Norsemen FC

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2011-10-14T02:19:00.000-07:00

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Old Salesians FC vs Norsemen FC

2011-09-20T06:41:00.000-07:00

Old Salesians FC vs Norsemen FC

Saturday 17^th September

Ewell

15:00

Norsemen profit from late summer sales

Dear Diary,

Another Saturday and another game of footy. Pretty much the same routine as last week. Thomas and Lou were away, so I had the run of the flat. Watched the rugby in my pants. Had a continental breakfast of Pain au choloat with jam, muffins and a cup of tea. Bloody lovely it was.

So….. managed to plan ahead today and have an early shower and packed my bag. NRC sorted his train times out this week so that we would arrive at the ground only an hour before the game. This meant I could take my time in getting to Liverpool St to meet Gavin. Gavin wasn’t wearing his white carnation as promised, so I struggled to locate him on the tube. Luckily the tube was empty so I managed to spot him. We had a brief chat about our mid week activities and then invented a very good game. For some reason two people had carelessly left Argos supplements on the tube seats. Why would people give up such good toilet literature?

Anyway, Gavin and myself took an Argos magazine each and looked for the worst thing under £10. Now considering how rubbish Argos is, they didn’t have many products under £10. This meant a lot of frantic page flicking in order to find the £10 products first. Luckily for me, Gavin has fat fingers and spent a lot of the time turning two pages at once. The winning choice was a copy of Stacey Solomons autobiography at £9.99. To me that book is over priced by £9.98. Good luck with shifting those Mr Argos.

Sadly the game had to end when we got to Waterloo. We had 15 minutes to spare before the train left so we went to buy some food from M&S. Gavin gave me a speech about how bad pasta is for you and I should just be eating plain bread and other boring foods. I ignored him and bought some pasta. He bought some apple bread and a yoghurt. What a g@y......... We get on the train and then meet the others minus Weeroy, Thomas, Phil and Mark on the train. Mark was running late and Phil stayed behind to wait for him and Weeroy and Thomas had their respective whips.

Bit of banter flying about on the train. Most of it aimed at the gaffer and Ossie. Ossie got ribbed about his first game for Norsemen and the horrible error he made for the oppo to score. The gaffer was ribbed about a few things. James asked for a bit of Gavin’s apple loaf and Gavin made a cheap comment about the gaffer’s timber issues. James reacted negatively to Gavin’s mean words and decided against having a bit of bread.

We eventually get to Ewell and disembark the train. Hempsey makes sure everyone beeps out with their oyster. Even when off duty he is still a bloody jobs worth….. We then follow the leader (Hempsey I think) to the Salesians ground. We arrive to glorious sunshine and a very nice pitch. The only problem with Salesians ground are the lack of hot water and the tree over the pitch in the far corner. Those points aside, Salesians is a very nice club.

So we go in to change. A member of Salesians walks into the changing room and informs us the boiler has broken so we will have to have cold showers. Cocky Joe then pipes up and says “do we get a complimentary jug then?” The man doesn't even humor Joseph. Instead he tells Joe to “watch his cheek”. Joe was quiet after that. I think that is what is known as a 'mugging off'.

Luckily I am really childish and easily excited, so I get changed first and run outside to kick the ball at the goal on my own. Because if this I am not involved in the conversation of “should we take our bags outside?” The verdict was to take them out; after all it was a nice day. Nobody bothered to take my bag out. Cheers guys. I will come back to this later.

So we line up as follows:

GK Anthony (New recruit)

LB Muzza

RB Ossie

CB Ballers

CB Tajae

LM Hempsey

RM Morais

CM TT

CM Tadd

CF Reg

CF Weeroy

SUBS

Thomas

Mark

Morris

At 3.00pm we kick off. Again Norsemen start slow. I'm not sure if we started slow, or if Salesians just started very quickly. The first 10 minutes were dominated by Salesians possession. They move the ball around with a lot of confidence and purpose just like Nottsborough did the week before. Salesians have a strong team all over the park, unlike teams in the lower divisions that would have a weakness somewhere in the team. The main difference in the leagues, apart from the quality of players is the movement off of the ball. The ball hardly stops and this gives you no time to stop and catch your breath. I'm not sure if Salesians aren't fully match fit yet, but after about 20 minutes of attacking the Norsemen goal, with only one real chance being created, they took their foot of the gas. This allowed Norsemen to get some possession under their belt and show what they can do with the ball. Two or three times Weeroy was released on goal, only to shoot at the keeper. I think the game vs Cockfosters on the Thursday hadn’t been kind to Leroy. For once his shooting looked tired. A fresh Leroy would have bagged a brace in the 1^st half. As usual though Reg and Leroy put in good shifts upfront, defending from the top. This work rate is part of the successful season Norsemen enjoyed last year. About 25 minutes into the half the heavens properly opened and to say we got drenched was an understatement. I had to change my shorts after half an hour as somebody had pinched the drawstring and they kept falling down from being so wet. Mark kindly gave up his shorts for me. What a lovely bloke!

Back to the bag situation. Because nobody bothered to bring my bag out, my bag was nice and dry in the changing room and everyone else’s bag's got drenched. Serves them right for being selfish! We go back in at half time and everyone moans about their wet stuff. I just sit there looking smug and listen to what James has to say. We are playing well and had the better chances in the first half, so just more of the same is what James asked for.

We trot back out as the conditions in the changing room became a little too close for comfort after Joseph dropped what can only be described as a couple of Hiroshima’s…….

No changes made at half time so we get into our little positions and await the ref’s whistle. Two quick points I missed from the first half, Tadd for the first time didn’t win one header (this really got to him as he isn’t use to it) and we had linesmen this week.

The game re-starts and Salesians start positively. TT’s raking ball out to Gav Morais was blocked from kick off and Norsemen were put instantly under pressure. If the ball hadn’t been intercepted then I am near on 99% sure Gavin would have scored.

Norsemen started the 2^nd half with an air of belief that they could get something from the game and on the 60 minute mark their constant hard work paid dividends. From a Muzza corner, Tadd won his first header of the afternoon and managed to pick out Gavin on the 6 yard box. Gavin swiveled like a ballerina and lashed the ball home. Yesssssssssss. We go nuts and take the lead. Old Salesians 0 – 1 Norsemen.

After the goal went in Norsemen grew in confidence and started to string some nice play together. Tadd, TT and Hempsey combined down the left hand side, only to see TT’s wild shot skew horribly wide. Shortly after this Norsemen increased their lead. Some good pressure on the right side of the pitch saw the ball fall to Leroy’s feet. Leroy spotted the run of a Norsemen shirt and slotted the ball through. Who was it you ask? Only super bloody Tajae. The Salesians defence cried for off-side, however we all know to play to the whistle. Tajae was 1 on 1 with the keeper, somewhere he doesn’t normally find himself. Did he slot it past the keeper? No. Did he round the keeper and slot the ball into the empty net then? No. Did Tajae give the keeper the eyes and then chip the keeper? Yes, that is what Tajae did. I think he may have miss hit it, however Tajae gives me his word he meant to do that. Tajae then ran over to the corner flag and held out his arms, ready to be lifted in glory. I seemed to be the only player to bother with the celebration. Still we had fun over by the corner flag. Old Salesians 0 – 2 Norsemen.

Salesians started to rally after the 2^nd goal was scored and started to get back on top of the game. However Norsemen’s fighting mentality well and truly kicked in at this point and we offered Salesians no room to breathe. Many a ball was put into the Norsemen box in the last 15 minutes, however due to a combination of them being rushed and Norsemen’s defending, nothing came of the possession. At the final whistle Norsemen were to be fair the deserved winners of the game. Again I think Salesians were shocked at Norsemen’s work ethic, just as Nottsborough were the week before. Norsemen won the lower division the year before with the same mentality. We have plenty of ball players, but our team spirit and abundance of energy seems to be something that Dan Ashley’s “super 6” don’t like.

We leave the pitch buzzing again. This is of course until it dawns on us that we now have to have cold showers. Reg doesn’t mind so much as he went to a private school. He was use to the cold showers. Some of the more precious players decided against the cold water and would wait until they got home to get clean. We tried to come up with a song for our new Weeroy however nothing rhymes with Tajae. Tajae tried to sing one himself but couldn’t think of an actual song either. His attempt at singing his own name was a good effort, but all in vein. We go and get our meal of two sausages, chips, beans and a bread roll and then sit down to have a chat in the club house. Hempsey said he had just called Cashley and that Cashley sounded very surprised about our result. I think most clubs have us down as just being here to make up the numbers this year!

We then all head back to the train station to head back into London for a couple of cheeky ones. Muzza and Tadd run off to the off licence to get some travel beers, only to return empty handed. They said there was no off licence; however to pikey kids at the station mug them both off by laughing and telling them it was 50 meters further from where they had run. Well done Tadd and Muzza. We all get on the train beer less. We lose Ballers, Tadd and Anthony at Vauxhall. The rest of head to the glamour of the Waterloo Weatherspoons where we bump into EBOG’s. Tadd makes small talk with a couple of them whilst we sit down and get drunk.

Now I don’t normally like to point the finger, but for this I think I am going to have to. Whilst sitting down and enjoying a pint of beer, my nose was violated more than once by a very high pitched and stinging smell of egg. Somebody had some serious issues last Saturday. Despite my displeasure, my spirits remained high due to the table next to ours being populated by a family which included grandparents. The look on the grandmother’s face when she caught a whiff of the rotten egg was priceless. Now the finger pointing has to come in when Phil, Muzza, Joe and James headed off early. The egg smell suddenly disappeared. I hope one of them felt utterly ashamed of themselves. Reg then made a sharp exit. Tadd, Hempsey and myself we were enjoying Waterloo so much that we decided to visit another drinking establishment in the station.

Unfortunately in this new place, which I have no idea what it was called, there was one lonely Welsh guy. He was f@cked. He didn’t even know what he had done that day. That didn’t stop Tadd from inviting him over to have a drink with us. Two pints down and we were looking for excuses to get away from him. The guy took a shinning to Tadd and even offered to buy him drinks. Tadd wanted to accept but decided against it and left with Hempsey and myself. Outside the pub a fight had just been broken up by about 30 police. The fight was between a large quantity of homeless bums. It was a bit like fight club. I said my goodbyes to the last 2 standing Norsemen and then made my way over to Soho to meet Cashley. My Saturday nights have a recurring theme recently. Annoying Welsh men and a Judas ex keeper. Me and Cashley get horribly drunk and then head to Karaoke and sing Remix to Ignition. Walk home at 3.30 down the middle of the road as no other soul was about.

Night world.

Nottsborough FC vs Norsemen FC

2011-09-16T02:46:00.000-07:00

Nottsborough FC vs Norsemen FC
Saturday 10^th September
Tolworth
15:00
Welcome to the Top Division

Dear Diary,
So…… here we are again. Another season, but this time we are mixing it with the big boys. The fixture man decided to make it a nice start for Norsemen by making us travel to the dirty south for the first game of the season.

I know what you are thinking. What did I have for breakfast? 4 slices of toast with strawberry jam and a cup of tea. Bit of a weak breakfast today. It would have been better, however I was too consumed by the poor language being displayed by the English rugby players. I say poor, but I actually mean funny. I took a casual look at my phone to find out the time and noticed I had once again left football preparation to the very last minute. I have 20 minutes before I need to meet Gavin and I haven't packed or had a shower yet. Sh1t.

Somehow I manage to shower, pack my bad and get out of the door within 20 minutes. This then brought up another a problem. Because of the rush I hadn't thought about what the weather was like outside. Turns out it was clammy. We all know not to wear the colour grey in these conditions. I think it is one of the first things we learn at school.

1. How to spell your name

2. Not to wear grey when it is warm and clammy outside

3. How to count to 10

I meet Gavin on the front of the tube to Bank. He was wearing a white carnation in his breast pocket as promised. I tried my very best to not have to raise my arms as there are some moist patches. Eventually I gave in and try to cool down by putting my arms up. People move away from me and Gavin pretends to read the horoscopes so that he doesn't have to associate himself with me. We then change tube and get off at Waterloo where we met up with everyone's favourite ginger man called Muzza. I was slightly confused when I exited the tube as there was another gent with ginger hair in front of Muzza. I started to call out Muz, only for the guy to ignore me. I thought to myself “Why is Muzza being such a rude pr1ck today.” My bad as it was a simple case of mistaken identity. Gavin and myself give the real Muzza a quick hug and then we head to platform 5 to get our train.

We chat in peace for 5 minutes, before being joined by the rest of the gents (minus Weeroy) at Vauxhall station. Jacko looks a bit worse for wear so goes and sits up the other end of the train with Taj and Mark. Obviously as it is the first game of the season there is a lot of banter flying about. I am lucky to be sat next to Macca and Ossie. Ossie has just got back from Ibiza. He told me he tapped up a bit of skirt out there, however he didn’t realise how nice she was until he made friends with her on Facebook when he got home. Let’s be honest Ossie, everyone puts their best picture as their Facebook profile picture. I would trust your own eyes over a photoshoped profile picture.

We eventually get to Tolworth and disembark the train. Some rude guy didn't wait for us to get off the train before he climbed on. I turned to Jacko and said “somebody doesn't have any train etiquette”. Jacko turned to me with a blank expression as if I had just made up a word. That is our future........

We get to the ground and at this point banter is at an all time high. Myself, Gavin and Ballers walk towards the front door of the changing rooms and Gavin notices a sign that reads 'no studs allowed in the building'. Gavin, thinking on his feet, says “Here, Ballers you aren't allowed in mate” (whilst pointing at the sign.) Ballers blushes and we all have a chuckle. Banter hey!

So we get into the changing about an hour and a half before the game. Either we are very ken, or NRC got his train times wrong. I will let you make up your own mind on that. My natural instincts would be to blame NRC straight away.

Jacko looks in a bad. He was boasting that he got in at 9 this morning and didn’t know where he was. When asked why he went out, he said he forgot it was the first game of the season. Silly boy. We try to take our time to get changed, however excitement quickly takes over and we all change as quick as we can so that we can go and kick the ball about. We then get quickly called back in for Phillip to name the team.

GK. Jacko

RB. Ossie

LB. Muzza

CB. Joe Morris

CB. Macca

RM. Gavin

LM. Hempsey

CM. Tadd

CM. TT

CF. Reg

CF. Weeroy

SUBS

Ballers

Taj

Mark

Taj and Jacko then spend the next 10 minutes fighting/flirting, before Gavin decides to sit between them and brake up the fun. We then get plenty of fluids on board for the 20 minute walk to the pitch.

We start warming up and what do you know, it starts to rain. Brilliant. Whilst warming up, I notice out the corner of my eye, a station wagon driving across the fields. It is only the bloody old boys. Nigel, Barry, Forbes, Chunky and Mike risked the wrath of the grounds men and sneaked across the pitches in their car. It is always a treat when the old boys turn up to show their support.

The time turns to 3.00 and it is time to kick off. I won’t beat around the bush, Nottsborough are a very good team and for the first 20 minutes we were chasing their shadows. I’m not sure if it was because we felt intimated by them or if it was for the fact that they are bloody good. The 3^rd man running from midfield was very hard to deal with on a personal note. So here are the main points from the opening 20 minutes:

· We touched the ball 3 or 4 times

· Nottsborough had a great shot come back off of the bar

· Macca chopped their number 9 down outside the box. He didn’t get booked, but the referee did give a penalty

· Nottsborough opened us up like a cheap can of beans and easily scored a second goal

· Jacko is an idiot

· Jacko got sent off because he didn’t like Nottsborough scoring and has no respect for his “team mates”.

· Joe Morris went in nets

From here the game turned. Tadd slotted in at centre back with Macca, Gav went centre mid, Reg went out wide left and Weeroy was left on his own upfront. For some strange reason Nottsborough took their foot off of the gas, or we upped our game massively. For the remainder of the half neither team had a clear cut opportunity; however Norsemen started to play with a bit more belief and started to play the ball out of defence and regained possession. Reggie was talking a good game and the rest of the midfield 3 were putting in a lot of effort to close down and win the ball back. After the game Reg told me he felt like he was just running shuttle runs up and down the wing.

