Wilderspool Causeway

AFC Whitchurch 5 Wokingham & Emmbrook 2 (C. Mulvaney, A. Mulvaney pen)

(Apologies to anyone from Whitchurch who may not recognise my somewhat subjective portrayal of their club and village. Match details are accurate.)

AFC Whitchurch were formed when their parent club, Whitchurch United, was bought by an American businessman who pumped millions of pounds into the club before floating it on the New York Stock Exchange. The Whitchurch fans were dissatisfied with this, fearing that investment would threaten their very essence, the nature of what it means to be ‘Whitchurch.’ Rather than expressing their love for grassroots football by choosing another local club to support – Pangbourne FC, Woodcote Caledonian Thistle, Goring Academicals, Streatley in-the-age-of-Aquarius FC – they decided to form their own club, AFC Whitchurch, who would wear gold and green to anchor them to the soul of South Oxfordshire.

As expected for a fan-owned club, Whitchurch packed one whole end of the Estadio da Luz, bouncing up and down before kick off to a raucous ‘Pogo if you love Whitchurch, pogo if you love Whitchurch…’ transitioning into a bitter ‘Where were you, where were you, where were you at Beale Park?’ No-one else knew what they were referring to, but it packed an irrelevant punch, that’s for sure. Discombobulated by the pageantry, Wokingham started the game as if in that most blissful of states: semi-consciousness. Reassuringly, Whitchurch scored within 1.3 seconds of kick off. They scored another in the next few seconds as our gloved and beanied brethren seemed much more focused on sartorial logistics than anything to do with the match proper.

Unfortunately, the pattern continued: Coach Michael is resolute in his insistence that skill, technique, fun and rotation are everything. We rotate so much that we’re all medicated; we’ve all got labyrinthitis. The goalkeeper changes four times per game. That’s the level of rotation. You can’t feel your fingers. They can’t feel their fingers. The Whitchurch supporters fall silent in pity as yet another dog’s breakfast of football management unfolds before them: the numbness of the Assistant Manager’s (me) five minute glove fitting, the manic sleeve inversions of the desperate. ‘You don’t know what you’re doing! You don’t know what you’re doing! You don’t know what you’re doing!’ It was best just to wave and move on.

Whitchurch scored again. And again. It was 4-0 before we’d even reached garment contentment. Now was the time for Mulvaney. Their experienced Irish coach said ‘Hey, dat nomber 4’s a good player now.’ Yes, he is. First he took on the whole team to make it 4-1, then he won a penalty which resulted in his cousin, Amelia Mulvaney, scoring her first goal of the season. Well done Amelia! Whitchurch then scored a sloppy goal before half time, which for us is merely a textile alteration window, the most dramatic weave being the sudden Pink Gloves of Connor Mulvaney. After the break, we laid siege to their goal. Evan controlled a cross first time, and shot just wide. Thanasie hit the post. We won another penalty, but missed.

As was predictable, the passionate yet precious souls of Whitchurch staged a protest 5 minutes before the end, bless them. The type of fans who invest their whole lives into a club always find something to complain about. The chanting had decreased in relevance as the game progressed: ‘Stand up if you hate Tidmarsh, stand up if you hate Tidmarsh’ and ‘We all dream of a house in Kidmore End, a house in Kidmore End, a house in Kidmore End’ were among the most notable. But events took a much stranger turn when 20 or so Whitchurch supporters walked on to the pitch with a banner calling for ‘Justice for Nettlebed Pete’ and sat down around the centre circle, laying the banner down in the middle. Coach Michael looked at me blankly and the 16 year-old ref was in way over his head. Ciara wondered over and asked me who Nettlebed Pete was. ‘We don’t know, Ciara’ said Michael in his booming Scouse tones, ‘But let’s just let it pass.’

But the people of the bend in the Thames just wouldn’t budge. Eventually we had to call on staff and stewards from the Goals Centre to gather to remove them. Within 10 minutes all manner of officials had gathered round and most fans eventually dispersed, apart from one lady who refused to move. St John’s Ambulance staff tried to sweet talk her off, but eventually she had to be lifted from the pitch, not without a final, piercing shriek of ‘PETE!!!!’ Our momentum was completely destroyed, and all we could hear were cries in solidarity with the clearly deranged: ‘We are Whitchurch, we are Whitchurch, we are Whitchurch from the Thames. We are Whitchurch, super Whitchurch, we are Whitchurch, stuff Cane End.’ They had made an impression, and won. They have a strong identity; we have a strong range of accessories.

That’s life and it was almost as feisty as the Stratfield Turgis v Sherfield on Loddon A33 derby, a real cauldron for the unkempt and over-rotated. Evan’s post match comment was typically tangential: ‘Dad, did you know that a long time ago, Drogba used to be in the top ten Didiers?’

February 13, 2016

AFC Whitchurch, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Twyford Comets v Wokingham and Emmbrook. Lokomotiv Stadion, Russia.

