Old Finchleans vs Norsemen FC

Old Finchleans vs Norsemen FC

Saturday 12th March

Finchley

3.00pm

Tough Day At The Office For Finchy

Dear Diary,

Not much to report on this morning. Got up and had awkward small talk with the builder about cricket. I tried to pretend I liked/cared about cricket, but this proved to be difficult. After a couple of minutes I let him get on with the building and I watched the news. Not really a good uplifting way to start a day, considering the state of the world at present. I needed a nice boost so I walked to the kitchen and had a nice bowl of sugary cereal. This gave me a 15 minute high. Had a shower and thought about getting rid of the weird hairy patches I have on my upper arms. Decided against the hair removal as it will just grow back longer and thicker.

Packed my bag and then headed to Old St to meet Thomas. Bought myself a lucozade energy drink thing. Tasted a bit like sick and gave me a belly ache. Sat in the park and ate some pineapple whilst watching a squirrel bury an acorn. I was so tempted to move the acorn, once the squirrel had run off. I would have definitely done it if there wasn’t a fence in between me and the acorn. Got to the gym to meet Thomas and he thought it would be funny to hide behind a car. I saw his week attempt at hiding and tried to hide from him. We did this for a couple of minutes and then decided to stop acting like idiots and get in the car. Managed to find an unscratched cd in the glove box and to our delight it had some Bruce Springsteen on it. Zoomed off in the direction of Finchley. Had a nice chat about various things this week. Can’t remember what they were exactly but I do remember it being a pleasurable ride.

Arrived at the ground and everyone was standing about. We were a little bit late. We just so happened to drive into the car park behind the Norsemen legend John Bayer. He bought his rattle along to cheer us on. Went and got changed in our really small changing room. Having needed a wee for an hour I left to find the toilets. On doing so I noticed that the home teams changing room took up almost half of the building. It is f-ing massive. Went out and warmed up. Found a dead pigeon in the net behind the goal. Lovely...... Tadd and Tajae both kicked the ball over the net so I thought I would be nice and get the ball for them. There was a river behind the goal and I had to climb in to get the ball. Tadd and Tajae didn’t help. Tajae run off and Tadd got distracted by a squirrel.

Warmed up and watched Old Finchleans kick the ball at the goal.

The squad was another strong one for Norsemen:

GK – Brad
LB – Ballers
RB – Ossie
CB – Tajae
CB – Macca
RM – TT
LM – Hempsey
CM – Leighton
CM – Tadd
CF – Jarrett
CF – Leroy

SUBS
Arda
Reed
Thomas

Again another very strong starting 10. It really does baffle me every week how Ballers gets to start. He has paid his annual fees like everyone else though so I guess it is only fair. I also believe when we got the funding for the new changing rooms, one of the stipulations was we have to be an equal opportunities club. That could explain a few things regarding the picking of Ballers every week.

The time is 3.00 and therefore it is time to kick off. Finchleans started well in what was to be a very fast paced first half. Within the opening minute Coleman was found out of position and the Finchleans right winger found himself one on one with Brad, however Brad spread himself well and stopped the effort.

5 more frantic minutes found Norsemen with a corner. Coleman put in a ball to the near post. Tadd got his head on the end of the corner and dispatched the ball into the corner of the goal. Yey for Tadd. He got really excited and started jumping about. Old Finchleans 0 – 1 Norsemen.

The next 5 minutes were not good for Norsemen. Literally from kick off Old Finchleans equalised. A ball was cleared by Tajae or Macca and the bouncing ball fell to the feet/knee of the Finchlean midfielder who hit a good volley from 30 yards. Brad got a hand to the effort to tip the ball on to the bar. Unfortunately there was a weird spin on the ball and the ball bounced into the far corner. Unfortunate for Brad as he did make a good save. Old Finchleans 1 – 1 Norsemen.

Two minutes later and the Old Finchleans right midfielder is bundled over in the Norsemen penalty area. The ref toots his whistle and gives a penalty. The penalty was placed right in the corner. Brad made a valiant effort to save it, but it was a well struck penalty. Old Finchleans 2 – 1 Norsemen.