At half time we went in 2-0 down, but felt good. Phil gave us a rallying talk and managed to make everyone feel good about themselves, despite the circumstances. I went to do a wee half way through the talk so missed most of it. I am just going on people’s faces when I returned to the group. No changes were made at half time so we went back out and lined up in our positions again. This half, Norsemen had the wind behind them and the belief that they may even be able to nick a goal.

We started the 2^nd half much better than the 1^st half. Norsemen played the ball around nicely at the back and started to play with confidence. We even started to put some attacking moves together. Ten minutes into the 2^nd half, Macca made way for Tajae.

With our continuing growing of confidence, the game was starting to be played more in the Nottsborough half. The 2^nd half was about 20 minutes old when Norsemen won a throw within the Nottsborough final 3^rd. All week there had been banter on emails suggesting what we would do if we managed to beat Dan Cashley in goal. Most of them involved pointing and laughing.

Coleman trots over to collect the ball and walks back to get a run up. He stands next to Forbes who tells him to chuck the ball right at Dan Ashley with that beautiful trajectory. Cashley won’t know what to do with it, despite watching it for the previous 5 or 6 years, week in, week out. Low and behold Daniel Gustav Ashley flaps at the ball and pushes it into his own net. He claims to have been pushed, however the nearest player to him was Weeroy. There is no way Weeroy could move such a weight like Daniel……. I turn to look at Forbes and he stands there with a grin on his face. I look a little sheepish as it isn’t really football. But then again their 1^st goal wasn’t a penalty. Game on. Nottsborough 2 – 1 Norsemen.

Reg makes way for Ballers and Hempsey is replaced by Mark. Norsemen have belief now that they can actually get something from this game. We start to play neat football and look to move forward at every opportunity. Nottsborough don’t look overly sure at the back due to Weeroy’s relentless running and they keep looking to knock the ball long.

With roughly 10 minutes left on the clock the ball is worked down the Nottsborough right. The ball is moved inside to their number 10 who neatly turns Taj and Tadd and manages to get a shot off. The shot squeezes past Joe in goal, only to hit the foot of the post. The ball was then collected by Tadd who gets the ball out to Mark on the left. Mark beat two men and found Weeroy just outside the Nottsborough box. Weeroy beat his man and then had a look up. Weeroy spotted the Nottsborough keeper off his line and neatly curled the ball over the misplaced keeper and into the net. We went f-ing mental. Annoyingly I missed Barry Ayers run onto the pitch celebrating. I was too busy chasing Weeroy to start a bundle. The ref was having absolutely none of it and blew his whistle. We all trotted back sheepishly to the half way line. Nottsborough 2 – 2 Norsemen.

With 5 minutes left on the clock, Nottsborough finally got that kick up the a$$ that they had lacked all half. Norsemen however were determined not to be beaten. In fact if the game had gone on an extra 5 minutes, who knows what would have happened. What actually happened though was the ref blew his whistle and the game finished 2-2.

To say Norsemen deserved the draw is a fair comment. We showed huge hunger/determination and team spirit. Nottsborough obviously have a lot of class, as they showed in the opening 20 minutes, however I am not sure they have come up against many teams that have wanted to win as much as Norsemen.

We walk off buzzing with excitement. It literally felt like a cup final win. We shouldn’t feel like we don’t belong in this league as we have only lost 1 competitive league game in over a year. Norsemen have shown they have what it takes to play against the best teams in this league and get a result.

After the 25 minute walk back to the changing rooms we all do our willy dances and sing Weeroy’s name. Weeroy quickly makes a quick exit as he is embarrassed. We then follow our favorite ex Norsemen to the Goals bar to get our food. Nasty microwave hot dogs. Probably the worst meal (if you can actually call it that) after a game. We get drunk with the old boys, whilst listening to Forbes and Nigel use some course language. We are then moved to the “bar next door” by the bar manager due to a function being held in the main room. The “bar next door” turned out to be the reception area with a few tables in it. We watched some of the football whilst asking the Nottsborough centre back about his date in Wimbledon. In the end the numbers whittle down to Macca, Reg, Muzza, Gav, TT, Cashley and the Nottsborough centre back.

Despite the fact that we enjoy standing in receptions, it is decided we move somewhere with a bit more atmosphere. A local off-licence is visited where Reg looks at the gentlemen’s literature, whilst the rest of us get some travel beers and spoof shots.

We catch the train and Daniel takes over with the drinking rules. We both have two cans each and are instructed to have them both finished by the time we have reached Waterloo. He even gave us a halfway point to make sure we had one can finished by then. I have missed having a bossy goalkeeper. We then start spoof. Obviously Reg makes the final. This time he is up against Gavin. Gavin loses, but pretends he likes whisky. It takes him 3 gulps to get the whisky down. Reg then makes it to the second final against TT. TT managed to f@ck it up and ends up with the vodka. TT knows he doesn’t deal well with vodka, but thinks to himself don’t make a scene, just man up and drink it. TT does this and then swallows back down his sick. We arrive at Waterloo and everyone bar Reg has finished their cans. To be fair he spent the most time playing spoof. He does need to stop being such a pu$$y at drinking though.

We hit the nearest pub and then decided it is sh1t, so move on to the next one round the corner. Spoof is started again and this time it is Macca who ends up drinking Baileys or something. He whines about it in his silly little tone. By this point we are starting to get pretty hammered. This would normally be the time that Reg would point and say “look over there” and then slip off back to his bed. Muzza thought he would prevent Reg from doing this by spilling his whole pint over Reg’s lap. Reg looked crossed. Muzza took Reg to the toilet and took his trousers off. Reg then snatched his trousers back and spent the next 20 minutes holding them under the hand dryer. Whilst this was going on some Welsh lads, probably Ricky’s mates, came over to the table and tried to join in spoof. Nobody understood them and they walked off.

Within the next half an hour, people started to make their excuses and they started to disappear until it was just left with Gavin and TT.

Gavin and TT decide it is time for some food. They walk down to the embankment and get a savory crepe each. They sit down next to a girl and a boy. The girl isn’t blessed with looks and the boy is a white guy trying to look like a samurai. Please. Anyway the girl had good banter and the boy was happy to sit there and say nothing. Gavin started asking about the girls boyfriend who she keeps mentioning. Gavin then decides to mug the girls boyfriend off whilst looking at samurai boy. Samurai boy humors Gavin and smiles back at him. Gavin then asks samurai boy how he met his friend. The girl then butts in and tells Gavin that Shinobi is her boyfriend. Gavin shrugs and carries on eating his crepe. Boy and Girl quickly make their excuses and leave.

We then get the tube back to Shoreditch and go to another bar and get horribly drunk. Get in at two, only to find I have been left with the kit to wash. Great.

Good night world.

Old Pakonians vs Norsemen FC

2011-05-02T14:52:00.000-07:00

Old Parkonians vs Norsemen FC

Fairlop

Saturday 16th April 2011

3.00pm

Park We Sung

Dear Diary,

The time has finally come to put the virtual pen down for the year. This is our last game of the season. I will tell you about the game in a bit, but first I am going to rewind the clock 12 or so hours, to the night before.

Finish work and go to meet Jarrett at Moorgate. Get a call from the Gaffer on the way, he is still writing his speech and wants a few pointers. Nothing quite like good preparation..... Meet Jarrett and get on the tube to meet up with the other lot. Meet up in Chad’s bar in Kings X and get bang on it. The likes of Ossie, Macca, Ballers, Muzza, Chef and Hemps are already there. Then Reg turns up after going for a long lunch with work. Last but by no means least, Paul Murray turns up. Couple of people mug him off (mainly the Chef though) for looking like a washed up 80’s 2nd rate pop star. Muzza doesn’t defend his brother though.

We all get fired up on premium lager and then set off to the tube. Macca buys a miniature and we play spoof. Paul Murray loses. Most people got off the tube when we got on, as we must have been quite annoying. Muzza was being very boisterous and being the most annoying. I say this because whilst people watching I saw plenty of people shaking their heads with disappointment when Muzza opened his mouth.

We get to Southgate a bit behind time and then head straight for the venue. Do a wee and then head straight for the bar. Grab a beer and then sit down in preparation for Mr John Bayer to get the ball rolling for the night. Unfortunately Radio couldn’t make the dinner, so in his absence Mike Pearl took over the honour of announcing the night’s winners. I think Joe Morris and Ballers are the subject of most jokes. We eat a 3 course meal in the space of 15 minutes. Weeroy then picks up young Norsemen of the year, despite being 25!

Finally comes the time for the Gaffer to do his speech. He has been a little quiet for the last hour, understandably as it is never nice doing a speech. I think Ballers gets mugged off one more time before Thomas calls Ricky up to do a quick emotional speech. Ricky doesn’t really look like he is on this planet whilst speaking. Thomas then hands out some awards, before we finally get to the big boys stuff. Norsemen of the year.

Despite all the ribbings he has received this year for not actually being very good at football, this guy is reliable and puts in 100% every time he plays (he has to really as trying is his only attribute). Ballers only goes and wins the award. I think the club were a bit short of nominations this year. Never the less he has won it now and we can’t take that away from him. Ballers smiled like a Cheshire cat for the rest of the night. Fitzy played him a lovely victory song on the piano, whilst the 1’s table won almost everything from the raffle. We went to the bar and got utterly smashed. Most Norsemen went off to the Tesco country club, whilst the people that don’t live out in the sticks had to prop up the bar and hopefully get the last tube. Obviously we missed the last tube and had to get a taxi home. It meant we got to see Lotty though. Lotty is Muzza’s Mrs. I also got to witness Carriao and Weaver have an argument with a woman in a taxi queue. I think it makes them feel big and clever arguing with women. Pathetic........

Got the taxi back to Shoreditch and went to bed feeling disgusting. All in all a very good night. Well done to Weeroy, Ballers and the Gaffer.

Back to Saturday.

Woke up feeling absolutely horrendous. I guess the feeling was felt by most in the team. This made me feel better that I didn’t have to suffer on my own. No idea what I did for most of the morning as was feeling rough. My first memory is of Louise asking me what I would like for breakfast. She is very nice like that. It turned out to be a repeat order of lasts weeks breakfast plus bacon, minus the shoddy egg poaching. Then I went upstairs and made the final playlist of the year, packed my bag and said goodbye to Lou. The gaffer and myself then plonked ourselves in the car, dropped the roof and set off rather late for Essex.

Arrive at Fairlop and greet everyone. Quite a quiet group this afternoon. Gav Morais isn’t liking people wearing sunglasses so goes around confiscating them. Ballers is still drunk. Not sure if he is drunk on alcohol or the fact that he won something connected with football. Hemps is greenish in colour. Macca starts telling his story of how he fell asleep on the tube last night and ended up in Acton. Everyone started to walk off to the changing room when they heard Macca open his mouth. The changing rooms had a very odd scent.

Takes us a while to figure out what we are doing, so we sit down in silence and look at each other, whilst feeling sorry for ourselves. After we snap out of that we don the blue uniform and gingerly trot out to the pitch. The pitch is as hard as concrete.

Quite a strange feeling today, as normally we get out and want to kick the ball about. Today however we just want to sit down and chat. I get up and try a shot. The ball ends up on the cricket pitch behind the goal. This would have been ok, if it wasn’t for the fact that the fielding team had just bowled. I jog over and apologise. I don’t think they accepted my apology. Oh well, cricket is rubbish anyway so I don’t care what they think about my poor shooting aim. I walk back to the 5 or so who are still sitting down and we all watch Jacko walk out to the pitch. He appears to still be intoxicated by something as he is talking to himself. Jacko then kicks the ball into the net by himself and then has a small tiff with the gaffer, at which point Thomas decides to put himself in goal. 10 minutes later and Jacko decides he wants to play.

Due to the nasty hangovers everyone is nursing we have a relatively relaxed warm up. When I say relaxed I just mean slow run and half hearted keep ball game. Ballers is buzzing from being named Norsemen of the year and because of this he manages to only lose the ball 5 times. Thomas calls everyone over and names the squad.

GK Jacko

LB Muzza

RB Ossie

CB Macca

CB Tajae

LM Jarrett

CM Tadd

CM Morais

RM Ballers

CF Weeroy

CF Reggie

SUBS

NRC

The Chef

Thomas

Ballers is handed the captains armband as a reward for being named Norsemen of the year. I can’t think of any other reason for giving him the armband.

It was a hot day and that didn’t help with the hangovers. Put Ballers on a level playing level with everyone else though.

The ref blew his whistle at 3.00pm and that meant Norsemen got the ball rolling. We started the much better of the teams. The ball was passed around with pace and space was found all over the pitch. Weeroy and Reg both looked threatening upfront, with both having good early chances. Morais was given the job of man marking the Parks danger man. He did a good job throughout the whole game, apart from his first tackle. I think the alcohol played a big part in Gav completely missing his tackle and man all together in the opening minutes.

10 minutes into the first half and The Chef, NRC and myself set off on a voyage to get some water for the chaps playing. Thomas tells me that Old Parkonians put together the move of the match whilst I am gone. Unfortunately I didn’t see it so couldn’t tell you what actually happened.

When the waterboys reach the changing rooms we realise that getting water mission was going to be hampered by the fact that the bottles were too big for the sinks we found. That was the 1^st problem. The 2^nd problem was that the water was f-ing boiling. Hot water is that last thing the brave chaps playing football needed. It was all we could find though so they will have to like it or lump it. Lump it they did.

We get back just in time to see a ball slipped through the Reg. Reg took a lovely first touch and then calmly rounds the keeper and places the ball in the back of the net. Barry was on hand as the official Norsemen photographer for the day to take a nice snap of his boy. Barry gives Reg 50p for every goal scored. That is £2 Reg has made form his dad this year. I will let you do the math. Old Parkonians 0 – 1 Norsemen.

After the goal, Parkonians started to find a bit more rhythm with their play and started to create chances. A good effort from the edge of the Norsemen box saw Jacko make an excellent save to tip the ball on to the bar. The rebound fell nicely to a Parkonian player, who took a touch and had a shot at goal. Tadd saved it with his arms and gave away a penalty. Well done Tadd. The penalty was neatly dispatched and levelled the score. Old Parkonians 1 – 1 Norsemen.

Shortly after the goal I wondered over to Barry Ayers, who was standing behind the Norsemen net, poised to take more photos. Can I just mention that despite Barry having the camera for the whole of the game, he only took about 15-20 photos. I thought I would be sifting through the photos for days. Turns out Barry is a man of few photos. Whilst chatting to Barry, Norsemen won a dubious penalty. Not sure who won it, or how for that matter. The penalty was given to Tajae to score his first goal of the season. Tajae took a very weak penalty, which the keeper parried. Tajae wasn’t having any of that and so run up to the rebound and smashed it into the back of the net. Tajae claims he wanted to score from open play, and this is why he played a one-two with the Parks keeper. That now makes Muzza the only player not to have scored for Norsemen this year, despite going up for every set play…. Old Parkonians 1 – 2 Norsemen.

This was the last action of the first half. The gaffer gathers everyone in and we all huddle and wait for our last speech of the year. Not much to say to be honest but he said some stuff. First thing was to make a sub. Norsemen of the year made way for TT. TT was at last handed the captains armband. He is a really special player. NRC decided he was still too ill to play and went for a lie down. Thomas just told us to keep playing the way we had been and the win would come. On a hot day both teams were showing some nice touches and putting in a good shift. Morais moved out to the right and TT teamed up with Tadd in centre midfield.

The second half got underway at a good pace. Old Parkonians looked like they had been yelled at by their manager at half time and came out to do business. However Norsemen showed the kind of form that has kept them at the top of the table for most of the year and managed to get back on top quickly. Shortly after the second half had begun, Macca pulled up with an injury. Not sure what it was. I just don’t think he fancied it this week. Tadd went to centre back, Gav moved back in to central midfield and NRC came on to occupy the right wing. Hempsey wasn’t wrong when he said he didn’t feel very well. I’m not sure if it was nerves or alcohol, but NRC was sick twice as he entered the field of play. The parks team just looked at him and must have thought what a joke. To be fair to NRC he is only a wee lad so it makes sense that he can’t handle his alcohol. After NRC’s first run, he pulled up again and vomd on the pitch once more. At least go over to the touchline next time NRC. That kid has no pitch etiquette.

