Who wants to be a millionaire: The final question in that celebrated programme is normally a killer. The kind of question that scant few know the answer to. So for those not privy to today's events I ask you this.
How can it be that in the 89th minute of today's game the score read, Grapp vets 0 - Macc vets 3 but in the official recording of the match result it will read, Grapp vets 3 Macc vets 0
1st home game of the season. Fortress Orford Park. You know, the place where we struck a deal two seasons ago to play our home games on the FA funded, billiard table flat superb pitches directly outside the changing rooms of our new home.
" Pitch four lads just through the tree's down the path by the skatepark" ......so we trudged past the female teams warming up on 'our' pitch to the grassy meadow that would appear to be our home turf. At least it had been mowed.
The Macc boys turned up in numbers. Rucks of 'em. I'm sure I'd heard they were bad travelers.....
Ref running a bit late, plenty of time for a warm up and stretch off.
So here we were again. The commencement of our new season. Once more into the breach. A warm up friendly last week saw us wanting against some younger opposition who could still 'bomb on' with 20 to go. It would be different this week of course. A level playing field, if not literally then certainly in terms of talent and ability.
Well lets gets at them then....... The ref blew us away, wind behind us and PEM's words whistling around our heads. ' I want this victory lads'
New Dan at the back. Big fella with a commanding presence, a sweet left foot and a full head of hair. A welcome addition. Junior, our player of the season last year, some say awarded to him rather than me so we don't lose him, whatever.... sitting in the middle, and due to the shuffled pack, alongside him our ever reliable Phil Neville play anywhere... Tok. Gentleman Richard up front ably assisted by Tony 'Gascoine' Prescott. Leight on the left and your author on the right. Full backs Ray Elliot and Cookie. Imperious Martin at the back....Yes tilt your head and nod approvingly. A decent eleven. With Iliff and Norm keeping warm, you just never know, there might be a point or three in this after all.
So we gave it a shot. We knocked it about and chased and harried and they knocked it about and chased and harried and they had five corners in the first 10 minutes and we had none. Now I reckoned at this time that they had the edge on the will and want. I liked Tok back in the middle and of course we all love junior when he wins us the ball as only he can but the bias , the leaning, the desire, the fight was with them. What was it....perhaps an edge on the fitness, an edge on talent and composure, but what we did do was match them in chances created. The finest and most noteworthy from Gazza Prescott. A booming through ball from whom I do not know but Gazza lurched and lunged and pulled it under his spell , their 6'4 centre half, Colin Hendrie like, charges in to cut him off only for Gazza to flip it over his head and for the goal to open up in front of of him, 10 yards out, the keeper frozen in wonderment and shock open armed and helpless.......needles to say Tony fluffed it, that ringing in your ears you get when overcome with excitement and adrenalin. We've all been there, composure gone, thrash wallop and the ball bounced away into the tree's. Still it was a moment to cheer and I think on reflection perhaps the games turning point, because it was about then that the Macc lads really started to bitch and moan. Oh and how. Not just at us, but amongst themselves and the ref and of all people the good doctor Tok.
Before half time the ref had flashed a couple of yellows at them. Verbal stuff mainly. Couldn't keep their mouths shut. Their number ten featured and was the principal protagonist. Little stocky fella with a Mediterranean tan and fabulous set of pearly whites. Not a bad footballer but just couldn't keep his mouth shut. Easily provoked. I mentioned to him in passing whilst trotting back for a corner that he appeared to have lost it and would end up being sent off for being a twat. His eyes flashed red momentarily and he replied that if he got sent off I would be going home in the boot of his car. How thoughtful.
It was all getting a bit unnecessary. Ill tempered. Loud and shouty and the football went flat. Half time. Nil nil.
It was warm and we re hydrated whilst PEM gave us a whats for. Lets reset chaps. Forget all the nonsense and get back to playing a bit of football. But of course and what we didn't really appreciate at that time was that we were all completely knackered and dead on our feet. I've not spoken to one teammate yet who hasn't had a splendid summer. Not a soul who spent August at fat camp running up inclines carrying logs. It would seem those lazy days reclined sipping Campari's have taken their toll.
