The Goalkeeper Who Never Was

The much vaunted – and now publically available, to Alan at least – Jarvis Algorithm for team selection took a break this week, as Simon Gas picked the sides owing to me being away from a computer all day. 

Here’s what the main man came up with:

Blues: Simon Gas, Peter, Michele, Danny, Andy, Ed (NB: not in goal this week), Mark, Tony, Paul, me

Yellows: Steve, Alex, Joseph, Geoff, Simon Ink, Ross, Ian Baggies, Mick, Antonio

The game got off to a roaring, effervescent start which never waned until the final whistle. Michele had two good chances to put the Blues ahead after being put through one-on-one via passes from yours truly, but on both occasions was unable to find a way past Simon Ink in goal. Alex was the first goal-scorer, for the Yellows, with a typically surging run through the midfield capped by a fine goal, the Potteries Dynamo passing the ball calmly into the bottom right hand corner. 

In what was always a fiercely competitive game, clear-cut changes were relatively few and far between, but the Yellows made the best of them, with Simon Ink bagging a rare brace with two poacher’s finishes from close range. I believe both came from kerfuffles at corners. The Yellows’ midfield proved decisive on the night, with Alex back to his very best form and Antonio having one of those evenings where it proves virtually impossible to dispossess him – time and again he chested down balls which fell like stones from the sky and effortlessly pinged them on to either Alex or Joseph in midfield or onto Ross. 

With Steve agriculturally clearing anything which hove into view and the Blues getting bogged down trying to regain possession, Michele was ploughing something of a lonely furrow up front, but he had a splendid game nevertheless. The Blues were able to get on the scoresheet – Mark scored what was arguably the goal of the game with a left footed finish that he steered into the corner from just outside the area. And Ed, making a rare appearance outfield owing to a bashed thumb, also scored a good goal, swivelling and volleying into the top corner from a similar distance to Mark’s earlier effort.

With the game poised at 3-2 to the Yellows came the major talking point of the game. The Blues won a corner and in the ensuing melee Geoff ‘saved’ a goal-bound effort. Apparently he had swapped ‘keeping responsibilities with Antonio between the corner being awarded and taken, but it all seemed a bit of a rum do and after the game in a fit of conscience Geoff admitted it should have been a penalty kick. 

Clearly, Geoff’s stop-start acting career has taken on a new lease of life, with the Finchley Aesthete playing the role of his life – The Goalkeeper Who Never Was. Stanislavski would be proud.

With the Blues unable to get an equaliser we finished at 3-2 to the Yellows, but all things considered it was a highly debatable final score. Just a quick word for Tony this week, who I thought put in an excellent shift in goal and more generally at the defence for the Blues.

To the pub! Not a high turnout this week, but we did have enough people present to debate a) an Ugly Current World Football XI, (hello Frank Ribery!), b) the moribund state of guitar music, never better illustrated than with the fact that the guitarist in The Maccabees augments his income by delivering guitar lessons Tony’s son and c) the relative merits (or not) of Shane Meadows, Quentin Tarantino and the Coen Brothers. The evening left with North London’s leading thespian epically procrastinating ahead of an abortive attempt to attend a leaving do that he didn’t want to go to. Presumably he went away to ponder his motivation.

Agent Morgan and the Secret Files

Greetings all, and many apologies for the recent radio silence. It’s been a few weeks since the last match report and in that time we’ve had an Easter break, as well as a dispatch from Paul, the self-styled Coram Fields ‘Guvnor’, which covered the game I missed when I was reliving my youth by pogoing around to The Wonder Stuff at the Forum in Kentish Town.

The last game I played in is sadly lost to the mists of time – apologies here to Ross in particular, who I know is endeavouring to maintain stats on the game’s leading goalscorers – but it was notable for the most unfortunate of reasons from the perspective of my top secret Player Attribute Scoring System. Like a tipsy civil servant on a night out, I left that week’s line-ups with their relevant values in the bag of bibs. Of all people, Alan was rostered to wash them that week and he duly uncovered the hitherto secret codes by utilising his Government training to open the piece of paper and read the content printed on it. Shocker. If this had been wartime I’d have been shot at dawn for passing messages to the enemy.