The kid did good 10 minutes later. It must have been a corner or free kick that was half cleared. Muzza had carried his big head upfront and must have known the attack wasn’t over. That or he is lazy and slow. The ball broke to NRC out on the right. NRC whipped in a delicious ball into the box. Muzza found himself in acres of space, about 10 yards out. Muzza delicately lobbed the ball into the far right corner of the goal with his big ginger Swede. There it is, every outfield player for Norsemen has scored in the 2010/11 season. Well done to you Muzza. Old Parkonians 1 – 3 Norsemen.

Reg makes way for The Chef. Shortly after The Chef is introduced into the game, Old Parks find a lifeline. The ball is played back to Jacko. The ball takes a bobble and Jacko has to take an extra touch, this gives the Parks striker time to close down Jacko’s kick. The Norsemen defence manage to get back and pack the goal, however the Parks striker’s shot is well placed and he reduces the deficit to 1. Old Parkonians 2 – 3 Norsemen.

Almost from kick off the ball is played up the right by NRC. The Chef gets a touch to the ball and guides it into the path of Weeroy. Weeroy weaves through 3 or 4 challenges and neatly passes the ball past the keeper. Weeroy has probably now scored more goals on his own than the rest of the team. As we know though it is a team sport and there is no Weeroy in team. Old Parkonians 2 – 4 Norsemen.

Norsemen see out the game and on the balance of play deserve the victory. Saying that, the Parks team is very different to the team we played earlier in the season. I suspect if they needed the win then we would have faced a tougher opponent on the day. Well done to Parks for the season though. Climbing from bottom of the league to 2^nd is a big achievement. It will be a pleasure to play against the nice bunch of lads next year. They play the game as it should be played.

We go back to the changing rooms and have a little sing before doing the round of willy dances in the showers. Good showers this week. Norsemen of the year managed to pull off the best dance. Well done to him. He has had quite the weekend.

Everyone still seems to be hungover in the changing room so not much celebrating to be done after the little sing. NRC seems to have a bit of colour back in his cheeks now though. Go and get some nice Spag Bol off of the lovely kitchen ladies at Old Parks and then try and leave with the Gaffer. Took 3 attempts of saying goodbye and leaving the room before we found a door that let us out of the building.

Thanks again to Chunky, Barry, Mike Pearl and Nigel for showing their support today.

All in all a good day for Norsemen. Due to the previous nights activities I doubt anybody went out for beers. I positioned myself on the carpet in front of the TV and watched football for the next 6 of so hours. I don’t even like watching football all that much, I just felt too disgusting to move. As this is the last match report of the year I am going to have another educated guess to what the rest of the team did when they left the clubhouse. Now I must stress this won’t be factually accurate, but it will be pretty close to what they actually did.

Jacko – Went to a fried chicken establishment on the way back to Enfield and then went to watch Rio 3D with Arda.

Ossie – Went home and created the pilot for his new TV show that is based loosely on The only way is Essex.

Muzza – Went home and bored Lotty about his goal. Then he made her play “Stack of truth”. Lotty probably won and then told Muzza the truth about his hair…..

Macca – Played dress up with his Mrs. Was then made to vacuum the house and make dinner.

Tajae – Washed his new boots and then text Jacko to see if he wanted to do something. Jacko didn’t hear his phone as he was in the cinema. Tajae watched MOTD and went to bed.

Tadd – Was put out on his leach in the garden.

Gav – Ran home from Fairlop. Did some squat thrusts and sit-ups. Ate his 5 fruit and veg for the day and then went to bed.

Jarrett – Got home and did a bottom burp. Was sent to his room and had to play Monopoly on his own. He won.

Weeroy – practiced his dance moves infront of his mirror for a couple of hours. Then penned some chat up lines in his diary before finishing up with kissing practice on his arm. Weeroy loves them B1tches so has to put in his homework.

Reg – Went round to his dad’s house to pick up his pocket money. Went home and had a chat with Gabriel for a couple of hours because his wife is sick to death of talking to him.

NRC – Got the tube to Liverpool Street. Got to sit with the driver. When he got to Liverpool Street he did his regular 3 hours of train spotting. Went home and probably had pie, chips and gravy.

The Chef – Went home and got tied up and gagged by his Mrs. I will let your imagination do the rest.

The Gaffer – Went up to his room and listened to his speech that he taped from the night before. He listened to the speech on loop for 3 hours and then had a curry and went to bed a happy boy.

That is it.

Bye now.

Champs

2011-04-18T14:48:00.000-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Old Finchleans

2011-04-17T13:08:00.000-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Old Finchleans

Edmonton Sports Ground

12th April 2011

6.00pm (ish)

Peter Piper Picked A Peck of Pickled Pepper Where's The Peck of Pickled Pepper Peter Piper Picked

Dear Diary,

So a bit of new territory here for the season. A midweek evening game. Norsemen needed to take just 1 point from this game to be crowned champions of the SAL division 2.

I am a bit thrown as to where to start today’s episode. Normally I would bore you with the antics before the game, but to be honest with you there were no antics today, just a boring day at work.

Arranged to meet Ballers and Jarrett at Liverpool Street. We met up and exchanged handshakes and then set upon our way to Edmonton. Ballers starts telling Jarrett and myself that he has played football every year of his life since the age of 5 or something, without a gap. Me and Jarrett look extremely surprised by this comment. Surely 25+ years of playing football would have provided Ballers with some footballing talent...... Jarrett just smiles at Ballers and then looks out of the window. As we pass White Hart Lane, Ballers shakes his fist in a rude manner and Jarrett looks at the ground and declares his love for Spurs. This rivalry of football clubs could cause a problem at their joint marriage.

Get off the train and everyone’s favourite muscley Norsemen gets off the carriage next to us. Gav talks about playing football in Norwich at a good standard. Jarrett and Ballers quickly get bored of this and walk off ahead. I am polite and carry on listening to Gavin. We get to the ground and everyone is waiting pitch side in their work clothes. There is a buzz going around the place. For some reason the 1’s and 3’s don’t mingle, and instead decide to just stand there looking at each other. Me and Ballers play kick the ball into the goal and the others stand around and chat, whilst waiting for the gaffer to turn up with the kit. Thomas got held up in traffic so arrives last.

We get changed and listen to some of the Chef’s music. Go out and do a light jog and then Phillip let’s us play the 3 touch game. Bibs probably come out on top of this session. As we turn around to start the match we realise Finchleans only have 9 personnel on the pitch. They try and stall for the start of the game, but Thomas gets the ref to start. We swap ends and start to play the game with the following formation:

GK Jacko

LB Muzza

RB Ballers

CB Macca

CB Tajae

LM Hempsey

CM TT

CM Tadd

RM Thomas

CF Weeroy (this is a new name I have given to Leroy)

CF Jarrett

SUBS

Ossie

Morais

Reggie

Leighton

A strong line up again for the 1’s. This has been key to our success this year. Apart from the loss away to Esthameians, where we struggled to get a team out, we have been consistent with getting the core of the team out this year. Our hat goes off to Thomas for sorting this out every week.

So we kick off with 11 against 9. From kick off it was apparent that we decided that this was going to be easy and as a result we treated the first half as a training exercise.

Within 5 minutes Norsemen took the lead. Jarrett received a poor goal kick from the keeper and nodded the ball through to Weeroy. Weeroy took a touch to go round the keeper and then slotted the ball into the net. I am told this puts Weeroy one goal ahead of Danny in the Norsemen goal rankings, but who is counting.......

Norsemen 1 – 0 Old Finchleans.

After the goal was scored Finchleans managed to get their numbers on the field up to 11. This didn’t really affect Norsemen’s style of play. We dominated possession, however at a very slow pace and because of this we started to make errors. Then because of that we started to get on each others backs. This as we all know is counter productive.

About 30 minutes into the game and Finchleans have their first meaningful attack of the game down the right. A good bit of interplay provides their right winger with space on the edge of the area. The winger neatly dispatched the ball over Jackos hand and into the corner of the net. Fair play to Finchleans as it was a good goal. Norsemen 1 – 1 Old Finchleans.

A very short time after this we saw some glimpses of Jarrett’s early season form. I will paint a picture of the scenario for you. Weeroy through on goal and should have scored. He didn’t. Weeroy had quite a big crowd following him today so was understandably nervous. Jarrett didn’t. Weeroy had a shot at goal that was saved by the keeper. The ball bounced back to Weeroy who should have passed to Jarrett first time, but didn’t. Eventually when Weeroy knew he had no chance of scoring he laid it back to Jarrett. Jarrett had the whole goal to aim at. Jarrett lashed at the ball and hit the post with an open goal. He looked cross. The game stayed level.

We had numerous other chances to score in the first half, if it wasn’t for the impressive Finchleans centre back and keeper, then we would have scored more. Muzza missed a couple of sitters in both halves from set pieces. Both Muzza and Tajae are the only two outfield players not to score this season, so both were trying their hardest to score. Muzza goes up for most set pieces so he has an easier job than Tajae. If Tajae wants to score, then he literally has to take on the entire opposition. He has almost succeeded doing this a couple of times this season.

So we get to half time and are drawing 1-1. The gaffer calls us into the changing room and sits us down. First thing he says is naughty so I wont repeat it. Then he tells us to take a long hard look at ourselves. He lines us up in front of a mirror and then one by one we tell him what we can see when we stand in front of mirror. Not sure what this exercise was supposed to achieve but it moved NRC to tears…….

We go out for the second half, knowing if we played our game to our strengths and used the space out wide, then we had a very good chance of winning the game. Tadd had decided at half time that he wasn’t satisfied just playing centre midfield, so he took upon a personal mission to try and play everyone’s position for them.

We started the 2^nd half, as we had finished the 1^st half and took the game to Old Finchleans. We went close on a number of occasions, however as the half went on we started to look desperate and tried to force the goal. Because we tried to throw the kitchen sink, bath, patio, pond, loft conversion, walk in wardrobe and sex dungeon at Finchleans, we were left exposed at the back a couple of times. Fincleans come close once, but that was the only pressure they offered in the half.

Leroy had a shot saved well by the keeper. As I mentioned earlier, Muzza missed a sitter and Tadd fluffed a volley from inside the box. With 3 or 4 minutes to go, knowing we only needed a draw to clinch the title, Morais and Muzza tried to keep the ball in the corner. Professional players make this look easy. Gavin and Nicholas made it look difficult….. Half the team wanted the ball played into the box so that we could try and score, but Gav and Muzza were having none of it. Eventually the ref had enough and blew his whistle. Norsemen FC are crowned CHAMPIONS of the SAL 2^nd division. Yey.

The atmosphere after the game was strange as it didn’t feel like we had won the league with the performance we had given. However we had and when we got back to the changing room after giving the old boys high fives, there was a couple of bottle of the finest Bulgarian champagne waiting for us.

We pull off some fine willy dance moves in the shower whilst the gaffer and Ballers spray everyone with Champers. Muzza drags a fully clothed Chef into the showers and we all jump him. I slip and nearly kill myself, but apart from that we have a smashing time and drench the Chef. From the corner of my eye I see Hempsey and Gav sitting on their little benches whilst shaking their heads. They are older members of the team so maybe they don’t get it.

Tadd enters the changing room after 20 minutes. Apparently he did a couple laps of the pitch whilst thanking the fans. We don’t have any fans so I have no idea who he was thanking.

Go into the clubhouse and Nigel offers us some more champagne. This champagne was aptly named Leroy. We all stand around the oppo and watch them eat what looked like one of the most disappointing meals I have seen this side of 2000. Not sure of any worse the other side of 2000 but I just want to cover my back!

All in all a lovely feeling to have won the league, it just hasn’t kicked in properly yet. Role on Saturday and Old Parcs. Before that though we will all look forward to the Gaffers speech at the club dinner on Friday.

Champions

Civil Service FC vs Norsemen FC

2011-04-14T09:19:00.000-07:00

Civil Service FC vs Norsemen FC

Chiswick

Saturday 9^th April 2011

3.00

Civil Faulty

Dear Diary,

So the league draws to an end and the penultimate weekend serves up an away fixture to high flying Civil. Just a little bit of good news during the week. Norsemen FC 1’s only went and got blimmin promoted didn’t they. All the seasons hard work has finally paid off.

Massive thanks to Phillip and the Chef for all the hard work and dedication they have put in for us.

Back to the game in hand. Civil required a win to keep in contention for promotion, whilst Norsemen required a win to keep on track for being crowned champions. Today’s fixture had the potential to be epic.

Woke up to the glorious sunshine beaming through the gap in my curtains. Attempted to put a pillow over my head to regain total darkness. Annoyingly this didn’t work and the sun had beaten me. 7.45 and I was up. Thought about doing something and then thought better of it. Had to keep my reserves for the game in hand. Went downstairs and had some children’s cereal. Then had a chat with the gaffer, before he went off to the gym. Nipped down to our local supermarket to get some fluids for the day’s game. What a wonderful day it was. Got some food for a bit of brunch for Thomas and myself. Tried to make a poached egg for the first time, but failed miserably. The egg hit the water and just decided it didn’t like it surroundings. After deciding it didn’t like what was going on, the egg made the water go misty and rank. Had to call Thomas down to give me a quick poached egg master class. I have only recently converted to poached eggs from scrambled eggs and this is the reason for my inability to cook a poached egg. We ate our breakfasts and they were yummy. We then noticed we were running a bit late for the agreed meeting time. We grabbed our stuff and walked to Liverpool Street.

Get to Liverpool Street a bit behind time. Give NRC a tinkle to find out where we have to be and when. We have 25 minutes to get to the rest of the team in Vauxhall. Looking a bit unlikely but we head to the underground anyway. Sit on the platform for 5 minutes with no sign of a tube. Then decide to get a taxi. The taxi driver assures us we are going to be able to make Vauxhall train station in 20 minutes and on his word we climb into his taxi. The taxi driver’s word is kosher and he gets us there with 2 minutes to spare. Thomas gets out at the traffic lights and sprint/jogs for the train. Sure enough NRC’s instructions are correct and everyone is on the platform waiting for us. Jarrett is wearing his summers best. NRC looks like he is going to a beach party themed 50th birthday party and the rest are wearing their nice shirts in preparation to hit the town after the game.

I am shocked to read on the train that our nuclear submarines can only go to a depth of 300m. To me that isn’t deep. I can rescue a brick from 5 meters and my £7 watch can go 50m. Surely a submarine that costs loads of money can go deeper. Me and Muzza talk about this for a while and then the topic of conversation turns to the Grand National horses. We aren’t interested in the good horses, just the sports editor’s synopsis of the rubbish horses. One horse had a description of “Tries really really hard but all is in vain. This horse will return nothing if you back it”. Imagine if the horse could read and it stumbled across a copy of The Times. It would be absolutely heartbroken.

We get to our station and NRC gives us the nod to get off the train. We then cross the river and head to the Civil ground. I haven’t mentioned it yet but boy what a day it was. It was a little on the windy side, however the temperature was spot on. We get to the pitch and are greeted with a small stand. Civil must have spent all of their money on the stand as the changing rooms are just a bunch of demountables. Tajae and Leroy kick back and sunbathe whilst the rest of us aimlessly kick the ball around. Tadd and NRC find a tennis ball and decide to play catch. They look like a couple of girls as they throw the ball to each other and giggle. If they had decided to play hopscotch, then they would have looked less girlie. I find out that Ballers uses his left hand to throw a ball. At first I think he is just mucking about as he has a weird throwing action, but he assures me that that is the way he throws…….

We line up as follows:

GK Jacko

RB Ossie

LB Muzza

CB Tajae

CB Macca

LM NRC

RM Gav

CM TT

CM Tadd

CF Leroy

CF Jarrett

Subs

Ballers

Carriou

Thomas

Thomas decided as the changing room was extremely small and the weather was very nice, to get changed outside. Gav Morais set up his little changing station in the middle of everyone. I think this was a tactical move on his behalf as he remembered what little gems he had put on that morning. As he dropped his trousers he revealed a pair of salmon coloured pants. On the likes of Muzza or myself it would have looked like we didn’t have any pants on. It would have also looked like we had lost our appendage due to the colour and tightness of them. Due to Gav’s beautiful holiday Tan, the pants stood out. You could see the jealousy in Ossie’s eye and that he was hatching a plan to swap pants at the end of the game. A bit like a player swapping shirts with an oppo, Ossie likes swapping pants.