So we set out against the wind. Mike Iliff on for Cooks who pulled his hip?
I don't know what their half time team talk consisted of but they came out of the traps flying. Wind assisted and the inappropriately named ' Sootie ' bolstering the middle ground with youthful exuberance. It didn't take long before they broke through. Some fleet of foot movement and ball exchange saw their front man presented with an opening 10 yards out which he promptly dispatched. A groan went around and we set off again but soon the impetus was against us once more, a relentless barrage of running and movement. Tired legs unable to respond. Too much Campari sloshing around in them. Anyway they scored a second and settled down and more importantly quietened down. Gone were the gushes of vitriol. Thank goodness for that.
Meanwhile Richard was working his socks off, Gazza switched with Norm and we tried our best. But what seemed like a force 6 against us was only really a gentle breeze and there wasn't an incline working against us and they didn't have thirteen players on the field. We were spent and they were not.
Tok stirred. A winner our Tok. Doesn't like to to be beaten . Never has. Slid in a couple of times, a little late? Mike I slid in a couple of times and left them prostrate. And then it seemed to get nowty again. Shouting and finger pointing. A crowd gathered at the skatepark yonder looking on. ....'What this all about' .... 'Look at them old 'uns chopsing off'
The ref fortunately had gargled with a saline solution that morning and was well prepared for an afternoon of conversing. Often seen in a one on one with their number ten. You know the one, he with the tan and teeth.....Why the Macc lads didn't take him off I do not know but he remained on the field and wound himself up into a frenzy.
We got slower and slower, they seemed to find a spring and energy from somewhere and 'bombed on' incessantly. They scored again and we were three behind. Dan forayed forward because he was able. Norm spurted here and there, gentleman Richard chased lost causes, Junior dug deep, PEM rebuffed them and the skateboard park crowd saw us on our feet but really we were on our knees....and our neck was bared and the sword hovered steady and all was lost.......but then in a twist not even Jeffrey Archer could have foretold the game swung entirely to the home team boys and victory was assured.
Their smiler it was. The tanned one with the nice teeth and big mouth. Couldn't get a grip of himself all afternoon. Got himself into some sort of tangle with Mike I or Junior or maybe Ray Elliott, who knows. Tok probably, anyway he gets the hump and fronts up to Junior. Oops. Junior gave him one of those subduing ' 'now calm down sunshine' throat pinches which interestingly he didn't rise to, but instead sets off in a gnashing teeth snapping rant aimed at Ray Elliott, scoring a near miss on his face, twice! Lots of pumped chests bumping off each other amongst the rest of us and the poor ref in the middle brandishing his red and trying to restore some order. A straight red for Gnasher but he wasn't for being told. Called the ref a racist. Protestations aplenty and a refusal to budge. So there we were a large group of elderly men stood in the middle of a public park in Warrington shouting and jeering between ourselves being cheered on by a watching crowd some twenty meters away in a skateboard park, baying for blood.
Anyone got that million dollar question yet?
The ref blows up. Final whistle. One minute to go. Match abandoned. More shouting and jeering, with distant encouragement from the incredulous crowd and a slow realisation that the match was over. Eventually the penny dropped and those amongst us that had turned up for a run out and game of football nodded our heads and shook hands. That was everyone present bar gnasher. Everyone. Gnasher, venom spraying, expounded his innocence. Deaf ears. Threats, posturing. clenched fists.
The ref called the police and we escorted him back to the changing rooms. The bobbies arrived , but too late to put gnasher in the dog van. Flee'd back to Macc he had, tail between his legs.
What a palaver. Not much fun if truth be told. Still no harm done other than Cookies hip and we can't blame them for that.
It was only back at the club afterwards musing over events with junior Longworth ( a referee in his own right no less) who pronounced the FA ruling on such matters. Match abandoned due to wrong doing on behalf of one team. Check. No blame laid at the feet of the other. Check. All goals scored by offending team scrubbed and their score reverts to zero. Team wronged awarded three goals.
So there it was, Grappenhall Vets 3 Macc vets 0.
Anyone get it ? No I suppose not..... Apologies to Big Dan. It's not normally like this sir. Tok's not really that bad.
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