This manic 5 minutes rocked Norsemen and perhaps last year we would have just rolled over and taken it. Within 10 minutes Hempsey and Tadd had got us back into the game. Hempsey found a bit of space out wide. Tadd made a dart into the box and Hempsey flighted a lovely ball in Tadd’s general direction. Just as Tadd was about to head it again he was shoved in the back and the ref tooted his whistle again. Penalty kick for Norsemen this time. Hempsey stepped up and scuffed it into the corner. Old Finchleans 2 – 2 Norsemen. That is a 50% success rate from the penalty spot this season now.

Almost straight from kick off the ball was played back to Tadd who in turn played it back to Ballers. Ballers forgot his limitations and tried a first time ball. He got it all wrong and sliced it out. He looked at Tadd as if it was Tadd’s fault. It wasn’t though. It was all Ballers fault.

From here until half time Norsemen started to play the better of the football with Finchleans resulting to the long ball up to the big front man. Tajae and Macca dealt with this threat very well and didn’t let Finchleans have another sniff at goal. With 10 minutes remaining in the 1st half, Ossie picked up the ball at right back and decided to have a go. He beat half of the Finchlean team and then thought about shooting when he got to the edge of the box. However he bottled it and just kicked it out. It could have been so nice.....

Half time whistle is blown and the teams go in level. Finchleans have played a high tempo game and are starting to look a little tired. To be fair to them though they are a decent outfit and do not deserve their league position. Bit more team play and encouragement and they will easily climb the table.

The second half kicks off and Norsemen start the spritelier. There was a bit more pressure on Norsemen as we knew we needed a win to pile the pressure on the pack behind. A lot of opportunities came and went for Norsemen. Leroy for a change was not firing on all cylinders and found it difficult to get a shot on target.

About 10 minutes into the second half and Norsemen win a corner. Hempsey took an in swinging corner which the keeper comes out to punch. Unluckily for Leighton as his head was between the ball and the fist. Any other player and that would have been goodnight. Leighton got up as if nothing had happened. 10 minutes later though and the concussion kicked in. Leighton had no idea where he was! Leighton makes way for Thomas.

Norsemen continue to press for another goal. The fact that we were playing on such a small pitch made it difficult to get the ball down and pass as there was always a player within 2 yards of each other.

Norsemen won a free kick, just inside their own half which Ballers miss cued up the left wing. TT got a flick on the header and Hempsey run on to the ball. Hempsey beat a player by cutting inside and had a shot. The keeper saved well. The ball fell to Jarrett’s feet and with 4 or 5 Finchlean players crowding the box, he somehow managed to put the ball in the back of the net. We went crazy and hugged each other. It was a beautiful moment. Jarrett doesn’t like scoring at the best of times so for him to feel like scoring at this moment was much appreciated.

The game become a bit stretched at this point as Finchleans pushed forward to find an equaliser. This gave the Norsemen wingers and Forwards a lot of time and opportunities. It also meant the Finchleans centre backs had to cover a lot more ground. The tallest of the centre backs found himself out wide facing Thomas late on. Thomas must have said something because the centre back got really cross. So much so that he forgot about playing football and instead just jogged around after Thomas. Apparently he wanted to break Thomas’ legs. Thomas must have said something really naughty to have made the centre back so angry.

Norsemen had plenty more chances to finish off the game but Leroy didn’t fancy buying another jug and just missed all of his chances. We probably had so many chances because Finchleans were only playing with 1 centre back in his position.

The game ended 3-2 and on the balance of play and chances I think Norsemen deserved the victory. I think Finchleans deserve credit though as they pushed us all the way and made a good game of it, despite the manager saying he only had 8 regulars playing.

We had another good turnout of old boys today and it is appreciated that they take the time out of their Saturday to come and watch.

After the game we got changed and had a shower. The shower at Old Finchleans don’t favour the willy dance so again this was missed. Next week we are at home though so I will be practicing for then.
Had some grub and a couple of beers whilst watching the Utd vs Arsenal game. Sat next to the chef and mugged him off as he is a Gooner. When i say mugged him off I merely chuckled when Utd scored. He didn’t like this.

Leighton told us about some of his travelling stories. My favourite story included a cage and some friends. He is a nice lad. Jarrett, The chef, Leighton and myself then drove to Shoreditch and got utterly smashed at various bars and clubs. Thomas and Louise met us late on. By this point we could barely talk. Thomas said we refused to talk to strangers and just stuck in a tight group. Simple rule of not talking to strangers. One of the first rules you learn in life.

Went home and got into bed. After the room stopped spinning I went to sleep.