more on the scoresheet before [insert name of rangy six foot plus player who is too modest to reply to the message about who scored] made it 3-1 to the Yellows. Will was left unmarked from a second ball following a corner and made no mistake, before Ed sealed the win for the Yellows after a tremendous run to the by-line from the impressive Morgan and a deft cutback. Mick got the final goal after stealing away from yet more slack marking at another corner and prodding home inside the near post from about three or four yards.

The aforementioned Kavanagh Snr was one of three people to rattle the woodwork; another was Theo, who fired in a viciously dipping shot from the outside of his left boot. The ball span back off the crossbar and bounced down, but the younger Nick couldn’t quite sort his feet out and the ball squirted wide when it seemed easier to tap home. 

Final score: Yellows 4 – Blues 3

And so to the Skinners, which was reassuringly busy. Topics under consideration chiefly involved the obvious, but we did have a bit of chat about Cyprus that was not entirely virus related. Perhaps the best way to end this blog is with a photograph of Spizz from last Wednesday’s Holy Holy gig. He cheerfully told me he can no longer run for a bus these days (rock n roll!), so it may be that his playing days are finally at an end, but it’s good to see he still looms large. Sort of. Until Friday, (fingers crossed).