Wilderspool Causeway

‘This is our teacher, Les. When he refers to your tailbone, he means the place your tail would be, if you had one.’ As Evan and I reclined on blue mats in Emmbrook Village Hall, three days before our crunch derby game for which I would be manager, Evan leaned over and whispered ‘Dad, I don’t really understand this.’ But it didn’t matter. We needed all the help we could get: Les, Grandmaster Choa Kok Sui, Keith Chegwin; if John Redwood had popped in for a hug or to release a pigeon into the Emmbrook sky, we probably would have welcomed him. This is the Glenn Hoddle school of management and everyone’s accepted.

The build-up involved all the tension, gamesmanship and psychological warfare associated with any big derby. The Cougars brought the biggest following we’ve ever seen at this level, many of whom positioned themselves in and around our technical area prior to kick off. I returned to the touchline after the warm-up to the most bizarre of scenes. My Costa take-away was smashed and smeared all over the advertising hoardings and, no word of a lie, one of their fans said ‘Yeah, we used to dance on Karl Marx’s grave.’ This was a highly alienating comment: ‘Sorry, what? Where’s Karl Marx’s grave?’
‘It’s in Highgate Cemetery…and we didn’t smash your coffee, by the way. Were you looking forward to that?’

Were we up against the Lazio of Wokingham? Were these Mussolini acolytes, displaced from Rome? Or had they simply noticed that Mr Parry (Emmbrook Maths guru and assistant manager from the Black Country) and I are teachers, and therefore highly suspect lefties? Anyhow, these shenanigans would not stand. Due to fixture congestion, we were playing a 7-a-side game on a much larger pitch, a situation with which both teams were unfamiliar. As a result, the first half was ragged and scrappy as players reverted to a herd mentality in pursuit of the ball; but how can you be direct and yet inoffensive when addressing a six-year-old? They need to know what to do, but not feel bad about not doing it, somehow.

One of the advantages of working in a boys’ school is that you learn all the new slang as soon as it’s minted. Last week, a boy told me he’d been ‘ham sandwiched’ by another teacher; this seems to be the equivalent of Fergie’s ‘hairdryer’: a short burst of ire, strategically timed for maximum effect. A lot of these were needed today. Apparently ‘ham sandwich’ is transferable; any negative situation is ham sandwich. Just as the game was threatening to go totally ham sandwich, Connor Mulvaney, ever the architect of our revival, seized the ball in his own half, dribbled around most of their team and smashed it into the corner. He scored another a few minutes later before a swift counter-attack from the Cougars brought them back into the game, sending their fans absolutely nuts.

A controversial moment followed when we were awarded a goal after the ball seemingly went out of play. Their manager, who looks more like Jurgen Klopp than Jurgen Klopp himself, seemed disgruntled, albeit in a studied, academic and philosophical sort of way. I decided to trespass into his technical area to say we were willing to have that goal chalked off. The guy earlier involved in ‘Costagate’ decided to interpret this as a failing on his own manager’s part and yelled ‘Typical Klopp. Always questioning every decision.’ So an attempt to be conciliatory just ended in embarrassment. Is the lesson that it’s best just to accept any advantage? That magnanimity is/reveals weakness?

Cool heads were needed to consolidate the winning position, and none was cooler than that of Mark Sexton who, at a finely poised moment in the second half, strolled up to take a free kick and curled it, with power, high into the net. It was an excellent goal and even the rabid Cougars applauded, one of whom said that it was worth attending the game for that moment alone. There was no way back from this for our Wokingham brothers and we were able to win 5-2, the controversial goal not included.

After the whistle, Karl Marx grave dancer 2 approached one of our players and said ‘If you carry on playing like that, you could play for West Ham when you’re older.’
‘You could play for Fulham now’, I said, superficially generous in victory; smiles on the outside and ham sandwiches within.