(n.b. due to the closeness of the game, the score has been withheld until the end. Evan’s post match interview is also there, so Route 1 here would be to skip. Route 2 will take you through the whole game/ build-up).

What is Twyford? As Assistant Manager for this game, part of my brief was to gauge the temperature of the village, to assess the culture and philosophy of its residents. The only way I know to determine this is to visit the chapel of Our Lady Astride the Crossroads and read the inscriptions on the green sacramental token bins therein. Only then can you gain a flavour of who or what abides in the orbit of Twyford, Central Berkshire’s ring doughnut, the centre of which is an absence, a crossroads. This week there is an appeal for the veterans of this floating world to be granted sufficient means ‘to visit Eastbourne or Weymouth.’ A rival bid is for a group who would like ‘maybe the odd Bingo night’, but my vote went to the Charvil Whatever who wanted to do their thing strictly within the realm of Charvil. So the question remains: what is Twyford?

Perhaps we’ll never find an answer. We do, however, know that an extremely irritating and single-minded nightmare of a human being lives there. Readers of previous reports may remember a lady who turned out in support of ‘Harrison’ when these teams last met. She was here again and in full, shameless voice: ‘Grapple with him, Harrison! Put your foot in there! Get her in a headlock! Pull her plaits off!’ From the dugout on the opposite side of the pitch I could hear her shrieking exhortations from the first minute to the last. To make matters worse, following a neat finish from Connor to put us in the lead, Harrison scored their first goal, taking it past three players before blasting it into the corner. Evan, starting up front, got into some excellent positions and had a few near misses before the game swung with seemingly terminal force in Twyford’s favour. Evan, now in goal, decided to pass the ball out to Amelia who miscued spectacularly, looping the ball back over Evan’s head and into the goal.

Twyford then scored another before half-time, this time through the oddly named ‘Andrew’. I’m not knocking the moniker in itself, but you do seldom hear it nowadays. Not many people introduce Baby Andy to the world. Does this signal yet another bewildering cultural difference between Wokingham and Twyford? I wouldn’t be surprised if Twyford’s ‘Evie quotient’ is also down somewhat in relation to other places, perhaps accounting for just 80% of girls’ names there as opposed to 95% elsewhere?

The second half was a nightmare and I was a jittery mess throughout, partly to do with an excess of filter coffee and partly because Coach Michael made me participate in the warm-up, running up and down and lifting my knees high in the air while wearing jeans and boots. Ridiculous. Harrison’s mum’s report would have identified her double, I’m sure, wondering who the prick in the warm-up was and why he paced up and down the touchline yelling nonsense all game. It’s because it was so painful. We battered them in terms of possession, territory and attacking thrust, but just could not finish.

Amelia played excellently in terms of her positioning as lone striker, carving out several opportunities for herself by finding space – it’s just that she narrowly missed every one of them. Connor Mulvaney was nullified by a detail their coach seemed to have put on him and it was impossible to find a breakthrough until, that is, we were awarded a penalty after a handball in the box. Coach Michael decided that Evan was the man for this, but he was jostled no end by envious teammates. Michael called out that he’d chosen Evan and that the decision was final. The ref said ‘Right, enough of this. Can the penalty taker put their hand up?’ Four hands shot up. Eventually, Evan had a clear run at the ball, the whistle sounded and he curled it high and to the left of the keeper and into the net.

So it was now 3-2 and we continued to exert relentless pressure, but Twyford’s defence was excellent. It looked like it was just one of those games; all that was left was a search for inner humanity, the resolve to walk past Harrison’s mum with one’s head down, mute. But that wouldn’t be necessary. Just as all hope appeared to be lost, and with about 30 seconds left, the ball fell to Mark Sexton who pelted it, lofting the ball high into the net, Steven Gerrard style. I couldn’t restrain myself from running onto the pitch and joining the celebrations, morphing the delirium into yelled instructions for the last seconds, shifting the indefatigable Jack Parry into defence for the final moments, during which they won a free kick. A goalmouth scramble ensued, as did my final injunction: ‘Just hoof it!’ Coach Michael was unimpressed: ‘Alex – ”Just hoof it?” – you can’t say that.’ Point taken, Michael.

After the game, Evan was interviewed about his penalty taking style and approach:

Interviewer: So tell me, Evan, did you decide where to place the ball for your penalty?

Evan: No, I just hit it.

Interviewer: That’s fine, I suppose, as long as you don’t hit it straight at the keeper!

Evan (concerned, sympathetic look on his face) : No, I wouldn’t have done that because he was wearing hearing aids.

The most considerate penalty taker of all time? That accolade probably goes to Robbie Fowler who deliberately missed a penalty he deemed to have been awarded unfairly. The most counterproductive hearing aid in the History of Twyford? The village’s most punishing humanitarian episode? We may never know.

Twford Comets 3 Wokingham and Emmbrook 3 (Mulvaney, Saynor pen. Sexton)

February 6, 2016

Twyford Comets, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Wokingham & Emmbrook Cougars 2 Wokingham & Emmbrook Oranges 5 (Mulvaney 4, Sexton) Silesian Arena

‘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.