Happily, Alan has signed the Official Secrets Act, so – for now – the code remains outside the public realm, barring some sort of Edward Snowden-style Wikileaks revelation.  

Next, a report from Field Agent Tanner, who sent the following dispatch from the game immediately before Easter. (I’ve padded this out slightly).

Steve and Paul bumped into Michael Gove at King’s Cross before the match, shortly after the resignation of Iain Duncan Smith. Paul doesn’t say whether or not Gove was trying to seal off the St Pancras Euro Star terminal as a publicity stunt ahead of the EU referendum.

The game itself finished 3-2 to the Blues, with what Paul describes as “powerful” performances from both Yev and Mario. However, it is my duty to report that the game and quite possibly the result was adversely affected by the departure of Tony for the Yellows, who flounced off, loudly complaining that he wouldn’t “play with cheats”.

I am informed that Peter was the stand out performer for the Yellows and he netted the Yellows’ first goal following an “amazing, incredible turn and pass” from Michele. The tall Tottenham fan also slotted home a penalty given after David had apparently handled in the area, much to Simon Gas’s chagrin.

(End of dispatch from Agent Tanner). 

And so, finally, onto this week’s match report. Here are your two teams:

Blues: Specialist Goalkeeper Ed, Geoff, Alan, Mark, Steve, Jaime, Ben, Tony and Mario

Yellows: me, Andy, Simon Ink, Joseph, David, Tom, Peter, Danny, Alex and, eventually, Simon Gas

As you can see, Simon Gas is maintaining his recent selfless stance of stepping out of the starting line-ups to help balance the sides and ensure there are not too many people on the pitch.

What looked on paper like two evenly matched sides became something of a riot for the Blues, at least until Simon Gas came on for the Yellows to help solidify the defensive shape of the back line. Danny began in goal and conceded just the one goal before heading out – I believe the excellent Ben was responsible for the first score. I then replaced Danny in nets and was unable to prevent Mario, who had been played in via a great pass from Alan, from skipping around my abortive challenge and rolling the ball home. A third Blue goal arrived shortly after; I failed to deal with a corner and the ball squirted around the six yard box before Tony managed to crash the ball home, despite Andy’s valiant attempt to block it.

When Mario made it four nil with a swivelled half-volley through a crowd of players from the edge of the area Simon Gas was beckoned on and the Muswell Hillbilly duly stationed himself at left back as the Yellows went hunting for goals. Thereafter the game was more even, although all credit to the Blue team who played some great football – Ben, Tony and Mario proved to be a highly fluid and deft attacking triumvirate, while Steve marshalled the defence to restrict the surging midfield runs of Alex and Peter. 

For the Yellow team Joseph had a good game, mopping up attacks and elegantly carrying the ball upfield to tee up his team mates. The Yellows did get on the scoresheet; I think Danny got one and Peter seized on a loose ball to fizz a fierce effort low and hard into the bottom corner. 

There were a couple of slightly bizarre, slightly contentious handball decisions which left the final score in some doubt, both involving Honest Andy. The first confused me, as I thought Andy had called for a handball against the Blues, but in actual fact he’d called himself for handballing and a quick-thinking Alan took the free kick, played a one-two and calmly poked the ball past a bemused Simon Ink, who’d stopped playing. Whatever happened to playing to the whistle? On reflection, the goal should stand, but given no-one other than Andy had even seen the supposed handball, it was all a bit peculiar. 

I had a far better view of the second incident. Late on in the game and with the Blues well ahead Andy was defending as last man when the ball came back out to him following a save and bounced up and brushed his hand, which was down by his side. Mario called for handball, Andy shrugged and admitted that the ball had hit his hand, and Alan (again) was the apparent beneficiary as he lined up the penalty. Sportingly, he spooned it over the bar.  

