Black and white comedy capers

Some of you may have seen one of those very old black and white movies featuring the Keystone Cops and Charlie Chaplin, well all of the main characters were present at Avondale Racecourse on Saturday afternoon for the Pukekohe open white team’s game against Bay Olympic Red. On this occasion the screenplay was written and directed by Nick Rowe and this is how it went;

Pukekohe kicked off and Nick played one of the worst passes of his long career to nobody at all, in fact it was probably 20m from the nearest Puke player. Enter the keystone cops, 2 Bay Olympic players so stunned were they at this bizarre start that they proceeded to run into each other, the ball broke free to a 3rd defender/cop who played a 25m back pass. Regrettably from his perspective it only went 5m, now enter Charlie aka Andy Evans. Chasing a lost cause Andy proceeded towards goal taking it around the keeper to an impossibly acute angle, whereupon with a twirl of his walking stick (he has bad knees you know) he calmly tucks it away. One nil to Puke 15 seconds gone, this is where Andy tells us that we missed his finishing last week and given that start, well its hard to argue.

It is fair to say that this may have rattled our opposition somewhat and we enjoyed long periods of procession. In reality they had some excellent footballers but seemed to want to play the game as individuals rather than a team and we simply passed around them.

The second goal looked inevitable and it duly arrived, once again a through ball between a static and square back four saw Andy Evans race through, yes I did say race, and slot the ball passed their keeper. Andy described it as having been ‘lashed into the top corner’, that is not quite how I remember it, but nevertheless it was 2 to us and 2 for Andy.

From here on in the Bay Olympic boys seemed to get more and more frustrated and with the talking and movement paying dividends Puke controlled the majority of the ball with Bay limited to long range shots or solo runs which whilst on occasions beating a couple of players were eventually snuffed out.

Pukekohe looked to have added a third when Jon Waller had an unchallenged header 3 metres out but the ball hit the bar and his follow up was somehow kept out by the keeper. It turned out to be only a temporary reprieve however, with a great flowing move down the left involving Neil, Richie and Jon before Jon cut inside and thundered the ball into the top right of the goal.

At half time the team talk was about more of the same without getting over complicated. Matt Nugent making his senior competitive debut had a sound game and looked comfortable on the ball whilst Matt Green and Neil Skerry were very assured in the middle.

Chris Brittnall and Colin Case both caused their defence problems with their pace down the right and did lots of tracking back to help out when required. For the last 20 minutes or so young Jack Crane and Liam McDonald came on. It almost felt cruel really, as a more ‘experienced’ player myself, the last thing you want to see with 20 minutes to go is a ridiculously quick and skilful 14 year old come on and run you ragged. Well sorry but that is what they got. Jack and Liam along with Colin Case were left upfield whilst the rest of us solidified things at the back, in other words we were just as knackered and punted the ball forward for the young bucks to do their thing.

All in all a solid performance, including one great save from Colin Pegg saw a clean sheet against a team that got 5 the previous week. Next week the challenge maybe even bigger as we play the other Bay Olympic team and they beat our opponents of last week Manurewa 7-0, as against our 3-1 win, let’s hope everyone is available.