January 30, 2016

Wokingham & Emmbrook
Burghfield Reds 3 Wokingham and Emmbrook 7 (Mulvaney 3, Parry 2, Sexton 2) Estadio da Luz, Lisbon

You have one of the biggest military arsenals in the world, an army of 690,000 and a logistics labour force of up to 12.6 million people, none of whom can particularly leave the country. What’s the next step for the loopy autocrat with the dodgy Barnet? A leaflet drop. South Korea. Pop down to Prontaprint. You can imagine the song going around in Kim’s head:

Monday left me broken,
Tuesday I was through with hoping,
Wednesday I popped down to the printers,
Thursday we’re pam-ph-let-ing.
Thank the stars it’s Friday,
Dropping a hydrogen bomb on Saturday,
Guess it’s to the barbers again on Sunday.
I’ll be shaving my rug.

Today’s game was all about preparation. Not exactly inspired by Kim Jong Un, but in his wake, a group of us thought ‘F it. Let’s leaflet Burghfield.’ Let’s absolutely flood them with pamphlets about Wokingham. Let’s overwhelm them with tracts. Let’s extol the virtues of Winnersh, the stagnant ponds of Emmbrook. Tell them about Crockhamwell Road in Woodley: the traffic calming measures of Arborfield. Let’s become New Wave Tractarians of Central Berkshire, befuddling minds with inventories of Molly Millars Lane warehouses and the iron curtain of the mind which separates Lower Earley from civilisation.

This game was won, if not entirely on the doorsteps of Burghfield and Burghfield Common, then certainly on the Forest School training pitch. After last week’s (frankly woeful) performance, coaches Michael and Peter spent most of the session subverting FA directives in their attempt to toughen the team up. You are not allowed to explicitly teach 6-year-olds how to tackle, but you are allowed to model how to ‘press’ and ‘close down’ the opposition.

The team followed this plan to the letter, proving my beanie hat theory to be a bit of a red herring. The problem with not being able to tackle, though, is that you end up fouling. After Connor guided us to a 2 goal lead, Jack Parry received a STRAIGHT RED CARD for felling a country bumpkin who was through on goal. Except he didn’t get a red card because just as you’re not allowed to tackle, you’re also not allowed to be punished for fouling. This leads to an absurd situation in which almost anything goes, with players lunging in ‘all over the shop’, as my dad would say. So Jack lived on, and went on to score 2 goals of his own. Their bedraggled manager seemed upset before the game had even started (misfiring tractor? Udder problems?) and left the sanctuary of his urban technical area to prowl around the pitch in justified disgust. Fittingly, they scored from the resulting free kick. The foul was an accident, but maybe a sin bin should be introduced: 5 minutes out as a balm for the aggrieved.

Wokingham and Emmbrook were relentless. Evan- off colour with asthma and shinpad deprivation- did enough Cruyff turns and Jenas jinks to win the Skills Trophy, but it was really the drive and all-consuming passion of Connor, Mark, Ciara, Jack and Amelia which won the day: Amelia even managed to successfully execute a backheel pass across our own six yard line to get the keeper out of trouble at one point. Everything they tried seemed to work. A lot of credit has to go to coaches Michael and Peter Mulvaney for identifying last week’s problems and arriving at training with a clear strategy that the players were able to understand and then execute in the game. Sorry Burghfield, but that’s life in the metropolis. As Neil Hannon once recommended: ‘Wise up little souls. Join the doomed army. Fight the good fight. Wage the unwinnable war. Elegance against ignorance. Difference against indifference. Wit against shit.’

Coach Michael’s Man of the Match speech was slightly puzzling though. He said ‘Mark, you reminded me of yourself.’ Deep, but maybe a little cryptic, a little backhanded for a six-year-old?

January 23, 2016

Burghfield Reds, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Reeves Rangers Shepherds 14 Wokingham and Emmbrook Oranges 3 (Parry 2, Mulvaney). Olympiastadion, Berlin.

Apparently, Wokingham and Emmbrook are an ‘FA Charter Club.’ This means that on Evan’s sleeve there is a picture of England’s Three Lions alongside the Golden Arches of McDonald’s. Small countries such as Switzerland and Uruguay produce better players than we do. Is there any reason why?

This was a local derby against the QPR of Wokingham. They were formed in 1975 by a QPR fan called Terry who lived on Reeves Way, and their shirt is a blue and white hooped effort in honour of the shambolic outfit from Shepherd’s Bush. I’m sure Terry would be proud of how the club has progressed, as they are now also an FA Charter club, which means that they too have a right to bear the sacred lions and arches on their arms.

Last week was a story of accursed beanie hats, and this week I was horrified to see a variety of colourful thermal leggings as Wokingham conducted their perfectly calibrated warm up. As mentioned last week, warmth should be generated from within, as far as possible. Granted, it was a cold morning, but this really was an embarrassment and all the Wokingham fans could do was gently send the scenario up with some adapted verses of Dead End Street:

On a cold and frosty morning,
Wipe my eyes and stop me yawning.
And my feet are nearly frozen,
Boil the tea and put some toast on.