In Fifa's Laws of the Game 2005, Law 12 says a free-kick or penalty will be awarded if a player "handles the ball deliberately (except for the goalkeeper within his own penalty area)". Frustratingly, FIFA doesn’t provide any sort of a steer on what constitutes ‘deliberate’ in this context, although former Premier League referee, Harrow Schoolmaster and International Fusspot David Elleray has said the referee's interpretation depends on whether the hand or arm is in an "unnatural" position at the point of contact. Given Andy’s hands were at the end of his arms, I’d venture that this was not a penalty and we should have waved play on. Suffice to say it wasn’t an incident which affected to the final score.

Speaking of which, we trudged off with the Blues having scored either five or six goals, depending on your view of Andy’s first handball, to the Yellows two.

Onto the Skinners for a few pints and a chinwag, which I understand was not possible two weeks previous given the sheer number of people in there (reviews of the nearby Dolphin establishment seemed to revolve around the high bar prices). Conversation mainly centred on the remaining Premier League campaign, before we swapped opinions and reviews of TV and radio football pundits: Jermain Jenas good, Michael Owen execrable. There was some talk of a Skinners Podcast, (a Pubcast?), but we’ll need legal representation before even beginning to think of such a thing. Ian Gooner alone would keep the barristers busy for a few days after each episode.

Right, that’s over 1,200 words, which will hopefully help to make up for the dearth of blog action recently. Given this week’s theme you won’t be surprised to learn that I’ve been exclusively reading spy novels since January, (I’ve also been watching the excellent spy dramas Deutschland ’83 and The Night Manager).

Over and out.

Twenty's plenty

This week’s team news was that no fewer than twenty people were interested in playing; Simon Gas even had to rotate Paul of the Antarctic from the line-up and, provisionally, himself. However, he had forgotten that Ian Baggies was playing, so rather than have ten versus nine, the Muswell Hillbilly was officially into the fray for a busy looking ten aside game. Twenty’s plenty, indeed.

Here are your two teams -

Yellows: me, Simon Ink, Joseph, Antonio, Charlie, specialist goalkeeper Ed, Danny, Vitaliy, David and Ian Baggies

Blues: Geoff, Steve, Mark, Ross, Mick, Bristol Paul, Tony, Nick, Simon Gas and Mario

With Bristol Paul arriving a little late, the Yellows made the most of their temporary one man advantage and took the lead through Simon Ink. The percussive gastronome made it 1-0 with a very composed spin and finish having been picked out inside the area. Shortly afterwards it was 2-0. Antonio chested the ball down and unleashed an absurd volley from about twenty five yards that slammed into the bottom right hand corner. And before too long it was 3-0; Charlie latched onto a monumental goal kick and managed to control the ball as it was dropping and spoon it over Simon Gas in goal.

At three nil down Tony started to agitate for a change in teams, but the Blues almost immediately got one back from Ross, (who was just getting started). A second soon followed from the trusted boots of Mario, back to his superlative best. Suddenly the Yellows were very busy at the back, with Tony, Nick and Mario pushing through midfield and seeking to release the in-form Ross. The Yellows were probably guilty of dropping too deep, but with Antonio feeling the effect of a challenge from Ross and the Ukrainian striker Vitaliy, or ‘Vitality’ according to Simon’s email client looking anything but, the Yellows were increasingly reliant on the skills of Antonio and the remorseless running of Danny to set up Charlie and Simon Ink up front.

Meanwhile the Blues were growing in confidence and after making it 3-2, Ross steered in the equaliser with a fizzing effort. At three apiece the game could conceivably have gone either way, but it was the Blues who capped a magnificent comeback to win 4-3; Ross, again, with the winning goal and his hat-trick, managing to lose his marker at a corner to nod home.

Relatively few moments of controversy this week, although there was a minor contretemps when Danny apparently fouled Mick and at the final whistle Tony got hit in the face by something or other.

Final score: Blues 4 – Yellows 3

Off to the pub then, where David and Simon got heavily involved with the pub fayre, the former opting for chilli nachos and the latter plumping for a Cajun chicken wrap. Topics for discussion included the Marlon James Booker winner, A History of Seven Killings, and in somewhat less literary fashion, Fatherhood, the current guest ales and the North London Derby. Steve also provided an update on his daughter’s suitor. He’s still in one piece.

That’s it for now. More goals, beers and other stuff next week.