AA2 v QP 05/05/13
/(AA2) Barnstoneworth Utd vs Queens Park
Location: Paine ‘Wembley’ Reserve – 1pm ko
Another gorgeous sunny Sunday started off with stress, at great eventual cost ($3 fine) and with huge delay and inconvenience. ‘Meet you by the car at 11.40am Tom’ tends to give the meaning see you near my motor around the time of twenty to 12 so we can get to the ground before 12pm and to not incur a fine…….….Ring ring ’Tom it’s 11.50am, where are you?’ – ‘Oh sorry Chris, just woke up, alarm didn’t work’…… enough said. My business card now reads efficient and reliable CBD taxi service and wakeup call available at additional cost.
After some concern and worry in the dressing room about the late arrivals, the team could eventually relax and focus on the task ahead. The first win of the season!!!
An average warm up didn’t quite get the team revved up for kick off, the whistle went and after some uninterested challenges going in and limited tracking back in the first 5 mins, a nice move down the right for Queens Park let two attacking players exchange a nice couple of passes, the striker took on the defence and BANG 1-0, clinical left foot strike into the bottom corner. I blame Scott, Scott blamed Downer, Downer blamed Chris. So it was 100% the midfields fault for not tackling ok…….
Time to come out of the dressing room and start the game 2nds!!! And that we did. It was just the wakeup call the 2nds tend to need to start playing more aggressively, attacking and with purpose. Some great work by Scott down the right, with Gerry in support, saw B’Worth (bored of writing the full long name already) whip some decent balls in from the right and cause the Queens Park defence some nervous moments. Mags and Cathal were working tirelessly in the middle closing down the opposition winning the ball back and starting attacks over and over again. Tom and Barry were holding the ball up nicely and trying to make something out of nothing to get us back on level terms.
With more grey hairs than an old knackered out donkey chilling in a field (Steve don’t take offence to this hair joke please), the B’worth defence kept things nice and simple, didn’t let the strikers have a moment and helped the attacks continue to flow nicely. Scott and Steve were mistake free and getting forward nicely knowing the 77 yr old pairing beside them wouldn’t make any mistakes today. You can’t buy experience, you can buy a new hip replacement, a couple of new plastic knees and daily massage to improve an aging body, but I’ll say it again – you can’t buy experience!!! Priceless….
More good work came down the right from Scott, a little interchange in the penalty area and after a decent looking shot from Maggie (from memory) fell to Adam in the box, a sharp striker-in-form-like turn resulted in BOSH GOAL, 1-1 the 2nds are level and very well deserved. The pressure continued and with the introduction of Baker in the middle to give the hard working midfield a breather, the attacks continued to rain down on the Queens Park defence and it was kind of like watching Brazil (I’m sure there is a song in that).
One of Bakers early contributions was a flow of 3 tackles in a row then a knee down to the ground stomach kind of block thing (trusty move that one) at the same time of falling over caused the card happy ref to whop out a stinging yellow to Baker. I’ve never seen Baker jump so high with a tucked in swivel pike (8.6 from the Russian judge) in reaction to the yellow and a high pitched Mickey Mouse scream in disgust resulted.
After a warm cup of tea and scone, Baker (Mickey) calmed down and got on with the job at hand. More great work down the B’Worth right brought a free kick, a useful ball to the back post shortly after (from Cathal I think from memory) saw Baker timing his run perfectly and BOSH GOOOOOAAAALLLL 2-1, Baker with a tidy header to put the 2nds in the lead, great come back.
More pressure resulted and an awesome shot from Mags I think or might have been Cathal actually (you get the picture here, I’m old and can’t remember much) from the area rattled the crossbar, should have gone in. Awesome first half performance, time for a well-deserved rest.
Some great old clichés came out at half time to rev up the team, ‘it’s 0-0 again lads’, ‘only half the job is done’, ‘it’s a game of 90 mins lads not 45 mins’ etc. etc. gave the 2nds focus and more of the same was needed (there you go, another cliché chucked in).
Queens Park started the better of the two teams during the first 10-15mins of the 2nd half, with a couple of corners resulting and some solid defending once again needed to clear the danger. More of the same from the B’worth midfield bossing the game got us back on the attack, and Tom had a couple of half chances which didn’t result in any further goals but deserved more.
A couple of worrying moments for B’worth came about during mid 2nd half, one being a great shot from Queens Park causing Ken to pull out a top draw stop from the locker and sitting on the ball at the same time having a nice rest – great save by the top shot stopper. Brian came on, initially looked lively then collected a yellow for a dubious challenge with his eyes closed flying through the air like peter pan, another one to the collection on the day from the ref – yellow is defo his favourite colour.
A 2nd wind came in from the B’Worth team knowing we needed to kill this off and with a final push, more great work down the right side, a whipped ball in from the side ping ponged in the goal mouth to fall to striker wannabe Adam again, BOOM GOAL. 3-1, surely game over.
Another good stop from Ken and some good clearing of the lines closed the game off, the whistle went and a very well deserved win at last!! The crowd of 8 or so went wild. Starring performances from Scott and Cathal to mention just two, everyone played great and let’s hope this kicks off the season moving forward. The 2nds looked great for the majority of the game so with the same effort and commitment and attacking flair for the rest of the season, the play offs look back on track. TAB updated the AA2 title betting with B’Worth 2nds now at $3.50 for the title.