What are we living for?
A nailed-on spanking from a fake QPR?
No chance to emigrate,
Cath Kidston leggings worn by our Number 8!

Quite frankly, I wasn’t in the mood for this. I wasn’t ‘feeling it’, as they say: the leggings, the beanies, the QPR connection, the forgotten gloves, the near certainty of defeat having seen our worst goalkeeper robed up to start the game between the sticks. I was ready to snap before we’d even started. Sure enough, within 1.3 seconds of kick-off, Reeves Rangers put the ball past an utterly unresponsive goalkeeper. A few seconds later, they scored from a throw-in: this is not permitted and will not stand! ‘Why have you given that, ref?’ I yelled, in contravention of the FA Charter (which, let’s face it, was fatally undermined from the moment they got in bed with Ronald McDonald). Unusually, the ref decided to answer, apportioning the blame to our keeper who apparently was supposed to know that if they left the ball without touching it at all, the goal wouldn’t have stood. Give me strength. Could the ref not see that this was already the most casual of cakewalks? The game was over.

Evan started in defence, looking about as comfortable as Donald Trump at a human rights convention as Queens Park Attendant after Queens Park Ranger skipped past him to effortlessly slot the ball home. Another dad said that Evan kept getting caught in possession due to his lack of confidence in the keeper. There was possibly some truth in this, or possibly he was just trying to help me feel better. Whichever way you look at it, the first half was an unmitigated disaster from which it would be impossible to recover.

To add insult to injury, the Reeves Rangers coaches decided that a half-time team talk wasn’t for them. They obviously felt too far ahead to issue any instructions whatsoever. They didn’t feel the need to warn against complacency; they didn’t see fit to encourage good sportsmanship or grace in victory. Instead, they allowed their charges to rampage around the pitch, disturbing the downcast Wokingham players as they sought to listen to Michael and Peter’s pick-me-up messages. I was reminded of a motto from Martyn Joseph’s Ryder Cup song: ‘To Lose with Honour and Win with Empathy.’ A good one to remember, perhaps, and in fact the shepherds did need to stay focused because Wokingham are always stronger in the second half.

Each of Wokingham’s goals were forced over the line from a yard out, like rugby tries.This was encouraging; they were going to go down fighting. The best of these resulted from Evan picking up the ball in an advanced position, where he’s more comfortable, taking it past a defender and threading a well-weighted ball through to Connor Mulvaney who scrambled it over the line after an initial save. The other two goals were courtesy of Jack Parry’s irrepressible tenacity. He’s like the figure in the Johnny Cash song: ‘You could stand me up at the gates of hell, but I won’t back down. I will stand my ground.’ At the end, his dad, a fellow Emmbrook pedagogue, said that it was the most depressed he had ever felt after a football match.

So there were some encouraging signs in the Woodley wasteland, but they were difficult to find. We were cheered up no end after the game, however, by the surprise arrival of Steve, Emma, Connie and Charlie, whose Maidenhead Dolphins team were up against Shinfield Rangers. Big up to you for the season!

January 16, 2016

Reeves Rangers Shepherds, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Marlow Royals 12 Wokingham and Emmbrook 6 (Mulvaney 3, Saynor 2, Parry) Amsterdam Arena.

i.m. Jo Trott

This is a difficult report to write. Jo took a great interest in Evan’s football and is one of the few people for whom we consciously play and write. That won’t change.

Today we were up against a team we had never faced before, a team from the affluent Chelsea Belt whose fans came bedecked in the most luxurious outdoor clobber available to man, as if they were expecting at any moment to be scooped up by private jet for an Esquire fashion shoot in the Pyrenees or by Lake Geneva. Woodley wasn’t really the place for them. Their pre-match banter was arcane, esoteric and difficult to latch on to. Oh no, it wasn’t actually: despite the most outlandish sartorial flair, it consisted of a series of mock/cock-er-nee standards:

‘Your boys done well to be fair.’
‘Yeah he’s a lovely fella mate. Diamond.’
‘Brilliant, yeah. Lovely jubbly mate. Gutted, I was.’
‘Lovely guy.’
‘Great fella’
‘Lovely stuff.’
Lovely.’
‘Bang on, mate.’
‘Yeah.’

I wondered who the source of all this loveliness was. Jose Mourinho, presumably. I looked down at my supermarket jeans, boots inherited a few years ago and hoodie from a discontinued high school drama called ‘Britannia High’ and thought…well I didn’t know what to think actually so I left the catalogue boys to their endearing London-based banter and watched from a wet and lonely vantage point, not noticing through the drizzle that my friends in the Wokingham and Emmbrook crew were amassed behind the railings at the opposite end of the pitch: huddled, dishevelled and half South African.