James takes us for a warm up. Not sure if he just makes exercises up sometimes. He makes us run from one side of the pitch to the other and during the run he will make us do things like rolly polly’s and cartwheels. He will then say this helps with your core balance or something like that. All gym talk that I don’t really understand. This is Gav Morais favourite part of the footballing day.

Phil then lets us play football in a square. The non bibs thrash the bibs in a game of 3 touch. Not really the morale boast that the bibs needed before a big game. The only words I can offer to cheer them up is “just be better at football”.

The ref calls for the captains and we kick off proceedings. We are playing in front of a crowd of 30-40 people today. I think a lot of them have heard about ‘the throw’ and they wanted to see it with their own eyes.....

Both teams start with a frantic pace. Civil have the wind behind them and it is evident from the opening 5 minutes that they are trying to play the long ball over the Norsemen defence for the lone striker to run on to. This doesn’t work as the back 4 were immense in the air for the whole game.

10 minutes in and the Civil left back tries to have a pop at Gav Morais. Being up against the Hulk, the Civil player obviously had no joy. Gav got a scratch on his knee and Civil player stayed down after bouncing off of Gav and falling on his hand. It did look a bad injury and I think he may have broken a finger or too so we all hope he gets well soon. Despite the injury the left back played on, although the injury seemed to jade his performance. 5 minutes later and Norsemen took the lead. Gav received the ball on the right. He jinxed past 2 Civil players before putting a cross in for Weeroy to poke home. A well worked goal and on the run of play, no more than Norsemen deserved. Civil 0 – 1 Norsemen.

5 minutes later and Norsemen attack again. This time down the left wing. Hempsey plays a great ball down the line and Jarrett sets off on a run to retrieve the ball. The Civil keeper starts running out to collect the ball, however upon seeing angry Jarrett running at him, he thinks twice. At this point the Norsemen chairman, who is standing on the sideline starts shouting “you’ve sh1t yourself, you’ve sh1t yourself”. I am sure this doesn’t help the Civil keeper with the situation. Jarrett gets to the ball first and lobs the ball over the stranded keeper. The ball bounces once before hitting the roof of the net. Jarrett finally finds double figures for the season and doubles Norsemen’s lead in doing so. Civil 0 – 2 Norsemen.

Norsemen were buzzing after the goal. Civil started an attack down the right. The left back tried to knock it past NRC. NRC was having none of it so he stuck his hand out to stop the ball. Muzza didn’t like this and had a go at NRC. NRC didn’t like being told off so he said a rude word back to Muzza. This is what is known as “a lovers tiff” in the real world. They didn’t make eye contact for 5 minutes after the tiff.

With 10 minutes left of the half Civil won a throw in the last third of Norsemen’s half. A long throw was nodded on at the near post. Macca and Jacko went for the same ball. The ball fell to the Civil midfielder, who blasted the ball at Macca’s chest. Macca’s hands were in front of his chest and so he handballed it. Ref gave a penalty. Fair shout. The Civil player despatched his penalty into the corner. Well taken and nothing Jacko could do about it. Civil 1 – 2 Norsemen.

Norsemen upped their game after the goal, but found it hard to penetrate the Civil backline with the windy conditions. The ref blows his whistle and it is half time.

Thomas calls us into the shade and Ballers carries over the water. This was Ballers main task for today’s game. He took this job seriously and hid the water under some shade. Well done him. Thomas gave us a nice speech. You could see Tadd and NRC looking for a tennis ball to play some more catch, but the tennis ball was gone. They both looked a bit sad.

We all trudge back to our starting positions and the ref gets us underway. Norsemen have the benefit of the wind this half and begin well, putting Civil on the back foot.

10 minutes into the 2^nd half, TT and Jarrett chase down the Civil centre back. The ball lands at TT’s feet and he decides to have a run at goal. He only goes and drops his left shoulder and glides past the centre back. This leaves TT through on goal, with only the keeper to beat. He is comfortable with this situation. Then from out of nowhere Weeroy turns up on the scene and starts screeching for the ball to be played square to him. This completely puts TT off. TT is so annoyed with Weeroy that he decides enough is enough and decides to just kick the ball off for a goal kick. That will teach Weeroy for trying to spoil the party.

Within 5 minutes of the Weeroy incident, TT put Norsemen’s 3^rd in. A free kick was awarded on the halfway line. Coleman thinks to himself “I am going to have a shot from here. I have the wind behind me so why not. They all think I am going to cross from here. Yeah have a shot Coleman, go on, treat yourself”. Had a shot and scored. Being a humble and modest gentleman, Coleman just stands there and shrugs his shoulders. Macca is the first on the scene and jumps TT. He is soon followed by half of the team. The ref gives the goal and then starts running back to the centre spot. The ref turns and see’s an upset linesman. The lino saw Gav in an off side position or something like that and gives a free kick to Civil. Cheers Gav.

Gav hadn’t felt like he had spoiled the game enough, so he spent the next 5 minutes thinking what he could do. What Gav come up with was giving the ball away on the half way line and left the Civil centre forward to run at Macca. The forward let off an early shot and managed to put the ball in off the far post. Again nothing that Jacko could do about that goal. A nice finish. Civil 2 – 2 Norsemen.

Thomas thought Gavin had done enough damage and so subbed him for Ballers.

Almost from kick off Norsemen started to attack the Civil box. The ball was cleared to the right hand edge of the box. Who was there to collect the ball. It was only Ossie, wasn’t it. Did Ossie bring the ball down? No. Did Ossie take his time? No. Did Ossie hit an ambitious volley? Yes. Did Ossie score? No. Did Ossie kick it off for a goal kick? No. Did Ossie’s shot at goal go off for a throw? Yes.

During the game there were couple of incidents I would just like to share. Tadd being called a “lanky streak of p1ss” being one of them. The other was the blossoming romance of the Chef and the Civil number 9. Throughout the game they had been exchanging love notes, just as you do at the start of any good relationship. Then from there the odd wink and kiss was blown. At half time they met up on the adjacent pitch and had a talk and cuddle. They swapped numbers and everything seemed to be falling into place. Then as all relationships seem to end in the 21^st century, things took a turn for the worse. Number 9 stopped returning the winks and the Chef started to become jealous. The final exchange of words went a bit like:

Number 9 “At least I’m not fat”

Chef “I would prefer to be fat than ugly”

Two classic lines straight out of the playground insult book. Shortly after this exchange of words Barry Ayers was asked by the ref to escort the Chef away from the side of the pitch. Love can be cruel sometimes......

Back to the game and you could see a belief in Civil for the first time in the game. From a corner, number 9 hit the bar from a header. The ball bounced to a Civil player, who hit it goal bound, only for Muzza to clear off the line. This is the first time Norsemen didn’t look in control of the game. This short spell of attack soon came to an end and Norsemen started to get back in the game.

Weeroy pounced on a poor pass from the Civil defender and managed to toe poke the ball into the goal. We naturally went f-ing mental. All I could hear was Tadd and Jarrett screaming with joy. Then from the corner of my eye I see Gav Morais sprinting down the line in relief from not costing Norsemen the game. We all jumped on each other and celebrated nicely. Civil 2 – 3 Norsemen.

Shortly after the goal Weeroy managed to hand the victory to Norsemen and score what seems to be his billionth goal of the year. Hempsey sprayed a ball across the pitch to Ballers. Everyone thought Ballers would let the ball role under his foot. It didn’t. The Civil defence obviously don’t know who Ballers is and so they tried to close down the angle for Ballers, to prevent him from shooting. Ballers then did something nobody thought he was going to do. Ballers crossed the ball back across the goal to an unmarked Weeroy. Weeroy took a touch and then curled the ball into the far corner. Probably the goal of the game. We go crazy again and mob the little man.

Muzza goes off for Carriao. Dan’s first touch was to fall over and trap the ball on the line with his toe. It was a nice move to be fair to Daniel. He then got up and pretended as if nothing had happened. Shortly after this the ref blew his whistle to end the game. We go bonkers and start hugging each other and shake as many people’s hands as possible. Civil have been one of the best teams this year and if they have another season like this then they will be back up to the top division next year. Their season mirrors our season last year.

Complete a half hearted warm down with an embarrassed Chef and then head back to the changing room for an epic willy dance.

Unfortunately on returning to the changing room we were met with a disappointing set of showers.

Shower number 1 – Resembled a hose end. The pressure of the shower would suggest the hose had a kink in it.

Shower number 2 – Had the appearance of a shower. However the pressure was equal to that of a water can that was running out of water.

Shower number 3 – Again disguised as a shower. Instead of being attached to the water pipe, the other side of the shower head was attached to somebody’s mouth. This person used spit and saliva to provide the water flow.

The showers affected getting clean, but not the dancing. It was only 3 dancers at a time, but this gave the rest of the team a chance to sit back and admire the hard work and thought that had gone in to each dance. I think Macca won this week’s dance. Macca’s preferred move of the day was the reverse helicopter.

Ballers and Tajae had some really nasty wine that Thomas had won in a raffle and then we set off to the club house for some fish fingers and chips. I think this is the meal awarded to the World cup winning team after success......

We watch Norwich get beaten and Thomas stitch up Weeroy with 3 shots. Macca gets a jug in for conceding a penalty and we all get bang on it. Forbes, Chunky and Barry all offer their hands in congratulation. Another big thanks for all the old boys who have shown their support this year. Makes a big difference seeing some Norsemen legends on the pitch side. We leave the Civil club house with Weeroy lifted in the air and everyone shouting his name. Gav Morais gets out some Cuban cigars from his travels and a couple of members of the team think they will be cool and smoke them.

From here we go to a pub that doubles as a jazz bar. Bit random. Weeroy is struggling from the shots and decides to take a breather. The pub don’t like our noise and we are asked to be quiet. Shortly after this we leave and make our way back to Waterloo. We are joined by our Chairman, who tries to make a quick escape at one of the stops. However Thomas runs after him and drags him back on to the train. At Waterloo we go for a quick half and Ronnie manages to escape.

Jump in some cabs and head to the Nelsons Retreat in Shoreditch. Juke box goes on, pool is played and pints are consumed. Everyone starts to look a bit worse for wear now. It has been hot today and a couple of people have had one too many. Me being one of those. We then drop our bags at the gaffers and go to the Commercial Tavern. People start to sneak off now. This has been the pub that has sorted the men from the boys........

We then head to Brick Lane and meet up with everybody’s 17^th favourite 1^st teamer, Neil Mordi. Luckily it is only £4 for a can of beer in the place we meet Mordi. Ballers argues with the bar tend that he can buy 6 cans for £5 in the shop around the corner. The bar tend tells Ballers to go there then. Ballers decides to go home instead. We quickly get asked to leave the bar and then head to bedroom bar. We are left with:

Thomas

The Chef

Carriao

Morais

Muzza

Macca

The rest decided enough was enough. I wish I had now as I still feel a bit rough. Got kicked out at 1 and went to a house party. Then went to another house party when we got kicked out of that. Just TT and Morais surviving the whole day. Although I think Gav got lost and ended up at a complete strangers house. He said he didn’t recognise anybody there, but decided to stay none the less. Got home at 6 feeling wretched and went to bed.

PROMOTED TO THE SAL 1ST DIVISION

2011-04-06T13:50:00.003-07:00

JURASSIC PARK

Norsemen FC vs Old Esthameians

2011-04-06T10:51:00.000-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Old Esthameians

Edmonton Sports Ground

April 2^nd 2011

3.00

Mean Norsemen Don't Surrender Any Points

Dear Diary,

Annoyingly woke up early today. Couldn’t get back to sleep, so went downstairs, put the kettle on and watched some kids TV. Kids TV today is rubbish. There is nothing that even comes close to the likes of Super Ted, Going Live, The Racoons etc etc. They just have silly programmes. Got bored of the sillyness quickly and decided to go and lie back in bed. I decided to make a new playlist for the drive to football. I started to put together what I thought was one of my best yet. Later Thomas would spoil the drive by skipping past most songs. He has poor taste. I have put that out there for everyone to read. Jeopardised a starting spot next week, but that had to be said.

Eventually got up and went for a walk. Grabbed some breakfast and then it was time to go home and get ready for the voyage up to Edmonton. It was a nice day so shorts and sunglasses were put on. Got in the car and zoomed off to Edmonton. I say zoomed, it was must just safely drove to Edmonton within the speed limit.

Thomas allowed 3 songs to be played in their entirety. This created an element of tension in the car. Despite Hat watch was over for the season, it is still nice to just have a fun game. The tension created by the track skipping meant Hat watch was overlooked......

Got to Edmonton and met Joe Morris and Ross Davis in the car park. Joe dished out a couple of hugs, whilst Ross just stood there smiling. Ross looked like he had ten too many the night before.

Entered the changing room and saw an old face straight away. Gavin Morais had returned from his South American expedition. He still looks like incredible Hulk, just a very tanned version now.

Touched base with everyone else and then put the blue uniform on. Tajae decided not to iron the kit this week......

We lined up as follows:

GK Brad

LB Muzza

RB Ossie

CB Macca

CB Tajae

LM Hempsey

CM TT

CM Tadd

RM Morais

CF Reggie

CF Leroy

SUBS

Thomas

Leighton

Dan Cairrao

A very strong team this week. Not because Ballers was away, but because Reggie plays his second game in a row for the first time this season. It was a shame that Barry hadn’t turned up today. I think Reggie asked him to stay at home in an attempt to boost his own popularity. I don’t think it worked.

It’s 3.00 and that can only mean one thing. Kick off.

Old Esthameians lined up 3-5-2, whilst Norsemen went for the more traditional 4-4-2. The early proceedings were controlled by Norsemen on a pitch that was dry and dusty in the middle, but luscious and green on the wings. Norsemen managed to exploit the positioning of the Old Esthameians high positioning, with Hempsey and Gav seeing a lot of the ball out wide. However we failed to make any real chances in the first 20 minutes.

On the half hour mark we made our break through. Coleman took a throw in the last 20 yards of the Esthameians half. He was looking for the head of Muzza. Couldnt see much else to be honest as Muzza was standing at the near post. The throw went over Muzza’s head somehow and looked like it was going off for a goal kick. Up steps the man of the moment. Reggie hurls himself at the ball and somehow manages to back head the ball towards the goal. Reggie somehow managed to put spin on the header. The ball span around the goalkeeper at the near post and landed in the back of the net at the far post. Not a pretty goal but they all count. Reggie actually confessed after the game that he didn’t even realise it was a goal. Norsemen 1 - 0 Old Esthameians

From here Norsemen dominated the rest of the half, with Bradley as good as redundant in goal. Despite the dominance in possession, Norsemen were unable to add any more of a lead to the score.

We go in for a chat at half time. Thomas sits down and tells us a story about a Polish orphan. Tadd and Muzza have a cry. To be honest the story is very powerful and moving, but not relevant to the task in hand. Thomas apologises and then tells us to go out and do ourselves proud.

Again Norsemen start strongly. Leroy and Reggie instantly provide problems and questions for the Esthameians defence, which they struggle with. After 15 minutes of pressure Norsemen finally get their just deserved. After some nice play the ball arrived at Ossie’s feet. Ossie laid the ball on to Gav who went on a bit of a run. Gavin took on 2 or 3 players and then passed the ball to TT on the edge of the box. TT had a pop and it went in. To be fair the keeper could have just moved his foot one pace to the left and he would have saved it. Thankfully he didn’t and Norsemen doubled their lead. Norsemen 2 – 0 Old Esthameians.

2 minutes later and Norsemen secure the game. From a Hempsey corner, Reggie nods the ball down and Leroy pounces to lash the ball into the roof of the net. Goal number 10022033040405058693020201 of the season for Leroy. Norsemen 3 – 0 Old Esthameians.

Gav and Hempsey made way for Dan and Leighton. Norsemen continue to look for goals. Reg finally made way for Thomas and we looked to see out the game. 5 minutes form time Tajae has a small altercation with the Esthameians striker. There was some handbags thrown about and both players took a booking.

From the resulting free kick Brad made his first save of the game.

We see out the game and keep our first clean sheet for a long time. The Chef warms us down and we rejoice with pats on the back and high tens.

Now is the time for the most anticipated activity of the day. Willy dance time. Hempsey is so keen he tries to leave out the warm down. The Chef calls him back and makes him do some stretching.

