875 views: 5 comments:
Tom Cramer posted on April 13, 2009 23:22
You can do the write-up this week. One of the perks of making my return to the cut and thrust of Over 35s football? How do I follow Roys fishy epic from last week. To be honest, I wont even try. However, just to show that I know some big words, Ill tell you that before I came to Pukekohe I was working as a Clinical Specialist in Immunohaematology at a hospital in Wellington. There you go. Thats shocked you hasnt it? Ill take a quick break now while you dash off to find a dictionary! No more huge words that nobody can understand, honest.
On to the game itself. The Old Boys had no league game this weekend, so we made the short trip to McLennan Park on Friday to take on Papakura in a friendly. They say that as you get older, your memory gets worse. It must be true because on Friday I found myself struggling to remember the last time I got my gear off in a car park. When I did remember, it brought a huge smile to my face, but that's another story. Anyway, back to Friday. It wasnt pretty. There were more wobbly bits on show than youd see in a Snoop Dogg video (You see what I did there? A reference to the young peoples music. Just to keep them interested!)
It became apparent very early on that the social attitude that the depleted Over 35s line-up took into the game wasnt going to be matched by our opponents. I mean, come on, a massage table by the side of the pitch! Incontinence pads and oxygen tanks I could understand, but a massage table?
The early exchanges were fairly even with both teams having their fair share of chances but Papakura looked the more dangerous team. The fact was that they looked as if they had been playing together for a while, and even worse was that they looked as if they actually trained, and slowly they started to cause some problems for our back four. I wont go into details of how they went 2 0 up, simply because I cant remember much about the goals. I can, however, remember Fabs getting us on the scoresheet with a sensational long-range effort. The rest of the first half was about Papakura playing some decent football and making some chances, while we were content to hoof the ball up the park and hope that Andy could weave some of his magic and conjure us up a goal. Sadly, it didnt work. Strange highlight of the first half was the referee introducing his own version of the 10 Yard rule. Following a blatant push by a Kura player in their penalty area, the ref decided to award us a free kick outside the box, 10 yards away from where the push had actually happened. Odd! Half-time, 2 -1 to the Kura.
The second half is best described as..well, actually its best not described at all. Our midfield werent really competing and this led to the blue hordes charging at us for most of the second half. Add to that some tired legs and youll begin to understand how our defence began to look looser than a wardrobe from Bunnings Warehouse. Kura scored some more goals, including one where Andre was momentarily blinded by the sun reflecting from Russel Whiters head and the ball managed to squirm through his fingers. We kept on going and got one back from the penalty spot, The Man from Atlantis, aka Roy, slotting the spot-kick. It finished 5 -2, and probably should have been more.
Just when we thought things couldnt get any worse, as we entered the changing room for a shower, we were greeted by the extraordinary sight of one of the locals having a dump on the floor of the toilet. Not in a cubicle, oh no that would be too easy. On the floor, in full view of everybody. Not a pleasant sight, to say the least, and it didn't smell too flash either just quietly! However, as he hitched up his pants and left, you couldnt help but think hed probably summed up the game quite well!