Equally clueless and ill-positioned, Wokingham spent the first few minutes (with Evan on the bench, I might add), bumbling around in the club beanie hats which had been misguidedly issued before the game. They looked brilliant in the warm up. I deleted sacred videos in a doomed attempt to free up space on my phone to capture them, but they were simply not right for the match. Anything which makes the experience more comfortable should be left in the bag, surely. That’s for after the match. When you’re under pressure, you need to generate the warmth from the effort you put in; if you start off freezing, being made warm artificially just won’t help you. On Thursday, Evan came home and said that during the Great Fire of London, ‘Samuel Pepys buried Parmesan, wine and his papers’ in the ground. In a strange moment as an 18-year-old, I bought a hardback biography of Samuel Pepys which I never read. I hurried to the index, but there was no mention of the cheese in question. Still, is it not a similar principle? In times of pressure, get rid of every extraneous encumbrance and rely on fight and ingenuity to survive: a slingshot. Bury your Parmesan.

Wokingham and Emmbrook drifted about meaninglessly while Marlow, in their Chelsea-style blue shirts and Chelsea-inflected accents, carved us apart with ease and alacrity, cruising into an unassailable 4-0 lead in no time at all. Things went from bad to worse and by half time it was 8-1, with only a deflected shot from Jack Parry for the coaches to seize on by way of consolation during the team talk. Without wishing to be too critical, perhaps the first good decision of the day was to put Evan and Connor on the pitch at the same time. Soon after the whistle, Evan ran down the left flank and hit a brilliant left-footed lob over the keeper. A couple of minutes later he found a bit of space at the edge of the box and side-footed the ball into the corner before Connor seized the initiative, scoring a hat-trick- including an outstanding left-footed effort from range- as Marlow, bereft of subs, began to tire. This is when the Marlow coach began to earn his money.

Jurgen Klopp currently has a hamstring crisis to deal with at Liverpool; not only that, he has to engage with Sam Silly Sausage of Sunderland in the media. But at least Klopp’s problems are real. In typical Chelsea style, Marlow began to invent problems, skilfully arresting Wokingham’s progress and momentum. Suddenly, players were hitting the floor. I heard Evan lash out at one after a corner: ‘You’re just on the floor because you want a penalty.’ Suddenly, the goalkeeper had a problem and it was crucial for the coach to enter the fray for some much needed ‘glove adjustment time.’

Neither the problems, nor the time, really existed. During a New Year’s Eve training session I told Evan that we’d be going home ‘in a minute.’ He replied ‘Is that a real minute or a notional minute?’ I had introduced him to the idea of a ‘notional minute’ because of his tendency to count to sixty when told something will happen ‘in a minute.’ Surely it’s good to learn that words are often devoid of content, have pragmatic rather than literal meaning and are often empty signs designed to guide you towards some kind of holding pen while adults decide what to do. So if the ref was asked if he was going to add time on due to stoppages, he would have made the best noises he could but the fact was that the Amsterdam Arena had to be evacuated by 10:30. Notional minutes were in abundance. I have since tried to introduce the idea of a ‘notional biscuit’ too, but that hasn’t been quite so successful.

Marlow were soon able to find a rhythm of their own and score a few more goals, sending their well groomed acolytes back to Buckinghamshire with the fairly innocuous-seeming pride they arrived with, as well as a few shots across the bow courtesy of Evan and Connor.

January 9, 2016

Jo Trott, Marlow Royals, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Caversham Trents 0 Wokingham and Emmbrook 11 (eleven) Mulvaney 3, Saynor 3, Dance 2, Zanthoulis 1, Parry 1, Hood (og)

N.B. If planning to read this, you might want to make yourself comfortable as it’s an end of year extended edit.

Vanilla latte lid crisis averted, we arrived at Woodley Goals Centre for yet another battle of North v South, but this time with a difference: the Trents not only claim Caversham and North Reading as their own, but also vast swathes of the Midlands, stretching from Biddulph Moor in Staffordshire to the six towns of the Potteries and through the Nottingham Home Sluices to the fringes of Scunthorpe and the North Sea. Not only does this team claim an outrageous geographical area, but also a literary prestige derived from the words of Henry Hotspur in Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1: ‘See how this river comes me cranking in, and cuts me from the best of all my land a huge half-moon, a monstrous cantle out. I’ll have the current in this place damm’d up; and here the smug and silver Trent shall run in a new channel, fair and evenly; it shall not wind with such a deep indent, to rob me of so rich a bottom here.’

Perhaps the weight of history and culture acted as an albatross around their necks, for the Trents failed to orchestrate anything of meaning or coherence in the opening exchanges of the game, thwarted by Wokingham’s high pressing style and that low, brooding Woodley sky. They had the haircuts; they had the boots. They had half the country implicated in their name. But did they have the wherewithal to resist Mulvaney, Mulvaney, Dance, Saynor, Sexton, Parry, Xanthoulis and Butler (those future Berkshire lawyers)? They looked about as comfortable as Paul Trott opening up for George Osborne at the Conservative Party Conference, or sharing a pint with Nigel Farage at the Duke of Wellington. The first half was all but lost to meaninglessness as the ref seemed to drift about in a parallel dimension, gesturing aimlessly and struggling to elicit sound from his central implement, no matter how hard he blew.

