Wokingham & Emmbrook Oranges are now sponsored by a company from Solihull called Lafarge Tarmac – the people to turn to if you’re ever in need of some decorative aggregates or a bit of Topscape drainage gravel to round off the weekend. If you research the company in more detail – inspired, perhaps, by Daddy Pig’s famous loan of ‘The Wonderful World of Concrete’ in Peppa Goes to the Library – you find an impenetrable world of gypsum activities presided over by Martin Riley and Cyril Ragoucy. All sorts go on at the aggregate quarries, depots and terminals, but precisely what happens remains open to conjecture. Mathias Blamont, writing for Reuters, once labelled Lafarge Tarmac ‘unloved’, but an Irish company called CRH snapped it up for £5 billion. Who has true discernment when it comes to tarmac?
During the summer transfer window, Michael and Peter Mulvaney successfully landed Ozzy Ferguson from Wokingham & Emmbrook Cougars (free transfer) and Hayden Harris (unattached), while retaining the services of Leitwolf and top goalscorer Connor Mulvaney, whose pro-zone heat map would resemble a plate of spaghetti augmented by tomato sauce: there’s no frontier territory for him. How long he will remain a Satsuma before Binfield come knocking (with all their incentives) is an open question.
Reeves Rangers Hoops were founded by a QPR fan called Terry who used to live on Reeves Way, just off Wokingham’s car valeting and safe storage strip: the bubble wrap belt. We tend to lose to them, suffering at the hands of a pragmatic, agricultural style of play which owes much to the gravity-assist tactics of Dave Bassett, John Beck and Tony Pulis, touchline prowlers more akin to air traffic controllers than football coaches. Wokingham, meanwhile, are so determined to pass the ball out from the back and along the carpet that a goal-kick feels about as welcome as an opposition penalty, such is the frequency with which well intentioned cross-field passes go sadly awry.
The first goal was conceded in typical fashion: a corner was whipped in, only for our goalkeeper to punch the ball into the net rather than away from goal, as would seem more logical and helpful. Our players were passing the ball around well, and new boy Harris drew gasps with an audacious volley against the post before Josh Dance tapped the ball in from close range after a goalmouth scramble, sending the penned-in visiting supporters into raptures. Being joined together in such close communion was a real advantage, allowing us to belt out club standards at quite a volume, beginning prior to kick-off with a spirited reflection on one of last season’s lowest moments:
‘The Mulvaneys had a dream to build a football team
Had no midfield, lost 20-0 so we formed a Christmas Tree
(the following week) with three at the back, Josh Dance in att-a-a-ck
Watch out Rangers, we’re on our way back.’
The momentum now in Wokingham’s favour, players poured forward in search of a second goal before half-time, leaving a huge expanse at the back which Reeves exploited on the counter-attack to make the score 2-1 at the break.
Evan, sidelined by spreadsheet for the first half, began the second half at full-back and immediately made a difference to the pattern of play, linking up particularly well with Connor Mulvaney down the left. Coach Michael’s post-match WhatsApp verdict made welcome reading: ‘Evan was brilliant when he went on, so composed with some great diagonal passes. He also won the ball back a lot for us.’
Then the floodgates opened: Josh found himself in space, controlled the ball and equalised before Evan threaded a ball through to Josh who squared it for Connor to fire into the top corner: 3-2. Evan then picked the ball up on the right and shot a long range, looping half volley into the corner as Reeves Rangers folded like an oily deck chair.
But what do you make of this? A strange intervention from the ref: after a shoelace stoppage – usually interpreted as valid: inevitable, even, given the age group – he turned on our coaches, the Mulvaneys. ‘It’s your time you’re wasting, you know!’ I’m not really sure why he decided to do that, or what he hoped to achieve. If a shoelace is untied, then it needs to be tied again – doesn’t it? At that point, there’s no point envisaging tighter initial knots. Or is there?
Anyway, there then followed a rare, whipped strike from Amelia Mulvaney and a tap in from Josh ‘Miroslav’ Dance to complete his hat-trick before Connor Mulvaney concluded proceedings with a venomous shot which clattered in off the underside of the bar, leaving the Wokingham faithful to file out with a jubilant version of ‘King of the Road’ and hopefully no illusions about the season ahead.
Wilderspool Causeway 