Wow, what can I say, there are days when you never want to give this magnificent game up until the ripe old age of 103, but then there are days where you just can’t wait to get back home and forget football ever existed. Now for us, this was one of those terrible days to forget. The trip down to Acton was not the most pleasant and not the shortest in the world either, some of the boys having to stand for more than half the journey. When we finally got to the station we were greeted by mother nature who made our walk to the ground as wet, windy and uncomfortable as possible.
After a 10 minute walk we came across what looked like a scrap yard. I typed the post code into the trusted I phone 5+++ and Siri assured me that this was the place the match was taking place. We entered their changing room which could only be described as a construction site to change into our famous orange and black clobber.
Now to make matters worse, the plumbing had not being hooked up so finding drinking water and a toilet that worked proved be a problem… especially for The Judge (the honourable Steve Causer) who normally has a 30minute “away game ritual” where he blesses their “big white telephone” and makes his presence known. This proved to be a major problem for the poor Judge today who would have layed a golden nugget, for a working loo. Poor Steve looked like an expectant wife in labour frantically pacing the Scrap Yard looking for a way out of this situation.
Our reward for leaving the sanctity of our makeshift changing room was to be greeted by a young (average age18-19years old) BB Eagles team who have only lost once all season.
We knew from the off that we had a real challenge on our hands to get a result out this game. The incredible thing is we were the better team in the first half. We played good passing football from the back to the front and created some great chances to take the lead. Josh as always a superstar coming close on a couple of occasion but narrowly missing putting us in the lead. Torq also narrowly missed scoring as the ball crossed an open goal but was just a couple of inches out of his reach as he threw himself at it.
The Eagles were not expecting this as they had cruised through most their games this season. They almost seem to lose their confidence and make silly mistakes which saw us look the more likely to score. Unluckily against the run of play, they nicked the lead right at the end of the first half.
We continued to battle in the second half but our effort and chances were not to be rewarded as they nicked a second. Still we continued to fight and stood toe to toe with this young skillful team. Around the 60 minute mark we managed to pull one back when our star player of the season so far Josh came up with yet another fine goal.
What was to follow in the final 25 minutes was partly down to great football by their players but mainly down to our lack of fitness, injuries (we had a number of players limping around the field) and casual defending on our part. We simply fell apart in the last quarter to allow them rub salt in our wounds. Perhaps they deserved the victory but the score line really was not a true reflection of our earlier efforts.
At least we had a nice meal to look forward to after our cold wet miserable game of football, ….wrong….their canteen only offered coffee, which we had to pay for and three sad over cooked hamburger patties on a BBQ, laying in the soaking rain, which were on sale for 3 quid each. I will never complain about our club house again ever and as far as I am concerned Sergio is better than Jamie Oliver on Steroids, compared to what they had on offer.
We would also like to congratulate The Judge for giving birth to twins shortly after the game, we are all glad you hung in there till after the game Steve 😉
Bring on the next game and hopefully some better weather!
Team: S. Kendall(GK), C. Manning(RB), S. Payne(CB), L. Caudebec(CB), D Tornarides(LB), W. Rose(RM), J. Kennedy(DM), T. Pagdin(CM), S. Causer(CM), D. Tullet(LM), J. Roberts(CF)
Sub: R. Kirton(CM) and A. Ritchie(LM)
I would like to apologise for the match report for Old Parks 8s away game and the goal by Andy which I’ve poorly described as “Darren slick pass to the right for Andy to coolly lob the keeper from an angle, 1-0.” but should have said “Darren slick pass to the right for Andy from twenty five metres to coolly lob the keeper from an angle, 1-0. It has to be the goal of the season for the 7s if not for the entire club”