The signs were good, however, for this was a game selected by Gags for attendance and it seemed unlikely that he would fail to weave his observational magic. Which game did he pick as his first Fulham match of the season? Fulham 4 QPR 0. Which game did mere mortals such as myself pick? A draw against Cardiff. Risk, table tennis, Monopoly, Scrabble, Pictionary, Snakes and Ladders, Tiddlywinks? Not gonna happen. The Divine Comedy summed it up nicely: ‘Can you beat your dad at chess? It’s harder than you think. Sit him down at Christmas, turn the TV off, give him lots of chocolates and a drink and he might give you a match and when you’ve been duly dispatched he will laugh Ha ha ha And you’ll say, “one more game.”

My explanation of how well Evan played last week was superfluous. Gags would have worked it out before the opening credits had faded and so, with a sense of predetermined fortune, the first significant moment in the game was Evan seizing upon a loose ball, controlling it with one touch and slamming it into the corner: 1-0. ‘I see what you mean’, said Gags.

After that, we were riding the Severn bore while they were drifting into the Humber. Josh Dance went steaming into challenges all over the pitch, bending the game to his will and scoring 2 before half time. Mulvaney added a delicate left-footed effort and the score was 4-0 at the break. Wokingham and Emmbrook had never kept a clean sheet for an entire half before. With a 4 goal lead, Coach Michael might have been forgiven for easing up on the teamtalk a little bit: no way. He was on their level, pointing, gesticulating and sweeping his hand back and forth as if he was Rafa Benitez calling his children in from the sea.

With Wokingham on the front foot again, they were soon awarded a free kick. Please Evan, do your stuff with Gags and Joe here. With a nonchalant movement of the arm, he waved Mark Sexton away and began his measured approach to the ball, hitting it with verve above the height of the bar before watching it dip into the top corner for an outstanding goal: 5-0. The intensity remained. Jack Parry, fresh from spells in goal and on the bench, ran diagonally past two players and was shoved slightly before slotting in an excellent goal. Rather than succumbing to euphoria, however, he ran the length of the pitch to the parents congregated behind the opposite goal and with a manic look yelled ‘Dad, that boy’s a FOULER! He pulled my shirt!’ As Joe noted, this is a boy whose life is clearly orientated towards higher purposes: those of justice in the game along with all the nobler qualities open to human aspiration. We salute him for that.

Despite the goals continuing to flow, there was a tragic moment in the game. Right near the end, Amelia Mulvaney burst through and shot; the keeper saved it but the ball hit the post and rolled back across the line, appearing- to Amelia- to cross it. She ran to Coach Michael, her dad, throwing herself into his arms in celebration. The goal, however, was disallowed and Amelia was broken for that moment: cue more waterworks than the River Trent could contain. After the game, with Caversham packed back off to the Potteries, a special moment was enjoyed by all. Connor and Amelia crossed hands to receive a joint share in the Man of the Match wristband in what was a fitting end to an excellent performance and a brilliant way to sign off for the Christmas break.

December 12, 2015

Caversham Trents, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Westwood Wanderers Colts U7s 8 Wokingham and Emmbrook U7s 5 (Mulvaney 2, Saynor 2, Sexton)

Rehabilitation almost complete, I was back in the dugout as assistant manager for the visit of Westwood Wanderers to the Maracana. With everyone at a low ebb, it’s heartening to see signs of life where possible. As Neil Hannon crooned: ‘If you’re wondering why this tired old world sometimes seems brand new: it’s you.’ As we took to the field, it wasn’t long before events took their usual turn towards the bizarre, lifting the spirits. A somewhat weakened line-up began the game but defended with passion and effort; still, it wasn’t long before the Woodland Folk scored their first goal, adding 3 more in the ensuing 5 minutes with Mulvaney and Saynor bench bound.

The source of the oddness, to be frank, was the referee. The lads who turn out to officiate on these cold mornings deserve a lot of credit, but this was the kind of chap who when asked to remove a pen from their pencil case (in a school, for example), looks at you as if you’re probably addressing them in Hindi and are to be pitied. In a complete world of his own, he made wrong call after wrong call, missed several clear fouls and sometimes didn’t bother to give throw-ins at all. I was reminded of a line from The Archers this week: ‘Jane doesn’t need a mentor. She needs a brain transplant.’

With Mulvaney back on the pitch, things soon improved for the Satsumas as the Woodlanders’ direct and combative players struggled to legislate for the skill of Connor, who scored one himself and opened up the space for Mark Sexton to add another. The half time team talk centred on various clothing alterations and instructions from Coach Peter for Evan along the lines of a child friendly ‘Don’t piss about with it, son; control it, use your skill if you need to and shoot.’ 5 minutes in, the ball was put through to Evan and just inside their half, he knocked it slightly to the right and then hammered it across the goal to make the score 4:3.