Here is a photo taken from the showers, mid willy dance:

So we finish up with the dancing and put our clothes on for the walk to the club house. The 1’s and 2’s played at home today so there was a good crowd in the club house. Slowly but surely people leave and we end up with Macca, Ross Davis, Steve Morgan, Weaver, Alex Puchalla, Muzza, The Chef and myself playing killer on the pool table. Steve and Ross lose so they have to do a forfeit. It is then suggested that as we are at a football club then we might as well play football drinking games. The game we played was crossbar challenge. The voyage to the basement had to be done first to find a football. A lovely green and yellow ball was found and the teams were forged.

Steve

Ross

Alex

Muzza

Chef

Weaver

Macca

Macca went first and just about managed to get the ball to the goal without it bouncing. Everyone else went reasonably close. Weaver decided to take his shot in his pants. He missed so it made him look like more of a dick. I went for power, narrowly missing. The aim of hitting it hard was to make the other team have to go and fetch the ball. Macca then had another go, which obviously missed. Up stepped Steve Morgan for his second shot. I goaded him to hit it as hard as he could. He did just that and smashed the bar. This backfired as I had to go and retrieve the ball that cannoned back past us. The other 4 mugs had to down their pints though so it didn’t really matter.

The rest of the evening went on in a similar vein until it was just Weaver, Alex and TT left in the club house. A first for myself and Weaver. We got kicked out and made to go to “perfect kebab” by Alex. Perfect kebab was anything but perfect. Didn’t play well with my stomach. I haven’t actually seen Weaver since leaving him on the train, so who knows what it has done to him. Cheers for the suggestion Alex.

Went home and spoke to the Gaffer and Lou for a bit. They kept on asking me questions like “how many have you had?” and “why?” and “when?”

I decided to avoid the questions and go to bed.

Weirside Rangers vs Norsemen FC

2011-03-29T07:05:00.000-07:00

Weirside Rangers vs Norsemen FC

Saturday 26^th March

East Molesey

3.00pm

Uh-Oh, Weir in Trouble, Something's Come Along And It's Burst Our Bubble

Dear Diary,

This is it, the final run in for the league. For some it is the business end of the season, for others it is squeaky bum time! 5 games left and today’s opponents are high flying Weirside Rangers.

Sooooooo...... I woke up and had a bit of breakfast whilst watching England lose at the cricket. Was a waste of everyone’s time and money. Thomas comes home from the gym and we set off for football. Today’s trip from door to door only took 2 hours so that isn’t bad is it....... In two hours you can actually get to Barcelona on a plane. Barcelona is bloody miles away. East Molesey is max 18 miles from Shoreditch.

Met up with everyone outside Vauxhall train station. We had a nice squad of 15 today. Got some skin off of Leroy, Tajae, Mark, Arda and Brad. Gave everyone else a hug. Ossie decided to sit on his own for 15 minutes, despite being able to see everyone outside. Odd lad our Ossie.

Get on the train. As the doors are closing Reggie runs up the stairs and just misses the train. He has to wait on the platform with Ex Norsemen Daniel Gustav Ashley. They have a nice chat (probably) and then Reggie leaves Dan and gets another train. Reggie is growing in popularity but is still a good country mile behind Barry in the popularity contest.

Interesting point from our train journey. Muzza sat next to a mother and her two children on the train. At first the kids just stared at Muzzas head. You could see them thinking to themselves “ how on earth is his head so big?” After a couple of minutes they got scared and moved as close to their mum and as far away from Muzza as they could. After observing the children’s behaviour I then got caught by the heads tractor beam and started asking myself questions like “how” and “why” in regards to the massiveness of Muzza’s head.

Got to the station and Hempsey instantly got us lost. Led us on a wild goose chase. We actually walked past where we needed to go and luckily bumped into Reggie. Reggie was getting out of a taxi. Whilst doing so another gentlemen got out the other side and immediately run off. Reggie didn’t know the guys name. He said he picked the un-named chap up from the station. More like he had attempted to kidnap the guy. The guy saw it as a good chance to escape his captor as there was 15 or so witnesses. Reg looked disappointed when the guy run off. The penny has only just dropped to why this was.

Get changed in a massive changing room. This was the biggest squad for the season and yet the size of this changing room made the squad look small. We lined up as follows:

GK – Brad

LB – Muzza

RB – Ossie

CB – Floody

CB – Tajae

LM – Hempsey

RM – Marko

CM – Tadd

CM – TT

CF – Reg

CF – Leroy

Subs

Macca

Leighton

Arda

Thomas

Dan Cairrao

A nice welcome back for Floody. He has been missed. Not only is a very good footballer, but he is a blimmin nice chap. Apart from that one time at BB Eagles where he offered everyone a lift, only for him to drive off laughing. Marko making his debut for Norsemen on the right wing too. Again another strong turn out by the old boys. Even Radio managed to make his way over. This is one of the biggest commutes for Norsemen so their support is very well appreciated.

The time is 3.00 and that can only mean one thing. Kick off.

Weirside had the better of the opening 5 minutes and used their long ball tactic well. I think they started with a 3-5-2 formation, meaning they had the extra man in central midfield. However after 5 minutes Norsemen had picked their game up and started attacking themselves, winning some throw ins and corners in the Weirside half. Leroy came close from a corner from the right. I think he hit the bar. He may not have, but I seem to remember him doing so. Norsemen then got a throw in on the left hand side of the pitch. TT launched in a throw, only for a Weirside defender to get a big head on the ball. The ball came back out to TT. TT let the ball bounce once and then had a pop at goal. The keeper got down well, but only managed to parry the shot onto the post. The rebound fell nicely to Leroy, who with an open net scored his millionth goal of the season. We go nuts and start jumping around like kids. Weirside 0 – 1 Norsemen.

Marko is substituted for Dan Cairrao. Muzza goes left mid, Dan left back and Hempsey moves over to the right of midfield.

Almost from kick off Weirside send a long ball forward. Floody got up well and won the header. Not sure where but the ref spotted a foul. The ball from the free kick was played out wide and from the cross Brad called for the ball. Floody could have headed it clear but decided he would leave it for Brad. The ball somehow made its way into our goal. Weirside 1 – 1 Norsemen.

Norsemen would have not fancied games like this in the past and would have just rolled over, but not this season. We went straight back up the other end and won a throw in. From the throw in Reggie hit a left footed hook volley into the roof of the net. We went mental. Great finish from Reg. I tried to celebrate with him but he ignored me and run straight for Thomas. The fact that Thomas had his personal body guards around him, meant that Reg couldn’t get close. Instead he jumped on Macca and they made out. Weirside 1 – 2 Norsemen.

The lead didn’t last for long however as Weirside start attacking from kick off. Weirside won something on the left, could have been a free kick, could have been a corner. The ball landed at Tajae’s feet. Tajae doesn’t like kicking it long, so instead started dribbling it out of defence. As the pitch was drier than the Sahara desert, the pitch was very bobbly. Tajae couldn’t keep as close control as usual and as a result was tackled on the edge of the box. The Weirside number 7, who was their best player on the day, hit a shot that looped over Brad in goal. Weirside 2 – 2 Norsemen. All goals could go down as being scrappy or lucky but as my Dad says “A goal is a goal”.

Both sides had half chances in the rest of the half. Leroy and Reggie both playing out of their skin upfront. Hard to choose which one deserved man of the half, if there is such an award.

Ref blows his whistle for half time and we walk over to Thomas. He gives us a nice little pep talk.

We go out with the same side and start the better of the two teams. By this point Weirside are reduced to the long ball. They will probably say that all we have is a long throw. I am pretty sure I threw the ball about 40 times today. My stomach is f@cking killing me as I write this. That may, or may not have something to do with me throwing the football lots. About 20 minutes into the second half Hempsey played a nice ball down the line for Leroy. Leroy latched onto the ball and put in a cross. The cross took a deflection and spun up into the air. Because of the concrete like pitch, the keeper miss read the bounce and completely missed the ball. The ball bounced over the keepers head and into the path of Reg. Reg nervously tapped in from 2 yards. We went bonkers. All I could hear was Tadd shouting and screaming. He was so excited. Weirside 2 – 3 Norsemen.

From there we carried on attacking and Leroy had an excellent volley saved well by the Weirside keeper. With 5 minutes to go Weirside got a free kick just inside our half. The ball was floated right to the back post and Hempseys man nicked in to score a vital header for the home side. Everyone had given everything in this game and had no more to give after the goal went in. Weirside 3 – 3 Norsemen.

The ref blew his whistle and the game finished a draw. Tadd was especially annoyed about drawing. It wasn’t what we come to achieve from today’s game but it wasn’t the worst result. Weirside are a very good team.

Went back to the changing rooms for a shower. Wasn’t the right kind of crowd in the showers to do willy dancing. We had to share them with rugby boys and they are a lot bigger and cooler than football chaps. I’m not saying that they are intimidating; I just didn’t feel like performing for them!

Went to get some grub and Arda suggested we take all the food and go and eat it on our own. That is vintage Arda that is. That boy never fails to surprise me with his deceit and snidyness! Went and ate our sausage and chips and then decide to have a game of spoof. Not before Macca thought it would be ok to have a pop at little Gabriel Ayers. Coupe of people were sick from shock after Macca finished his rant. Bloody Northerners. The loser of spoof not only had to drink a shot, but also had to lie on the floor and let the first 3 people out of the game lay on top of them. The three on top would then take it in turn to say something they disliked about the loser. The first three out were The Chef, Phillip and Tadd. The Chef and Phillip said some pretty harsh things. Tadd is a pansy and just said “I hate war and just hope one day the world can live in harmony”. He is so wet.......

Slowly but surely people leave and in the end it is just Leighton, Tadd, Muzza and myself left. We get some carry outs and walk to the train station. Get drunk and talk about how we are going to go about trying to get promoted. Play some pool in Shoreditch and then spend the next 2 hours getting turned away from bars, because there are too many guys in them already. Brilliant!

Went home and went to bed early.

Norsemen FC vs Alexandra Park

2011-03-21T10:17:00.000-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Alexandra Park

Saturday 19^th March

Edmonton Green

3.00pm

Norsemen Go Two’s Up On Alexandra Park

Dear Diary,

So, again not a lot to report on this morning. Thomas was down in Devon, celebrating his Dad’s 60^th so I was left on my jack this morning. Watched some Soccer AM and had a bagel and then pretty much got ready to leave for football. Walked to the bus stop and got on the bus that terminates at Edmonton Green. Played hat watch on my own. Won comfortably. Score was probably 35-0. It would have been more if my eyes and brain worked quicker, but sadly they don’t. Consequence of being from Essex and having small eyes I guess.

Stupidly didn’t do my research for today’s trip. Forgot Spurs were at home to West Ham. Traffic was shocking. Spent an hour and a half on the bus. Not ideal really. Had some really weird people sit next to me on the bus. Now it was a very nice day and for some reason a gentleman got on wearing a coat that resembled a sleeping bag. He must have been roasting. Got off the bus and started walking to the ground. Half way up Church Street I hear a ‘toot toot’. It was only little Tommy Collier. He let me in his new car. It has electric windows. He seemed disappointed that it was such a nice day and he had to sit on the bench. Surely a good day to sit on the bench. That is what I was thinking to myself anyway.

Met everyone in the bar and had a little chat with the Chef and Gav. Today we had the pleasure of two extra supports. Mrs Hempsey and Mrs Ballinger. They attracted a lot of interest from the old boys. Hempsey managed to get a shocking piece of news from his Mrs later in the day which I will come back to. So I walk to the changing room with Jarrett and Ballers. We all agree we have only had a couple of beers the night before. One of us was lying.

Put a bit of drum ‘n’ bass on in the changing room. Leroy doesn’t like it and puts on some weird pop song. Annoyingly it was on my iPod so it made me look like a dick!

Went out and warmed up with the chef and phil. It was properly hot so we all got a nice sweat on. The line up was as follows:

GK Bradley

LB Carriou

RB Ossie

CB Gav

CB Macca

LM Hempsey

RM Ballers

CM TT

CM Tadd

CF Leroy

CF Jarrett

SUBS

Tomaldinho

Leighton

Arda

A strong starting 10 again........

So it is 3.00pm and time to kick off. Alexandra Park won the toss and get proceedings underway. Within 5 minutes Norsemen were on top of the game but found it hard to get any real momentum. They looked nervous if I am going to be honest. Chances came and went for Norsemen. Leroy looked a bit more dangerous this week, after firing blanks last week. Despite it being a warm day, Leroy still chose to wear his leggings. Funny little lad our Leroy.

With about 30 minutes on the clock we got a break through. A ball was played up top and Jarrett got a good head on the ball. Leroy chased on to the ball and slotted past the Alexandra Park keeper. It was a toe punt down the middle of the goal really. The Alexandra Park defenders were very annoyed that Leroy wasn’t given as off side. He is so damn quick that I doubt they could tell if he was or not.

Norsemen 1 - o Alexandra Park

Shortly after the goal Macca pulled up with an injury and had to come off. Ballers, who was having a decent game at right mid, slipped back into centre back, Hempsey moved to right mid and Tomaldinho come on at left mid. This is where Ballers day went spiralling downhill. I’m not sure if Brad had anything to do in the first half. Maybe a couple of free kicks into the box, but I can’t think of any shots he had to deal with. I don’t think Brad likes holding the ball though as he tries to throw it as soon as he catches it. His kicking was excellent today though.

The first half finished 1-0 with Norsemen starting to look a bit more comfortable and relaxed. We all went into the changing room at half time and had some oranges. Phillip pointed out where we had been going wrong and asked us to correct this. We said we will try our best.

Second half begins and Norsemen start to make some early chances. Dan Carriou, who had been brought up from the reserves last week had been put on free kicks and corners as he was the only person in the squad that kicks it with his wrong foot. We won a free kick early on in the second half, just outside the Alexandra Park box. It was on the right hand side, so naturally favoured the Left footed player. Dan Carriou lined up to take the kick and to be fair to him the ref made him wait a long time to take the kick. Dan stepped up and scuffed it wide. The free kick was so bad that nobody said a word to him. Not even “unlucky mate” or “chin up son” or “better luck next time”. He knew he had done badly so just run back to his position.

Shortly after the ‘free kick incident’ Norsemen won a corner. Dan Carriou stepped up and put in a semi decent ball. The ball was cleared back out to Dan. The ball out was a high one and the sun was high in the sky on this particular day. Did this faze Daniel? No. Daniel calmly brought the ball down on his knee and put in a delicious ball that Leroy claims to have headed in at the far post. Again another one for the dubious goals panel. Looked to me like the defender put it in. I am sure the website will say Lunghu got both though so I will go with that too.

Norsemen 2 – 0 Alexandra Park

Almost from kick off Alexandra Park got the ball up the striker who was their best player on the day. Ballers pushed the striker out to the touch line. If you are reading this report Ballers I would stop now because it isn’t going to be pretty for you. The striker back heeled the ball around Ballers and turned with ease. Ballers slipped and fell on his front. In two words Ballers was ‘mugged off’. The striker made his way into the box, but his shot was blocked. Ballers was still on the floor at this point.

Shortly after this Tadd put Norsemen 3 up. The ball was played in from Ossie (probably wasn’t Ossie but the ball come from that side of the pitch) and Tadd rose above the keeper at the back post and nodded the ball in. The ref said Tadd had used the keeper for leverage. The ref was wrong though. Anyway we should have kept on pressing and scored more goals. With 10 minutes to go the ball was played to Dan Carriou. If you haven’t taken my words of advice already Ballers then I would seriously stop reading now. Dan passed the ball across the back line to Ballers. Ballers had a lot of time now to pass to Ossie or just kick the ball long. He could have even kicked the ball back to Brad or worst case scenario, kick the ball out for a throw. Did he do any of those things? He did not. What Ballers thought he would do was take on the striker. The striker tackled Ballers. As a result of this act of stupidity the striker was one on one with Bradley. To be fair to the Alexandra Park striker, he hit an extremely good shot and scored. Ballers looked annoyed that everyone was angry with him. Not sure why. After the game I managed to get a couple of quotes from the old boys.

Barry Ayres – “I saw the striker slip Ballers a fiver as he took the ball off him”.

Radio – “An utter disgrace”.

Chunky – “If it was up to me he would be in the 8’s. Sadly they won’t take him”.

Can I just illiterate that they are the words of the top end of the Norsemen Hierarchy and in no way quotes that I have just fabricated.

