Thursday 21 June 2007

Match Day 1


post match exhaustion, originally uploaded by patfoz.

T'was a dark and stormy, ill-omened Friday to begin the ASS campaign: the fashionable team shirts were lost in the post so it looked like the players might not have anything to wear, and the dark and stormy storms meant that most people's flights to Glasgow were delayed so it looked like that the non-existent shirts wouldn't have anyone to wear them anyway. Depending on how you look at it, the problems compounded each other, or cancelled each other out.

Thanks to Tim's efforts, the shirts were found and made it to Dunoon along with the scattered and delayed players, although some had to spend a night at Glasgow airport.

Come Saturday morning, it was no longer dark and stormy, just cold and miserable. The general consensus among the team was: "let's play one game then withdraw." Given the conditions, I'm surprised people were willing to play the first game. The 'pitch' we were to play on that day had a large pool at about half way (which we later learned was due to a cracked water/sewage pipe - we never did get a definitive answer), was slightly higher in one corner, and ranged from being ankle deep to knee deep in mud, which wasn't just mud but also contained lots of tiny and not so tiny rocks. And there was a witches hat in the middle.

Nevertheless in true 'have-a-go' Aussie style we leaped into the bog, and joked to each other about how it wasn't really that tiring. Within two minutes I had subbed myself off to go pass out. Adjusting to the conditions was tough, but once we did we began to dominate. Our tactic for simply getting up some momentum and charging the ball towards the goal seemed to work - we managed to put 3 past the opposition for no reply. Other teams seemed impressed by such a convincing victory.

With over 3 hours to kill before the next match, we hit the showers and tried to warm up by curling up in sleeping bags, turning up the heaters and having some soup. Just at the point where I could feel my fingers again, it was time to suit up for the next match. The taste of victory had left us hungry for more, and there was no more talk of slinking off home and forfeiting the remaining games.

Our second match was against the 'swamp babes' (a terrible misnomer) and were an experienced outfit (they had played in last years tournament). The experience showed early, when they immediately set about playing dirty. Pushing. Pulling. Grabbing. And even dacking (although the Scots probably have another word for it). In true Aussie style, we played in a civilised sportsmanlike manner, up to the point when it happened to us. Then we gave as good as we got. Actually, better. Amid all the foul play goals didn't seem as important: we put two past their keeper, but only one was noticed by the ref. At the other end we kept a clean sheet, and that was probably the only thing clean about the game.

With 2 from 2, we were confident of progressing to the next round, and went to the bar to celebrate (cheers to the Arran micro-brewery! - just the stuff to keep your liquids up). Our chances of progressing got even better when we discovered our third match had been forfeited by the opposition.

So at the end of day 1: 150% winning percentage, 5 goals for, 0 against. We began to think seriously about winning the comp...

Day 2 reports to follow.

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