Unfortunately, Westwood Glen then scored two very good goals themselves before a ludicrous ‘sleeve stoppage.’ Somehow, a Woodlander contrived to get their hand stuck within their sleeve, and it wouldn’t emerge from the typically and logically designed hand liberation gap. Do you imagine that the ref was able to offer much support with this? I thought not. Watching them wobble about trying to get the hand through made you wonder exactly what had become of man at this stage of our process.

Controlling the pace of the game with this sleeve business, Wanderers then managed to score again and the noise level really grew. As we sought to issue instructions to the players, I was reminded of trying to teach after each day’s break time Seagull Festival. There really are a lot of seagulls in Winnersh at times.
‘Where the hell did all these seagulls come from?’
‘Maybe they were bussed in from Brighton, sir.’
Pity the next driver if that was the case. And what would have happened when they stopped at the services? Would they have been allowed out to stretch their wings?

With the game pretty much out of sight, Evan managed to score from a corner, curling it in with the help of some dodgy goalkeeping. He was rewarded with the ‘Skill Trophy’ (awarded by Peter, of course), while I gave the Man of the Match wristband to Mark Sexton. However, we did both admit afterwards that our minds had gone a bit iffy when giving these things out. I might criticise the ref, but I think a little bit of responsibility can cause the mind to go weird, honestly. Before the game, Evan said ‘I want to live in Manchester because there’s not much wars there and I already understand their language.’ Not sure a conurbation straddling Lancashire and Cheshire was the place to do it, but it was definitely time to go and sleep this life off for a bit.

December 5, 2015

Westwood Wanderers Colts, Wokingham & Emmbrook
Caversham Kites 3 Wokingham and Emmbrook 6 (Mulvaney 3 Butler 1 Saynor 1 Zanthoulis 1)

This was one of those games in which Cheerios played an essential part: in their original form, variations and own-brand imitations. As Ciara raced through to score the opening goal, someone made an enquiry of her dad as to what she had for breakfast. Honey Nut Cheerios. Prior to the game, a mini conference was convened in the bar of the ferry, at which Ciara’s dad was absent. ‘What did you have for breakfast, Evan?’ asked Coach Michael in his booming Scouse tones. ‘Half a milky bar’ replied Evan, at a distinct tangent to the truth. I added that he’d also had Shreddies. ‘With warm milk or cold, Evan?’ asked Coach Peter calmly and with almost a hint of resignation. ‘And did you warm the milk up in the microwave or the pan, Evan?’ added Michael, strongly. Microwave. It transpired that only Thanasie, animated by toast, opted for a non-cereal pathway, with Connor going for straight-down-the-line Cheerios and Jack fuelled by cheerios with a small c, in their Morrison’s format.

Breakfast conversation over, we took to the Amsterdam Arena to engage in yet another North v South battle of mid-Berkshire with Caversham, this time in their ‘Caversham Kites’ manifestation. In the car park, their coach seemed perky. Apparently he had done some scouting on us and was quite confident of a win, if I understood him correctly. I also ventured over the bridge to test the temperature of Caversham Heights, the heartland of their operations. Emerging from a sideroom of The Grosvenor to an almost empty pub, the words of Michael Stipe came through the speakers: ‘Jesus loves me fine, and your words fall flat this time.’

Soon after Ciara’s opener, there was a bit of needle in the crowd. One of their shaven-headed (albeit to ameliorate the effects of baldness) supporters decided to trespass onto the pitch. Their goalkeeper took a goal kick and managed to score an own goal. ‘Just let him take it again ref. it’s a goal kick’ said the villager. I don’t understand how the ref managed to twist the rules so far that he was able to accommodate this statement, but somehow he did. No goal. The game then turned in the Kites’ favour and they hit back with two goals before half-time.

There’s a phrase which is repeated on Gardeners’ Question Time by the likes of Bunny Guinness, Chris Beardshaw and Anne Swithinbank: ‘Plant your earlies late and your lates early.’ I noted it down because I really wanted to shoehorn it into this report somehow. Well, Thanasie made an early run, but he made it late in the sense that it was spontaneous, an unpremeditated decision to break out of defence; it wasn’t practised. Evan put a perfectly weighted ball through to him and he scored: 2-2. Conversely, you can plant the idea of a late run early because late runs are known to be effective and are often rehearsed on the training ground. Another comment was ‘I inherited a tree peony, but I inherited it in the wrong place.’ That’s a difficult one to interpret. A further question related to where to re-pot a flowering gerbera: again, not an idea which particularly works in footballing terms.

Something which does work in footballing terms, however, is Connor Mulvaney. He scored three goals in the second half, one of which was an outstanding left footed shot which curled over the keeper and into the top corner. Evan added a neat finish and although the Kites pulled one back, justice was done in the end. However, I had to be careful not to stress the injustices of the game too strongly to Evan. I had to ensure he knew that our quarrel with Caversham was not ideological or motivated by religious or political differences. The other day, Evan, in a sort of mini role play, said in a lighthearted voice: ‘I’m a Catholic. I’m going to kill the Queen.’ Guess which aspect of history they had been taught earlier this month? How far from sanity do you have to migrate in order to cast Catholics as history’s primary aggressors? Time to ditch this topic, surely.