Norsemen 2 – 1 Alexandra Park

We managed to see out the game and get a result. Today was a result that we needed. By no means our best performance but a win none the less. We should have converted more chances today but we didn’t.

Alexandra Park were a better outfit than at the begining of the season. I think if they managed to stay up then they have some good players that could do well.

We all stretched and warmed down with the chef and then made our way to the showers. Just Hempsey and myself taking part in the willy dance show this week. I designed a super hero costume whilst drying myself.

Basically it was just my towel as a cape and that was it. Looked pretty cool. The chef liked it but Dan Carriou didn’t. I bet Dan would quickly change his mind if I turned up to rescue him from a gang of bullies.

We all go into the club house and watch England get humiliated by Ireland. Ballers hands me a bit of paper that he found in Hempseys bag. It was instructions on how Hempsey thought he could improve in training. Bless him.

Ballers Mrs slipped up and let Hempsey’s Mrs know that Ballers was out on the razz last night. Seems like Ballers telling Jarrett and myself that he had only had a couple of beers the night before was total b@llshit.

Get the train back with Dan after the rugby and then carry on heading south to Brixton. Get smashed and then head to a dub step night. A guy in the group of people I was with was probably the campest straight man I have ever encountered.

Best bit about the night was the strobe lighting. No matter what hand life has dealt you or how you are dancing, strobe lighting makes you look cool. I hold my hands up and admit to being a mediocre dancer at best but on the night of 18^th and the early hours of the 19^th March I looked pretty f@cking cool. Only in bursts of 10 seconds though, other than those 10 seconds I looked like a pleb.

Fell asleep on the night bus home. Luckily the last stop was my stop. Walked into the flat and saw the security man dancing to himself in the kitchen. Good job security man, doing your job well there. Took all my clothes off and went to bed.

Old Finchleans vs Norsemen FC

2011-03-17T14:34:00.000-07:00

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.

Norsemen FC vs Alleyn Old Boys

2011-03-11T01:53:00.000-08:00

Norsemen FC vs Alleyn Old Boys

Saturday 5^th March

Edmonton

3.00

Alleyn Bring The Wrong Key

Dear Diary,

This week’s adventure starts in the motherland. Woke up in an alien bed with a cat purring in my face. Push the cat away, it doesn’t like this. Traipse downstairs and get myself a bowl of non descript chocolate cereal. This cereal is normally left for when my niece visits my parents house, however as Thomas doesn’t allow anything that has a trace of carbohydrates, fat, sugar, sodium, potassium or anything that is bad for you, into the house, I thought it was only right to get my child’s cereal fix.

Watch an episode of ‘How do they do that’ on Dave whilst Dickie and Jackie go out to run an errand. Dickie and Jackie are my parents. Next on the list of things to do was head to the Mecca of Essex, Lakeside. Had to get a bed didn’t I. Our port of call would be IKEA. Went to buy a bed and ended up buying £250 worth of stuff, including scented candles! I only use candles for power cuts and i bought ones that smell of vanilla and jasmine. Damn you IKEA and your clever marketing and sales techniques. Ended up being a very annoying experience but more of that story later.

Have a nice coffee and to my surprise hear a mother talking to her baby that she has called Tracey. That child has no chance even at such a very young life! Jump in the car and head to Edmonton. Get stuck in traffic and arrive half an hour later. To my surprise I am not the last to turn up. Tajae and Bradley turn up later. I get a tough time off of the others but they are all jerks so it doesn’t really matter.

Start to warm up and one of the older Norsemen members asks Ballers if he has been painting, referring to the fact that he has a lot of grey hair. Ballers bent over and took it. He did a nervous laugh but didn’t come back with a ginger jibe. We in turn all laugh at Ballers for being a b1tch. Warm up a bit more and then Thomas calls us back in to name the team.

GK Bradley

LB Ballers

RB Ossie

CB Macca

CB Tajae

LM Hempsey

RM Thomas

CM Tadd

CM TT

CF Leroy

CF Jarrett

SUBS

Chris Morgan

Steve Morgan

Leighton

Again another strong starting 10. I have no idea how Ballers keeps getting a starting place. Maybe his parents are on the selection committee. Either way, despite the weakness we still looked like a strong team.

We take to the field against an Alleyn team that looked very similar to the one we played a month ago at their place. The conditions this time being a bit kinder to both teams being as the wind was minimal.

Both teams started well. Nobody really had the upper hand and neither keeper was really tested in the opening 20 minutes. Norsemen applied the more pressure but nothing come from this. About half an hour in and the ball fell to Jarretts feet 30 yards from goal. From where I was standing, it looked like Jarrett was going for goal, however is sliced volley fell perfectly at Leroy’s feet who calmly lobbed the onrushing keeper. I am sure Jarrett meant for that ball.... The Alleyn defender got a toe on the goal before crossing the goal line, however as Leroy looked so excited when he scored; we will give him the goal.

Not much else happened in the first half, apart from the ref being very strict and to the letter of the law. He brandished yellow cards willy nilly. I think 4 people were booked in the 1^st half.

Went in one goal to the good, not that we deserved it. Thomas didn’t tell us off as much as he did the week before, but he did have a little go. We decided that we needed an early goal and that would hopefully win us the match. Thomas made way for Chris Morgan.

The second half started a bit better than the first half had finished. Norsemen quickly got on top and created a few early chances. I think Hempsey took a corner from the right and swung in a nice ball that Alleyn managed to clear to the edge of the box. The ball eventually found its way back out to Hempsey, who delicately lofted a ball back into the box and on to the beautiful head of Macca. Macca stumbled backwards in an attempt to stop the ball from hitting his beautiful face, however in doing so the ball hit him on the crown of the head and from there the ball nestled into the bottom right hand corner of the goal. Macca did a slide on his knees type celebration. The celebration looked better than his goal. He won’t appreciate me saying that but I speak the truth!

Alleyns heads dropped a bit now. A nice Norsemen passing movement ended up with Hempsey having the ball near the half way line on the far right of the pitch. Hempsey curled a lovely ball round the back of the defence for Leroy to latch on to and neatly slot past the keeper. Best goal of the game. Not sure how many goals that is for the little man now but it is a lot! That lad is dangerous in front of goal and around Dominican women.

Alleyn became increasingly frustrated with the ref. The goalkeeper gave away two free kicks on the edge of his box for handling the ball outside of his box for goal kicks. He was booked for the 2^nd one. He felt hard done by, however Dickie told me both decisions were correct by the ref and I would always go by his word.

Finally Ballers made way for Steve Morgan. It surprises me every week how he stays on for so long. I have this theory. Because he is always fleeing the scene of a tackle, people only notice him at half and full time. After he kicks the ball out of play, he runs away and doesn’t give Thomas enough time to sub him.

With 15 minutes remaining Alleyn were awarded a penalty. A bit of a soft one to be honest. The Alleyn forward stumbled in the box and ran into TT. The ref said he was pushed and awarded a penalty. To be fair to the Alleyn penalty taker, it was a good penalty; however Bradley got his fingertips to it. If he had stopped it, then it would have been one of the best penalty saves I have ever seen with my own eyes.

TT then made way for Leighton and Norsemen saw the game out. Alleyn felt a little cheated by the ref, however Norsemen had the better of the play and finished their chances. Alleyn are a good outfit and shouldn’t be where they are in the league. Think they just need a bit of good luck and belief.

Had a shower, but forgot to do the winky dance routine. Have to try and remember that for next week. Went into the club house and saw the old boys. Barry asked to be mentioned in this week’s report so here you are Barry Ayres; this is your 2 seconds of Norsemen fame. Barry is the father of Reggie Ayres. Not only is Barry still better than Reggie at football, he is also more popular.

Got a lift home from the folks and managed to fit the bed into the lift at the flat luckily. Put it in my room to make and discovered it was a king size bed. This would have been ok, but I have a double mattress. What a nob. Got to go back to Lakeside and inevitably have another cup of tea in the presence of Tracey again. Brillifuckingant.

Went round Paulas flat for a house party and got smashed. Tried to win money playing pool, but failed miserably. Thomas turned up with Lou at 10 and we had some champagne. Somebody managed to break the toilet seat. Not sure how. At 3 I went to bed and had a nice dream.

Good night world.

NORSEMEN FC VS HSBC

2011-03-03T08:03:00.000-08:00

Norsemen FC vs HSBC

Saturday 26^th February

Edmonton Sports Ground

2.30

Norsemen hit bankers for six

Dear Diary,

Woke up today at a stupid time and was unable to go back to sleep. Very annoying. Decided to watch a film about a boy in a mental illness hospital ward. The film has probably been placed under the comedy umbrella; however it wasn’t very funny, despite having the beardy bloke from the Hangover in it. It filled the time before breakfast. Thomas arrived home from Louise’s and we had a nice chat. Myself, Thomas and his Dad then walked to get a lovely breakfast. Thomas’ Dad chose the controversial breakfast of kippers. I’m not going to lie, they smelt really fishy. Not surprising as they are fish I guess.

Went home and packed our bags and then set off for Edmonton. Thomas and myself invented a little game a year back called “Hat watch”. Now this game is probably my favourite game bar none. I am going to lay down the particulars of the game in case anybody feels like they want to play it.

Goal

To spot as many men wearing large hats in one pass of a designated area.

Rules

The route is the A10 and starts at the traffic lights of Manor Road and ends at the traffic lights of St Ann’s Road. Any spotting’s outside of this area is rewarded with extra points as the men are deemed to be out of “Jurisdiction”. The gentleman must be wearing a large hat and must be of adult status.

Ok so the points are allocated as such:

A man spotted on foot - 1 point

A man spotted on a bike - 2 points

A man spotted in a car - 2 points

A man spotted on public transport - 10 points

A man spotted outside Jurisdiction - Double points

Any false calls - Deduct 1 point

The points tally is loosely kept by the passenger (Me) and then once the end traffic lights have been crossed the victor is declared. Thomas seems to favour the darker conditions. My eyes are too small to identify the personnel on the dimly lit streets. I don’t favour any conditions but I win from time to time. This game isn’t all too dissimilar to playing the different colour car counting game whilst on a long trip.

Back to Saturday 26^th February and we are approaching the Manor Road traffic lights. The weather is grey, rainy and cold. We thought this would be an issue for “Hat watch” as they wouldn’t want to get their hats wet. Rightly so too as they look like they cost a fair bit. Problem solved with the addition of a custom made anorak to allow them to wear their hats. Probably one of the most underrated inventions of the 21^st century. Thomas was victorious this time with a score of 8 to my 5.

Ok so eventually we get to Edmonton and we park up. Arrive a little bit later than everyone else and as a result everyone is already in the changing room. Cass is wearing Ski gear which he now wears to ride his moped. It is an interesting outfit to say the least. What is nice is that his ski jacket is the same colour as his bike. It is a pleasant compliment. Brings out the bikes wheels..... I dish out some high fives. I purposely ignore Arda’s hand. He is still in my bad books for cheating at training on Tuesday. I have already decided to forgive him, however he won’t be off the hook until later in the day. He tried to laugh it off but you could see in his eyes that he was hurting. We get changed and the Chef puts on some of his music. It is a bit ropey but it is good background noise.

Once everyone has changed into their uniforms, we jog out to warm up. A slight problem this week, the 1^st team pitch is extremely moist. So much so that there are puddles covering most of it. A decision is made by the gaffer to play on the far Grocers pitch. Fingers crossed we don’t get rain this week so we can start using the nice pitch again. The Grocers pitch is still moist, don’t get me wrong, but it is a lot drier than the main pitch. The centre of the pitch in particular is bad, but the most talented Norsemen play’s centre midfield so it doesn’t affect his game much. If anything it merely brings him back down to mortal status.....

We warmed up in what seemed to be a pond. Thought it would be a good idea to lay down and do some stretches. It wasn’t.

Macca turned up to watch this week in his wellington boots. His wife probably made him wear them.

The team was as follows:

GK Michael

LB Muzza

RB Ossie

CB Tajae

CD Reed

LM Hempsey

RM Ballers

CM Tadd

CM TT

CF Leroy

CF Jarrett

Subs:

Arda

Bradley

Weaver

Thomas

Again a very strong starting 10. Ballers has paid his annual subs just like everyone else so I guess he deserves to play. Bit annoying that Thomas keeps selecting him to be honest but then such is life.

It is 2.30 and time to kick off. HSBC have the better of the opening encounters with a couple of long range efforts. However Norsemen quickly raise their game and take control. The game being played on a small pitch meant that the defensive lines were able to be played high. This forced Norsemen to try and play the ball over the top for Leroy and Jarrett to run on to. After 10 minutes Muzza took a throw in on the left hand side of the pitch to TT, who delightfully chested it back to Muzza’s feet. Muzza hoofed it up field for Leroy to chase. Leroy used his pace to get away from his marker and with the penalty box in sight Leroy was scythed down by the last HSBC defender. The ref had no choice but to send the HSBC player off and award Norsemen with a free kick on the edge of the box. Hempsey passed up the chance of taking the free kick to Jarrett. Jarrett took a lazy run up to the ball and hit a firm shot at the keeper. The keeper made the save, but fumbled it. Leroy was on the scene to convert the loose ball and make it 8 goals in 4 games. I believe at this point HSBC changed to the 4-4-1 formation.

5 minutes later and Norsemen had made it 2-0. Some nice interchange play in the middle released Leroy who rounded the keeper and tapped it in. This may not have been how the goal went in but that is how I remember it in my head. Either way it was Norsemen 2-0 HSBC.

Norsemen took their foot of the pedal at this point, even though it was barely on it. I would say that we went from 1^st gear, into neutral. The game became sloppy and Norsemen almost gave up, thinking that the game was already won as we had a 2 goal lead over 10 men. Up steps Gav Reed and Ballers. Gav Reed collected the ball in defence and played a one-two with Os. He then thought let’s try this again. Unfortunately he tried it with Ballers. Ballers obviously couldn’t return the ball to Gav’s feet. The ball fell to the HSBC number 7 who slotted the ball through for their lone striker. For once Tajae was on the wrong side of the defender (this is the first time I have seen him make such an error). The HSBC attacker out muscled Tajae (to be fair to Tajae the lad was a unit) and hit a hopeful effort from outside the box. Michael misjudged the bobble in front of him and the ball somehow ended up in the back of the Norsemen goal. Norsemen 2 -1 HSBC.

The game died out even more before half time. All in all not a spectators game. The gaffer was not happy and made the squad run back to the changing room at half time. This was annoying as we couldn’t have been any further away from the changing rooms. I can’t remember what was said but we did get a telling off. There was finger pointing and swearing. My mum reads this from time to time so I can’t put the rude words in.

We then begin the epic trek back to the Grocers pitch for the second half. HSBC look baffled to why we have taken so long.

The second half begins and Norsemen start with a bit more urgency. I would say we started in 3^rd gear. Within 5 minutes Norsemen had grab the game by the coin purse and started to dominate possession and attack. Despite the pitch being bad in the middle, the ball was played around nicely and we started to carve out chances. *

About 10 minutes into the second half Leroy made it 4-1. Again not sure what happened exactly but I will just say that Leroy was played through and he managed to slot it past the keeper.

2 minutes later and a nice Ossie ball over the top was met by the run of Leroy. Leroy held the ball up in the box and waited for Jarrett to make his way into the middle of the area. The ball was played to Jarrett who thought about hitting it first time but didn’t. Jarrett then proceeded to just stand in the box with the ball and take his sweet time. It look almost as if he didn’t like scoring. Eventually he decided to smack it into the net. His hardest chance of the game and he scored it. Well done Paul.

Another 5 minutes later and the game was won. A nice ball from TT found Hempseys feet. Hempsey in turn played it up to Leroy’s feet. Leroy turned and beet his man. He then passed it to the HSBC keeper, who to be fair had a good game. The ball somehow managed to slip through the keepers arms. When I say pass I actually do mean a pass. It was a weak excuse for a shot. Norsemen 6-1 HSBC. That is 11 in 4 for little Leroy now. Well done him. Leroy was then replaced by Arda.

