Playing Your (Good) Game, Baby*

We have, on occasions recently, had a few wrinkles in our sessions but I am glad to report that – unsolicited – at least two of those who reffed SHWFC games this week commented on both the quality of the football and the good spirit in which the games were played. Music to this blog writer’s ears!

Monday followed the usual pattern of our recent sessions at Ruskin with another bumper turnout and more debutants, step forward Geoff Phillips and Allen Crawford, we hope you enjoyed your first SHWFC experience and that you’ll be with us long term.

As a result of the numbers we had one pitch with 6 a side game who played for the full hour, and 4 teams of 7 with team change overs at half time. The line ups were:-

Old Gold - Donal, Beach Boy, Citeh Geoff, Big Phil, Sheila, Mika and Triallist

Green - Andy Manager, Tom Derby, Geoff Phillips, Steve Jones, Prout G and Little John,

Purple - Les Meldrew, McSpeed, Wickie, Chopper, Ashy, Geoff Poole and PaulF,

Blue - Chris Gillmore, Snakehips, Grav, Margaret, Lord Rainford, Big Tony and Mike Thomo

Black - Chris K, Allen, Roy, Cockney Rebel, Roger and Mark No Relation

Red - Steve Honeyman, Tom Stretch, Robin, Les H, Eileen, Jenko and Jeff Betty

The hour long 6 a side game on pitch A was reffed by Charlie who oversaw a narrow win for Blacks, 6-5 over Greens. Black’s scorers were Martin 2, Mark 2, Allen, Roy; with Tom Derby 2, Andy 2 and Steve replying for Green.

Jeff Bettye took control of two 7 a side games on pitch B. First up was Reds v Purples; a 5-3 win for reds. The game started at a fast pace with both teams being penalised for not walking; Reds eventually getting a penalty on Purple’s fourth running offence. As it was the Red team were slightly better in front of goal and took their chances well ending up winning the game. The winner’s scorers were Tom Stretch who ended up with a hat trick (including a penalty), Steve Honeyman and debutant Geoff. Purple’s scorers were McSpeed, Geoff and Les.

Red stayed on pitch B to take on Yellows, but they seemed to have burned themselves out in their hard fought first game victory. The game ended in a good win for Yellow with two well taken goals.

Jeff’s comment on  the games he reffed were “ Well done to all the players who settled down to play some great walking football as it should be played”

Over on pitch C the first game, Blues against Yellow, was definitely the dodgy keeper derby!. Mika made the first howler, lifting his leg like a dog taken short at Crufts to let in a Mike Tommo shot. Mags was always available for an out ball as Blues came under pressure, but Yellows’ efforts came to nothing against the might of Big Tony in goal (including a saved penalty from Phil) leading to cries of ‘change keeper’....from the other team! This duly done, Snakehips was the next iffy netminder as he swayed away from the ball allowing Mika to redeem his earlier error to even the scores up. Then with the last kick of the game Citeh Geoff was unlucky enough to spill the ball over the line from another Mike Tommo shot to give Blues a narrow 2 v 1 win in a very even and fair game.

Blues then started their 2^nd game against Purple (who’d moved over from pitch B) with an early Chris Gilmore goal but kept leaving gaps at the back which gave McSpeed and Geoff Poole the opportunity to put Purples into the lead 2-1. Gaps were then duly plugged by Lord R  and Chris which then gave Blues the upper hand again, as a shot squeezed in off the post from Grav made it 2-2. Two more goals from Grav in the last few minutes sealed a 4-2 win in another even game played in good spirit with both teams owning up for fouls conceded.

To Wednesday night at Sutton where those attending ended up with Andy Manager’s nightmare number, 10 inside and 18 outside, meaning we had to settle for 9 a side outdoors as splitting into 2 games, a 5 v5 and also a 4v4, isn’t really feasible.

Once again those playing outside experienced  the heady perfume of exotic cheroots wafting across the MUGA pitch (which stands for Multi Game Arena, and has no relation to red baseball caps). An intervention from the Sutton staff was called for (apparently the main culprits at Pothead FC are the coaching staff!); we’ll see if their finger wagging has any effect.....

Outside teams were:-

Red (plus pink): Chris 10P, Lord Rainford, Gaz, Neil Stretch, Cockney Rebel, Little Mark, Mark D, Jason & Nigel,

Yellow: Tom Stretch, Steve C, Deano, Eileen, Colin, Benno, Little John, Chris Sully and Jeff

An injured PJ bravely volunteered to ref in a game which showed that 9 a side isn’t ideal for walking football, no matter how far you stretch the pitch. It all gets very congested; there is little time on the ball and things inevitably get speeded up. This meant there were very few chances in an even first half, with a couple of near misses for Steve C and Deano, but Lord R came nearest to breaking the deadlock with a shot which Eileen was able to deflect onto the bar.

An injury to Little Mark for Reds meant Jeff volunteered to support PJ in reffing duties giving even up the sides for the 2^nd half, which got under way with Tom Stretch scoring, his shot - unluckily for Reds - taking a deflection off Gaz and wrong-footing Nigel in nets.

Things didn’t open up from then to the end. Yellows looked as if they would hold out for a narrow win but then Tom Strretch turned from hero to villain with a misplaced pass which Mark D gladly seized on to equalise with just about the last kick of the evening. 1-1 a fair result and a game mostly played in good humour despite the difficult numbers.

Inside saw none of the issues reported last week with two evenly matched teams lining up as follows, with Phil the Power as ref:-

White:  Andy, Wicky, Lee, Joe, and Triallist

Blue:- Degsy, Citeh Geoff, Grav, Chris, and Steve.

0-0 at half time but eventually Whites won 3-1 with Wicky, Lee, and Joe scoring for the winners and Grav getting Blues only goal of the night. And, in words echoing Jeff’s ref report from Monday Phil the ref commented “very much a pleasure to ref it. Played in good spirit.”

And so another week for SHWFC has ended – or nearly. We still have our annual quiz night at Ruskin this Friday under the capable MC’ing of our Social Secretary, Cockney Rebel. So expect the next SHWFC blog to cover both that and whatever the God of walking football slings in our direction over the following 7 days.....

Playing Your Game,Baby* The late great Bazzer White.