On the Chiswick Flyover after the game, he said: ‘Will we be anywhere near the houses of parliament? What’s going to happen there?’ I didn’t feel it appropriate to show him my one picture of politicians (Jeremy Corbyn and Gerry Adams out larging it), so just said it was a load of men and women arguing, a bit like on your school council but less civilised. This seemed to placate him, but he did burst into tears twice during Fulham v Preston because ‘the ref’s only being fair to them and not to us’ (true). I’m not really sure how to answer these points, particularly when they seem both true and part of a trend, so can only end with a couple of nods to people with great wisdom, humour and sanity who were in our thoughts today. Chris Doughty was in our thoughts because we chatted with him at the petrol station opposite Loddon Bridge Road- top lad. Jo Trott was in our thoughts because we hope you’re feeling better this weekend and dedicate you the victory!

November 28, 2015

Caversham Kites
Wokingham and Emmbrook U7’s 4 Caversham Arrows 8 (Mulvaney 2, Sexton, Parry) BYDL Cup Round 2

After a somewhat questionable managerial debut two weeks ago, I was summoned to a downstairs room of The Wokingham Masonic Centre to meet with officials from the upper echelons of the Wokingham and Emmbrook hierarchy. There was possibly nothing odd in that, given recent cuts to council budgets and a shortage of meeting space, but as my co-manager and I took our places among the caped brethren it soon became clear that the 20-1 defeat we presided over had not gone down too well, rousing the powers that be from their lodge-based slumber.

They were more than mildly shipped off, and as we were led towards the pillar of Boaz to bow in penitence- which we did not- they explained to us in complex pigpen cipher that, basically, we are a pair of morons. We have brought the town into disrepute, will now be tracked in perpetuity and will not be admitted to future games for an indefinite period. This makes today’s report quite tricky as once Evan was dropped off, I was left to retreat to Bulmershe Water Tower to watch what I could through binoculars and rely on text updates from the ever faithful Joe and Lewis Walker.

We were up against a team called ‘Caversham Arrows’ from an exotic region north of the River Thames I’m not entirely familiar with where you can go for a drink at The Griffin, The Moderation, The Alto Lounge, The Grosvenor, The Clifton Arms, The Crown on the Bridge, The Island, The Prince of Wales, The White Horse, The Gardeners’ Arms or- if you prefer Wetherspoon’s- The Baron Cadogan. If you’re not careful in Caversham Heights, you’ll end up in Mapledurham or Woodcote- the outskirts of Oxford, even. While Lower Caversham has a slightly grittier reputation, don’t be fooled by the upper area’s appearance of bucolic charm. You never know what goes on behind those net curtains, the pills that are popped, the barrenness of the cultural desert trudged through every day.

So these boys come from a different place, a place which no-one has been to. From what I can gather of the game, they scored WITHIN a second, and added 3 more very quickly. In the water tower, Text 1 read: ‘5 mins gone, 0-4. Mulvaney on.’ ‘Mulvaney on’ meant Mulvaney had been off- and I was sitting there in wet jeans and trainers, seething. How can you start a game without Connor Mulvaney? How can you set up a meeting with local freemasons for the people who helped you out, and then leave Connor Mulvaney- your own son and nephew- on the bench? Evan’s really great, Mark’s great- they all contribute in different ways, sometimes outstandingly. But Connor tends to be beyond great. He’s a Glen Campbell among Noel Gallaghers. You do not leave Glen Campbell on the bench, even if he has Alzheimer’s. Glen Campbell needs to be on the pitch, playing. Noel Gallagher isn’t fit to tie his shoelaces, isn’t fit to wipe his arse. Text 2: ‘Half-time 5-4 down. Mulvaney’s turned it.’ Obviously! Yes Connor, we’re back in the game son!

In the second half I was able to find a slightly better vantage point to the side of the tower, but could still only see blobs of red and orange, and then one blob of orange and several blobs of red. It was hard to work out what was going on, but then suddenly I heard a roar and saw the orange blob advance with a cry of ‘CHARGE!’ In Under 7’s football, the opposing team have to wait on the halfway line to allow the goalkeeper to roll the ball out to the defenders. This is supposed to cultivate a passing game and reduce the pressure on defenders. However, Wokingham and Emmbrook found a way around this by waiting on the halfway line and then re-enacting the Charge of the Light Brigade whenever the keeper released it. Even from a distance, I could sense the hilarity this provoked, though it was ultimately unsuccessful as a strategy. Final text: ‘8-4 final score, councillor gone, come back in for the team talk.’ I’m glad I did because Evan was awarded Man of the Match, apparently having pulled the strings in midfield to engineer an- albeit abortive- comeback, executing some tricky skills along the way to pick up the trophy.

November 14, 2015

Caversham Arrows