The foot was then well and truly taken off the gas and the game became messy and ugly. HSBC had a nice attack up the left wing. The HSBC mugged off TT and Hempsey and made his way to the touch line. He then had a shoot/cross which Muzza decided to catch. Ref had no option but to give HSBC a penalty. Muzza moaned about it not being a penalty but it blatantly was. Having said that the ref didn’t give Norsemen 2 stone cold penalty calls. I think the ref felt like he had to make up for the early sending off of the HSBC player though. The penalty was despatched very well by the chap who mugged off TT and Hempsey. Norsemen 6-2 HSBC.

TT made way for Thomas. Norsemen had a couple of chances in the last 10 minutes but by this time everyone had given up. The ref blew his whistle and Norsemen had earned another 3 points.

*Ballers tackled a goal in and put his goal tally back to 0 for the year.

We all had a shower. I somehow managed to become the boot cleaning b1tch. I must have cleaned 6 pairs. This meant no time to show off the new willy dance. Tadd had a 40 minute shower with his flannel.

We all got drunk in the bar and watched a very mediocre England vs France rugby match. Travelled back to Shoreditch with Thomas’ dad. Stopped off at my lady friend’s house for a trip to the little boy’s room. She looked very surprised by the flying visit. Met Jarrett and Stu in the pub and had a jolly good time talking about the 3D wallpaper. It looked like corrugated Iron, but it wasn’t. It was a little bit like a Paul Daniels trick.

Thomas and Lou then met us for some more drinks. Lou left to go and hang out with a Ladies football team in Soho and we made our way to Brick Lane for some food.

As soon as we hit the Lane we were offered numerous offers. After some time to consider the offers we noticed Tom and Jarrett had already been dragged into a restaurant so we thought we should follow them. The deal they were offered was one free beer. This free beer happened to be a thimble of beer. Oh well you win some, you lose some. Food was average. The turning point came when we realised we couldn’t pay by card. Conveniently the restaurant had an ATM in it. Why would it not! This ATM was placed nicely next to our table. Some klutz only went and left some money in it. I think the saying goes “money goes to money”.

Thomas used his animal instinct of spotting money and spotted the crisp £10 note. We took it, I am not afraid to admit it. Like the other saying goes “Finders, keepers, losers, weepers”. Finished the meal and went home to bed.

Night world.

Crouch End Vampires VS Norsmen FC

2011-02-23T05:58:00.000-08:00

Crouch End Vampires vs Norsemen FC

Saturday 19^th February

Crouch End

2.30

Norsemen Say Fangs Very Much

Dear Diary,

Another Saturday and another game of football. I wake up for the first time in the new flat. Bit of a strange feeling waking up in an alien environment. Think about doing something but then think to have a wash first. Lucky I did think about it as Thomas walks into the flat as I walk to the bathroom. I pack my bag and then follow Thomas to his car. We climb in and drive to his lady friend’s house in Mile End. Lou has kindly cooked us a slap up full English. She is blimmin brilliant. Thomas has a dance to Bros’ “when will I be famous”. I am going to risk a starting position next week with my next comment. Thomas looked incredibly gay singing and dancing to Bros. There I said it. I can’t take it back now.

Finish our breakfasts and notice we are running late so jump into the sports car and drive to Crouch End. Sat nav was playing up so just had to guess how to get to Crouch End from Mile End. We managed to do this via the North circular. Arrive at Crouch End’s game with the rain pouring down. I had a gut feeling that Macca wouldn’t fancy these conditions to watch his team. Meet everyone in the club house and do the normal high fives, handshakes, hugs etc. Everyone has different requirements for greeting, depending on how camp, masculine, frigid they are. Just one quick observation to be mentioned. James turned up hanging from the night before and looked/smelt like a tramp......

We all walk to the changing room to put our blue uniforms on. We meet one of Norsemen’s favourite children in the changing room. Mr Reggie Ayres. A true blue legend. He gets changed and puts his gay little gloves on....... The question on everyone’s lips is “where is Macca?” Muzza assures us that he will be along later as Macca dropped off the kit to Muzza earlier in the day.

I think their conversation went a little bit like this:

(Macca arrives at Muzza’s house in his camp little car. He gets out the car and then gets the kit out of the boot. He then prances up to Muzza’s door and rings the bell.)

Muzza- “Just a minute”

Macca-“Take your time lad”

(Muzza opens the door)

Macca-“Ey up”

Muzza-“alright mate”

(Muzza gives Macca a kiss on the cheek)

Macca-“Just dropping the kit off to you like and will then come down at 2 to watch like”

(Macca thought to himself that the weather didn’t look kind. He thought to himself it would be a perfect opportunity to stay at home with his wife and play dress up.)

Muzza-“ok mate I will tell everyone to expect to see your pretty little face about 2 then?”

Macca-“Sound”

(Macca made his mind up at this point to stay at home and not watch his “beloved” Norsemen commence battle against Crouch End. Basically he bottled it.)

(Macca kisses Muzza on the cheek and then off he minces to his car)

(Muzza walked back in doors, dropped the kit on the ground and then went to drop the kids off at the pool.)

Whilst changing, Muzza gets a text from Macca:

Sorry mate, not going to make it. Hugs x

Unbelievable!

Once changed, we slowly jog out to have a kick about. There is quite a big problem though. The 1^st team pitch is completely water logged. Tadd sees this as a minor obstacle and decides to run on the pitch and chase the ball around on his own. You could put that boy in a yard with a ball on a string and he would keep himself entertained for days.

Bugger. This is not fun at all. Not only have we all traipsed over to Crouch End, but we have also put all our kit on. Now we are being faced with not being able to play. Bit poor really. If there was a pitch inspection in the morning then they would have clearly been able to see the pitch wasn’t playable. We all start moaning and decide to walk over to the back pitches to see what the other pitches are like. We meet Thomas tip toeing back across the pitches as we arrive. He doesn’t have a hopeful look on his face. Maybe he is sad that he had to leave midway through his Bros song. It is probably because none of the pitches are playable though. The Crouch End team are on one of the pitches with brooms and pitch forks, trying in vain to get rid of all the water. In fairness their attempts were appreciated as everyone wanted to play. However I was watching one chap attempting to pitch fork a puddle. To say the effort being put in was minimal would be generous. On the other hand another lad was brooming the puddles like a mad man. For the next 25 minutes we discuss if the game will be on or not. It was a bit like an episode of loose women (minus the vaginas).

The chef starts to warm us up. We start by doing some running and then we attempt to do some ball work. Between the running and the ball work we are given a couple of minutes. We all stand around in a circle and kick the ball about. For some reason we attempt two balls at the same time. Ballers thinks he has the right to muck about and walk into the centre of the circle. It was put to a quick vote and the decision was to punish him. I took the responsibility into my own hands on behalf of my team mates to discipline him. I attempted to fire a warning shot at him to get him to return to his station. Just like a farmer would do if he saw a fox hanging his livestock. Unfortunately due to my limited ability the warning shot hit Ballers straight in the face. I say unfortunately but it was quite funny..... Ballers clutched his face and was trying so hard to hold back the tears. Bless his little cotton socks. I felt bad, so I walked over to him and gave him a little hug and rub f his hair. I did see a tear but I decided to keep that between us. He is a brave little soldier. What he lacks in football ability, he makes up for in bravery. It is an urban Norsemen myth that Ballers was raised by a clan of brave badgers. How true that is I have no idea but I certainly like the idea of it.

We finish warming up and then Thomas gathers us in for the team talk. We lined up as follows:

GK-Michael

LB-Muzza

RB-Ossie

CB-Tajae

CB-Reed

LM-Hempsey

RM-Ballers

CM-TT

CM-Tadd

CF-Leroy

CF-Jarrett

Subs:

Reggie

Arda

Bradley

I think everyone would agree that we started with a very strong starting 10 and Ballers. The ref did a pitch inspection and allowed the game to be played. He did stipulate that the game would be stopped if it started raining. We all did our anti rain-dance and then kicked off the game.

I am not going to beat around the bush; the pitch was in a bad state. Lots of puddles and sticky mud.

The game kicked off around about 2.30. Norsemen had kick off and straight away the ball was played over to Ossie. He thought it would be a good idea to try and recreate our goal from last week. He played a delicious ball over the top for somebody to run on to and lash into the back of the net. Unfortunately that somebody was Ballers. We all know how difficult he finds football. Ballers thought better of scoring and decided to skew the ball off somewhere near the corner flag for a Crouch End goal kick.

Despite the lack of grass on the pitch, Norsemen tried their hardest to get the ball down and play some football. To be fair to Crouch End they did too. This proved little joy in the middle of the pitch, but the wide players had a bit more joy. Crouch End has some handy players and they managed to forge out a couple of half chances early on. Norsemen looked the more dangers of the teams and on the 20 minute mark they made a breakthrough. A free kick from the right was swung in by Ossie, Muzza had a couple of attempts at putting it in the goal. He obviously couldn’t complete the task so Leroy stepped up to the plate and dispatched it with ease.

Crouch End 0-1 Norsemen.

10 minutes later and we had extended our lead to 2-0. A long throw from TT found either the head of Jarrett or Muzza at the near post. The resulting header fell to the feet of little Leroy who again slotted the ball home from close range. Neither goal aesthetically pleasing but they all count....

Crouch End 0-2 Norsemen.

Personally my favourite bit of the half was doing a sliding tackle that lasted for about 10 seconds. The result of the sliding tackle meant I gained roughly 2 stone in weight due to the mud on my Norsemen uniform. Not ideal but fun none the less.

At half time it was evident that a couple of players were not enjoying the conditions. Michael the keeper winged about not liking mud, despite being a keeper! Tajae and Leroy also looking sad at the fact that they had to play in the muddy conditions. Thomas was happy with our performance so he spoke to us nicely and then sent us back out to score some more goals and see out the game.

Crouch End must have had smoke blown up their bottoms by their manager as they started much brighter. Their formation had been changed and they looked a new team. The conditions in the second half had become almost unplayable in parts and our defence found it much harder to judge the flight and role of the ball due to the conditions. 10 minutes into the second half and Crouch End found a life line. A ball was pumped up the pitch and Norsemen midfield and defence wasn’t able to deal with the danger. The ball fell to the Crouch End left winger on the edge of the box. The Crouch End player hit a nice shot. The boggy box didn’t allow Michael to jump for the ball and as a result the ball flew into the roof of the net.

Crouch End 1-2 Norsemen.

Norsemen started to panic at this point and Thomas lost his voice from shouting orders. Despite being a goal to the good we played like we were losing. Norsemen still tried to play football, despite the conditions not allowing them to do so. This mentality was eventually what punished us. Muzza picked up the ball on the halfway line and started to drive with the ball (very slowly mind). He played a ball infield to TT. With the conditions as they were, this turned out to be a bad ball as the ball got stuck in the mud and TT was dispossessed as he overcooked his run in childish anticipation. The ball was played out to the right for the Crouch End winger. TT tried his hardest to recover the ball but it was a wasted effort. The Crouch End winger played a hopeful ball into the box which seemed to ping pong around the defence. The ball was then volleyed in by the Crouch End striker from 6 yards.

Crouch End 2-2 Norsemen.

At this point the game stepped up a notch or two and tempers were being lost all over the pitch. The ball got pumped up the pitch by the Crouch End defence. It became stuck in the mud and was there to be won by both the Crouch End striker and Reedo. Both players threw themselves into the tackle. To be fair I would say this as I am a Norsemen player and was probably the closest person on the pitch to the tackle but I thought it was a fair tackle. On reviewing the Crouch End players leg he didn’t get stamped on by Reed but it was not malicious at all. The Crouch End lad went mental, and probably had the right to as it looked like it did hurt. Gav sh1t himself and backed off quickly. Think he learnt that number from Ballers! Suddenly the whole Crouch End team thought they had to get revenge and tried to elbow Gav. I don’t think Gav enjoyed the last 20 minutes as the Crouch End sideline all said they were going to kill him. The Crouch End striker had to go from his injury. This was probably a blessing in disguise for Norsemen as he had changed the game when upfront and all of the productive play was going through him.

Norsemen teams of yesteryear would have bottled it at this point and would have just pulled down their pants and waited for it. Don’t get me wrong, we were shaky for the next 5 minutes but after that we composed ourselves and went about the task in hand again.

Around the 80 minute mark Jarrett went on a personal mission to win the game for Norsemen. He gathered the ball on the left flank and jinxed his way into the box, twisting and turning. He engineered a path to the touch line and fired a cross across the Crouch End box. The ball landed once again at Leroy’s feet. He thought twice about scoring as he knew he would have to get a jug in for scoring a hat-trick. Luckily Leroy came to his senses and kicked the ball in the net from 2 yards out. Yesssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss. Leroy run off and did a little slide. We all did the same and had lots of fun. Crouch End looked absolutely gutted as they had deservedly fought their way back into the game.

Crouch End 2-3 Norsemen.

We managed to see out the remaining 10 minutes for the victory. Lots of sliding tackles took place in these 10 minutes......

The ref blew his whistle and Norsemen had won the game. Gav run over to Thomas and waited for a ring of Norsemen players to surround him before he made his way back to the club house.

Unfortunately none of the subs got on today as it was such a tight match. A lot of respect for those 3 to take the time out of their Saturdays to come and watch us play!

We go back to the changing room and have an extremely hot shower. Then we have a nice plate of rice and bones and Leroy gets his jug in. The little chap has now bagged 7 in his last 3 games. Gav hides himself in the corner and hopes the Crouch End chap doesn’t spot him.

Climb into Thomas’ sports car and drive home. Listen to Bruce Springsteen and Dire Straits on route. Get home and go to meet my lady friend. Have a nice chat and then I head over to meet Gav and Thomas in the pub. Have some heavily overpriced premium foreign larger and play some pool very badly. In this particular pub there are lots of nudey women paintings. Gavin and myself take a slow walk around the room and class the painted ladies on their boobies and faces. A lot of these ladies are from the 1800’s so have the fuller build. One lady has nice perky ones but they point in weird angels. I am going to blame the artist for that as they kind of defied the laws of physics. After that Joe Morris decides to join us for half an hour as he tries to persuade us to go to a party in Shoreditch. None of us are interested so his attempts are in vein. Joe is heavily intoxicated and talks less sense than he normally does. He tries to plead his case to Thomas as to why he believes he should be called up to the first team. He claimed he could play in any position. I give Joe a hug after this outrageous claim and decide enough is enough and it is bed time.

All in all an interesting day and Norsemen sit back at the top of the table. Things are getting tight up there so it is important we keep winning. Not that anyone goes out to draw or lose. Since playing at Norsemen we always bottle it at this point in the season and narrowly avoid getting promoted. This year needs to be different and I believe with the current team we can get up. That’s all I have to say. Saturday 19^th February complete.

Night world.

Old Esthameians VS Norsemen FC

2011-02-15T09:02:00.000-08:00

Old Esthameians vs Norsemen FC

West Ham

Saturday 12^th February 2011

Norsemen Suffer Esthameia Attack

Dear Diary,

Another Saturday and another day of football and beers. Woke up early with a pain in my foot. Heroically played football for my work yesterday and got kicked on top of the foot. Could barely put my foot on the ground and as a result had to send the dreaded text to the gaffer to say I was out. Unfortunately Tommy Morgan also had to drop out on the day. Throughout the day I heard various reasons for the drop out. Not sure what one to believe.

Breakfast was a simple egg on toast. Nothing fancy but it filled the hole none the less. Said goodbye to the Mrs and head round to see Thomas. On route I get a call from Thomas and Neil. They are both sitting in the Albion enjoying breakfast. I get there and Tom heads to the lav. He was in there for a good 10 minutes so you make your own mind up what he was doing. Having said that I have lived with Thomas for over a year now and he is normally a quick pooer. Just something you come to observe after living with somebody for that amount of time. Dobbo on the other hand would take 25 minutes to perform his task. He would often try and attempt to open the toilet door and hold a conversation. The only problem being his attention span being 5-10 seconds. He would ask the same question 15 times and I would stop listening to him. Back to the Albion and Neil is insisting he isn’t paying for Thomas’ breakfast. He eventually forks out for both breakfasts. I buy myself a large cookie for being on best behaviour and we all walk back to the flat. Neil goes home and Thomas and myself set out on a task to find a mop. You wouldn’t think this would be hard right. Wrong.

