Harry’s FC 4 v 4 Botano Boyz (Monday August 3rd 2009)
Squad: Pistol Pete, Manager Mick, Rob Neesome, Al, Stammo, Teko, Nadge, Chef Dave.
Harry’s squad for this game was somewhat depleted due to a variety of reasons: the majority were caused by injuries (to Andy, Little Mick, Delaney, Webster, Ben) then there was the new baby excuse (Man City Dave) and finally injuries caused by Buffalo Sweats. This last reason is due some explanation as Lawrence clearly hadn’t recovered from his exertions the previous day when Harry’s celebrated the winning of the Caybrew Sunday League. Things in the bar afterwards deteriorated into drinking games where the loser had a forfeit, which was to drink a nasty Buffalo Sweat (Mechanic Mick’s favourite tipple). Step forward the unluckiest man in the world, Lawrence. First game up was furthest from the bull on the dart board with one dart – the fact Lawrence couldn’t even hit the board on one occasion should illustrate his ability at this game, and not surprisingly he went on to down three Sweats on the bounce. He impressively followed this up with more bad luck, by having to drink another Sweat by having the lowest playing card in the whole pub after everyone had been given a card – superb stuff.
When the game did kick off Harry’s had the luxury of 2 substitutes warming the bench in the formidable shape of Rob Neesome and Chef Dave.
Manager Mick set out a new 2-1-1-1 formation with Nadge sitting just in front of himself and Al at the back with Teko and Stammo playing further forward, one in front of the other. It was this new formation that saw Harry’s achieve a very credible result against probably the strongest team in the league (a 8-3 win for the Boyz the previous week against Burger King seemed to substantiate this claim).
The game was very tight for the first five minutes but the Boyz soon got in their stride and started to test ‘Caybrew’ Pete in the Harry’s goal. Pistol however, was able to repel all that was aimed his way, turning in a fantastic Man of the Match performance in the process.
But the pressure eventually proved too much, even for Pete and the Harry’s defence as the Boyz pace and trickery allowed them through onto ‘House Party’ Pete’s goal once too often where they took the lead after some smart lead up play.
Harry’s were not to take this set back lying down though, and hit back through the unlikely source of Chef ‘Villa’ Dave. A ball played from defence down the channel was inch perfect for Chef, and as he let the ball roll alongside him he struck a first time right footed shot low across the keeper and into the bottom corner. Chef was obviously delighted with his contribution and immediately subbed himself to reflect on his opening goal of the season.
But back came the Boyz and took the lead once again, before Teko scored a fabulous equaliser before half time to make the score 2-2 at the break.
Everything was to play for but Harry’s were looking a little jaded and tired. Manager Mick’s half time team talk was full of words of encouragement. Unfortunately, these words must have fallen on deaf ears as the Boyz from Botano struck twice in the second half to take a 4-2 lead. ‘Pistol’ Pete had time and time again pulled off some fantastic saves, drawing gasps from the watching crowd, but he was left helpless when Al tried to block a shot from well outside the box, but he only succeeded in deflecting the ball past the helpless ‘Pullback’ Pete in the Harry’s goal. The forth goal for the Boyz was from a shot that Pete had been dreading all night, a low shot down to his left, always Pete’s Achilles heel when it comes to his shot stopping (hope no one from the other teams are reading this!!) and although Pistol made an unconventional attempt to stop the shot with his left foot, which almost caused him to unintentionally do the splits, and almost putting a stop to Pete’s womanizing days into the bargain, the ball found its way into the bottom corner of the goal and the Boyz had a 4-2 lead.
But as defences have found out already this season, when Harry’s have Teko and Stammo on form, their quick feet and trickery can carve open even the best defences in the league. But it wasn’t from either of this duo the goal came. Step forward Rob Neesome. He scored his first goal for the light blues, and what a belter it was. With time running out, perhaps as little as 7 minutes left on the clock Rob took a gamble and stepped forward from his defensive duties to strike a howitzer of a shot high past the Boyz ‘keeper who could only react once the ball had passed him.
4-3 and game on.
With the clock now the enemy of Harry’s it was time for Stammo to take matters into his own hands, and as he ducked and weaved his way past defender after defender he unleashed a shot to equalise and bring Harry’s back from the death with only three minutes remaining.
All that remained to happen was Al to get himself yellow carded and sent off for two minutes for kicking the ball away in an attempt to waste some precious seconds after a free kick had been called. However Harry’s managed to see the match out with 5 men on the pitch to record a very satisfying draw.
Following on from last weeks 3-3 result with Coconut Joes, this was the second draw in a row - maybe Harry’s are becoming the fixed odds specialists on the pools (do they still do them??).
Man of the match performance by a country mile (that’s a long distance Lawrence) was Caybrew ‘Pullback’ ‘Pistol’ Pete who almost single handedly kept the score down when the Bobtano Boyz were on top. Fantastic agility from the veteran, and remember is Harry’s make shift ‘keeper. If he’s not careful he will be asked to play this role every season.
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
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