King Bill 4 Longstanton FC Sunday 2
Two games, two wins, 16 goals for, with just 2 against, a goal difference of plus 14. We - are - 2nd in the league. 2nd. Yep, 2nd. Drayton Lions followed up their opening week 7-1 victory with a 12-0 victory against our poor, porous friends Waterb[r]each Sunday. I blame the dickhead who said that they wouldn't lose another league game by 12...??
The fact that the result has still yet to be updated on the Full-Time website coupled with their minus 24 goal difference after two games is a concern; losing another team from an already too small league would not only reduce the fixture list, but it would render the 12-0 result null and void*, so let's all put our hands together & pray that the Waterbeach boys are masochistic enough to want to continue getting spanked every Sunday morning (I won't develop the church analogy further - they're not a youth team after all...??)**
Back to yesterday and Sunday newbies Longstanton FC Sunday were our opponents; they are literally a Saturday team who also now play Sundays, and they were always going to be a far tougher proposition and so it proved.
The team talk focused on an importance of putting the previous week to one side, to focus on a continuation of keeping our shape, discipline & doing our own jobs diligently. Opening minute, our deep-lying defensive midfielder, whose sole purpose on the pitch is to win challenges & protect the back four, goes charging after a loose ball on the edge of the opponents area, with visions of last week's 4.5 yard open goal screamer fresh in the memory. This is dogshit of the highest order. We can only continue to be a good team if people perform the roles they have been tasked with. Thankfully, everyone else did as I said & not as I did. However, that did not stop Longstanton putting one past us in what seemed like the opening 5 minutes: a reality check. We were under the cosh...
But we have goals. If we stick to the game plan and keep things tight, we will score enough to win. Northy - a firm pea-roller, Ryan - a sumptuous 20 yard top bins curler, Northy - Right-foot blunderbuss of a fuck off volley, Northy - "the one where I ran from the half-way line & slipped it in near post". I can't remember the order - I don't even celebrate anymore. Back at 2-1, Longstanton could've made it all square after a pen was awarded against Alex for simply wanting to swap shirts with their striker in the area during play. It was the right call by Alex, however, as Martin, like a Jedi Knight, used the force of his dive going the wrong way to redirect the spot kick onto the post. That would've been 2-2, but instead we finished the half clinging on, but inexplicably 3-1 up. 2nd half we made it 4-1 which essentially ended the contest until Martin & Dan HJ decided to pay tribute to the late great Barry Chuckle: to me - to you - 4-2. And that's how it ended. MoM is Dan North again. He scored a hat-trick, two of his goals were top, top drawer, and we needed all three of the goals to be sure of the points. Safe to say he's performaning his role. Honourable mentions to Ben C & Webbo for controlling midfield, and Pete W, Cameron & Royden coming off the bench & bossing the opposition, winning duels across the park in the later stages.
Michael summed the game up perfectly at the end when he said we've got things to work on from the performance, but we still won: we don't have to lose to work on our performance. Funnily enough, I had heard almost these exact words the day before from Jerome Kaino, legendary New Zealand All Black flanker, whilst watching the All Black's All or Nothing series on Amazon Prime...you can get Prime free on 30 day trial...
Well played everyone????
Up the Bill! Up the Kings!??
* if they fold, we still count the goals we scored - Joel & I need it. ** apologies if offended - just banter