First port of call is the Old Street Argos. No joy. We then drive to Sainsbury’s in Angel. No joy. Head into Angel on foot and visit 4 or 5 shops. None having mops. Our last hope was a discount shop. One of those shops that has one of almost everything. Everything is covered in dust and some things are ridiculously overpriced. Other things being a “bargain” as most posters dotted around the shop like to call it. They have mops. Spiceworld. However these mops aren’t to Thomas’ liking and he ponders on purchasing it whilst rubbing the moppy bit. I lose interest quickly and look for joke presents for Muzza as it is his 31^st today. Minding my own business and looking at the kids toys a lady walks up to me and asks me “where are the bin bags?” I look at her with the most obvious ‘F@ck knows’ look I can pull and tell her “don’t work here.” She looks at me oddly and just walks off. I am hoping she is one of the mentals as the store was clearly owned and run by an Indian family. Now I have been mistaken for a lot of races in my time on this planet; Malaysian, Thai, Chinese, Korean, Japanese, Polish, Spanish, Kiwi, Italian, Mongolian, Cambodian, Argentinean, Serbian, Turkish to name just a few, but Indian is not one of them. I walk back to Thomas and he tells me “it's ok my builder is going to pick one up.” Brilliant! We get back into the car and go home.

Thomas picks up his footballing gear and we jump back into the car and zoom off to West Ham. Get to West Ham station and Thomas jumps out the car to pick up some pain killers. For some reason he locks the car whilst I am still sitting in there. Now I understand being in West Ham you take a little more care with your possessions, but the top was down on the car. Around this time Ossie drives past and parks up as he is lost. Turns out the pitch was 100 meters further down the road. Ossie attempts to park up in front of Toms car. He makes a right pigs ear of the reversing. After driving into the curb 3 times, Ossie opts to get out the car and walk over to Toms car. I attempt to get out but the doors are locked. Ossie reaches over and shakes my hand. At this point the car alarm goes off. Instead of Ossie going to tell Tom to turn it off, he stands by the car for a couple of seconds and then walks slowly back to his car. Cheers mate! It’s ok though because Karma got him back at the beginning of the game. Ossie completed 0 out of his first 10 passes........

Thomas comes back empty handed and turns the alarm off. We drive 100 meters down the road and get out of our respective cars. We then head over to the rugby club house and meet up with the Chef, Taddy Waddy and Muzza. We then head back to the changing rooms. Now these changing rooms had the same builder as the bank of England vaults and Fort Knocks. Had to get through about 3 looked doors before we got into the changing rooms. The changing room itself was interesting. It wasn’t quite a sauna but it wasn’t far off. It was a very tall room, with armour plated windows at the top. These gave the illusion that you wasn’t standing in a prison! Somebody had tried to break these windows to get in though. The problem being that it would be impossible to get down from or back up to. Robbers are idiots!

Ok so this is how we lined up today:

GK Bradley

RB Ossie

LB Macca

CB Reed

CB Tajae

LM Muzza

CM Leon

CM Taddy Waddy

RM Thomas

CF Mordi

CF Leroy

SUBS

Arda

Everyone was excited about Ballers absence. So much so, 4 of the old boys made the voyage from Edmonton to watch us play. Spirits were high now that the chink in the armour was away.

It is 2:30.00 and the game is about to commence. 2:30.16 and the game is stopped. Why you ask? Well Norsemen kicked off. The ball was fed out to Thomas who played a lovely long ball upfront to Leroy. Leroy latched on to the ball on the far right of the oppos box and deliciously stroked the ball into the far corner. Norsemen one up. That time is from the official Phillip watch. I watched him skip back up the line singing “16 seconds, 16 seconds, we scored in 16 seconds.” It wasn’t as gay as it sounds though.........

Straight after this Esthameians upped their game. To be honest their game could have been that high already, it’s just they hadn’t touched the ball yet. Norsemen always struggle against Esthameians. They have a style of play that we find hard to deal with. I wouldn’t say it was kick long and run but it is very similar to that of the old Arsenal long ball tactics. Ball over the top and let the pacey forwards run onto it. To be fair to them they are good at it and it clearly works for them. They work hard and keep it extremely simple. The pitch didn’t help Norsemen’s style and we found it very difficult to get the ball down and play football.

Around about the 15 minute mark Esthameians found a way back into the game. I am going to quickly take you back to 10 minutes before kickoff. The ref come over to the Norsemen group and went through the rules of the game and how he likes the game played. Now these are the very words that came out of the referees mouth “I will give the attacker the advantage where I can so don’t stop.” So basically what he is saying is that he won’t be playing off sides....... Seems weird but hey what do I know about refereeing. Oh yes that’s right I am a qualified referee.

Anyway back to the game and the Esthameians striker is put through. He is a good 2 or 3 yards off side. Our back two naturally stop as it is clearly off side. The Esthameians chap has a free run on goal and manages to slide it past Bradley who got a hand on it. 1-1.

The rest of the half was one way after the goal and Norsemen had a string of corners and crosses that should have been put to bed. Leroy got on the end of a sublime Mordi cross only for the goalkeeper to make a superb save. Leon headed just over from a corner. As a half I think Norsemen deserved to go into the break a couple of goals to the good, but this wasn’t to be the case. At half time Reed was replaced by Arda. Macca moved across to centre back and Muzza moved back to his comfort zone at left back. Arda now took up his place on the left wing.

The second half begun and Esthameians had a slight breeze behind them this half. This allowed them to exploit their style of play. 15 minutes into the half and the ball fell to one of the Esthameians midfielders feet. He composed himself and took a great shot. Bradley had little chance to save it. Luckily the ball struck the bar and went straight up into the air. The ball seemed to stay in the air for about 10 seconds. Basically it defied the laws of basic physics by staying in the air for so long. Bradley was sluggish getting up from the save. Luckily Muzza was there to head the ball off the line. Unfortunately the ball fell to an Esthameians player, who in turn had a great effort blocked by the returning Bradley. It was a great save. All of this was in vein as the ball fell again to another Esthameians player and he in turn blasted the ball into the net. To be honest we went to sleep and didn’t react quick enough to the danger. Esthameians showed great determination and energy throughout the game.

This was a wakeup call for Norsemen. The formation was changed to 3-5-3 and we went for it. This left us bare at the back and Esthameians missed a couple of glorious chances to finish the game off. One miss was probably the miss of the season in the SAL. The right winger did so well to cut in twice and evade challenges, only to trip over the ball when one on one with the keeper.

Minutes after this came the play of the game. One of Esthameians long balls was sliced high out of the pitch. Barry Ayres, who had just admitted to rupturing his knee ligaments on Thursday, saw the opportunity to put a bit of flair back into the game. With such grace and composure, Barry allowed to the ball to drop across his body and Berbatovesq controlled the ball with such ease. Bosh, just like that the ball was ready to be picked up and thrown back in. Unfortuantely Muzza's pace let him down and it took a further 10 seconds for Muzza to get to Barry and pick up the ball.

We went close a couple of times. Arda missed a good chance, but to be fair to the Esthameians keeper, he made a fantastic save. Leroy scuffed an effort wide and Macca had a header that went agonisingly wide.

At the end of the day both teams had their chances and both could have won the game. I would say Norsemen played the better football, but then I would as I play for them. Esthameians seemed like they wanted it more though and you could see how much the victory meant to them at full time as they celebrated. That doesn’t happen much in the SAL. They deserved it. They took the unbeaten record away from Norsemen. Hopefully this gives us a big kick up the arse and makes us realise we have to fight for this league if we want it. We had a lot of players out this week for various reasons, however the team that was put out for the game was more than capable of securing victory.

After the game I guess everyone had a shower but I didn’t stay in the changing room for long as it was a tad too hot for my liking. Didn’t hear of any willy dance stories so I guess they didn’t take place. Shame really.

Had some Chilly and chips in the club house and watched a lady boy set up the room for a party with his/her friends. I’m not actually being out of order and saying an ugly girl looked like a man. It was an actual lady boy. I am going to name the lady boy Dennis for the purpose of this story. James wanted to quickly flirt with the Dennis so he pretended he needed to do a wee as we left. Funny how is wee only lasted 10 seconds. He then came through the setting up area and Dennis asked James if he wanted to party. James giggled and Muzza had to pull him away. James looked sad.

Being Muzzas 31^st, James, Taddy Waddy and myself decided to jump in Taddy Waddys van and head back to the Norsemen clubhouse for a drink. I had to sit in the back of Taddy Waddys work van for the journey. Not only did the back of the van look like a jumble sale full of crap, it was pitch black. I had to sit in these conditions for about half an hour. Not ideal. What did cheer me up was finding some really sh1t shoes of Taddy Waddy in the back of the van. He got a little bit of stick from us 3 for them!

Got back to the clubhouse and went blind in one eye from rubbing up against some asbestos in the pitch blackness of the van. We get a jug in and watch the spurs game with the 3’s and 4’s. Little Tommy Collier joins us and we talk about where the 2’s went wrong today. We then invite ourselves along for Muzzas birthday drinks in Winchmore Hill or somewhere like that. I have no idea about that area. Don’t know why they don’t just all go out around Shoreditch so that I can go home safely. Selfish......

We all get drunk and I go home about 10ish. Little Tommy gives me a lift to Edmonton. He is a nice guy like that. Should have pushed my luck and asked for a lift back to Shoreditch. I didn’t and because of that had to sit on the bus for 50 minutes. Got home, had a chat with the Mrs and then went to bed.

Muzza informs me he went on to a curry house after the pub. James fell asleep whilst dreaming about Dennis. Everyone got up and left him. I wish I was there to savour the moment. I wasn’t and because of this I am sad.

Good night world.

Alleyn Old Boys vs Norsemen FC

2011-02-08T07:18:00.000-08:00

Alleyn Old Boys vs Norsemen FC

Herne Hill

Saturday 5^th February 2011

2:30 KO

Norsemen Find Alleyn Key

Dear Diary,

So......... here we are again. Oh how I have missed you diary. What did I enjoy for breakfast I hear you ask? Well, my lovely lady friend made me some porridge, a cup of tea and a glass of pomegranate and blueberry juice. Not as extravagant as French toast but none the less it filled a hole. This breakfast would later come back to haunt me.

A new year and a new start in the league for Norsemen. Our last league game was back in early November 2010. Unfortunately Hempsey was in Thailand looking for exotic ladies with lumpy throats so the travel arrangements have been handed to Steven “I find football difficult” Ballinger. After 3 emails he managed to get the details right. Bring back NRC. The plan was to meet at Victoria and then get the train to Herne Hill to play football. Thomas decided to drive this

weekend so we had the pleasure of not having to get the train. Instead we played a game of Pro Evolution soccer 2011 in the new flat. I managed to thump Thomas 4-0. This upset him and he decided to blame me for being late. We were the 2^nd people at the ground. I think he was just angry he lost and had to try and take it out on me. That is just my opinion and I could be wrong, however I very much doubt it.

As we pull up to the Alleyn ground myself and Thomas pass the majority of the Norsemen lot. Thomas honked them whilst I saluted them with a rude wave of the fist. Macca giggled and Ballers looked sad. Get out of the car and have a big group hug. It is really warm and welcoming. Everyone enjoys this very much. We all pile into a very small changing room and attempt to get changed. Luckily Leroy’s I will be there in 10 minutes actually meant he would be here in 25 minutes and we had the extra space. Saying that he is only a small chap so doesn’t take up that much room. Mordi on the other hand.........

We get changed and run out to the pitch all eager. Within 2 minutes of warming up in the goal Muzza takes a shot from inside the 6 yard box and manages to miss not only the goal but also the massive nets behind the goal to stop the ball going into the gardens behind the goal. Muzza spends the next 20 minutes being scared about climbing over the garden fences and as a result he has to buy a new ball. Whilst Muzza is semi attempting to fetch the ball the rest of the team warm up by standing in the box and trying to convert Tommy Morgan and Steven Ballinger crosses. Not sure who put Ballers out wide to cross the ball in. He got tackled more than once by the imaginary defenders he was trying to beat before scuffing the ball into the box.

We welcomed Tadd Heath back to the squad this week. He seemed a little sheepish in the warm up due to his massive knee. He decided to just run around like a dog off his leash, rather than kick the ball aimlessly into the net with the rest of the team.

After 15 minutes of kicking the ball over the fence we are called back into the teeney weeney changing room by Thomas to go through the team. We lined up as follows:

GK Ballers

LB Muzza

RB Ossie

CB Tajae

CB Reed

LM Tommy Morgan

RM Jarrett

CM Thomas

CM TT

CF Leroy

CF Mordi

Subs

Macca

Taddy Waddy

Despite having 13 Thomas thought it was a wise choice starting Ballers. Personally I thought it was a massive risk but then I guess that is why I am not the manager. I am not ballsy enough to make such a massive call…….

Phillip warms us up with some nice stretching and then some ball exercises. The usual suspects find the later difficult but I will spare their blushes. We then gather round Phillip and sit down and cross our legs, whilst Phil goes through set pieces. Now I am pretty sure Phillip and Thomas go over the team a hundred times before the game. I am 90% sure Phil knew Macca was n the bench, yet he couldn’t help himself mugging Macca off by telling him to go forward for all set pieces. To say the next couple of minutes were awkward would be an understatement.

Thankfully the refs whistle interrupts the tense situation and everyone runs to their positions.

So we kick off and the first thing that is apparent is that Alleyn have Typhoon Yasi behind them. Alleyn start very well and look the more confident of the two teams. They got the ball down and played some neat football around the edge of the Norsemen box. However Norsemen defended extremely well and the extra man in the Alleyn midfield meant there was only 1 up top who found it extremely hard to get anything from Reed and Tajae. Tajae had one of the best games I have seen a Norsemen have this season. Even the ref in the shower said how good our little defender is. This was after Tommy Morgan mugged the ref off about his trainers, not knowing that the ref was under the shower next to him.

About 10 minutes into the game the Alleyn right midfielder fell awkwardly and landed on his hand. It looked like it really hurt to be fair. He decided the best option would be to sit on the ball. Ballers, not really knowing the rules of football (this would explain his style of play) thought it was fair to kick the player to get the ball. We all know it isn’t. The Alleyn player is rightly outraged and karate kicks Ballers. The rest of the Alleyn team kick off and Ballers does his usual of running away from the scene of the crime and tries to plead his innocence. Ballers escapes a booking. 2 minutes later and one of the Alleyn midfielders is booked for kicking the ball away. Seemed a bit harsh.

20 minutes into the game and Jarrett latches on to a lethargic looking Muzza through ball. Jarrett managed to win the ball and drove into the Alleyn penalty area. I would like to say that Jarrett didn’t dive but from where I was standing the keeper was a good 2 foot away from Jarrett as he went down like he had been shot in the back. Needless to say the ref booked Jarrett for diving. To this day Jarrett still pleads his innocence.

10 minutes later and we take the lead. A throw in from the right sees a ball played over to Jarrett who uses his strength and agility to out muscle the Alleyn left back. Jarrett found himself at a tight angle and with a barren spell in front of goal, some would presume low self esteem. However this didn’t seem to affect Jarrett’s nerve as he smashed the ball inside the near post. The fact that Norsemen had a gale force wind blowing against them and still managed to be a goal to the good was a massive morale boost. To say we deserved it would be a bit harsh on Alleyn as they had 70% of the ball in the first half. We knew if we could hold them at bay in the 1^st half then the wind would change the game in the 2^nd half and we would be able to attack them. To go into half time a goal up must have been a real sucker punch for the Alleyn men.

We had a nice sit down and listened to Thomas and Phillip chat about tactics. I was watching Mordi and Macca try and do keepy ups. They didn’t do very well. I think 3 was their record. Not their strength though....

The ref blew his whistle and the teams took their places once again. Alleyn again started the better of the teams in the second half. To give them credit they have some very good players and shouldn’t be 3^rd from bottom. I think a lack of team spirit is their main downfall. After 5 or 10 minutes Norsemen started to get a grip on the game and it was time for the Tajae and Leroy show. Tajae was immense at the back and Leroy caused all sorts of problems upfront. 20 minutes into the second half and Norsemen take a 2 goal lead thanks to little Leroy. A bit of pressure on the right hand side of the pitch by Thomas and Jarrett finds the ball dropping on the right hand corner of the Alleyn box. Leroy only steps up to the plate and smashes it into the top left hand corner. He is a little gem that lad. I have said it from day one. Despite wearing tights to play football, he is a good lad.

The skipper then takes himself off for Tadd. A lot of running was done by the midfield in the first half and some fresh legs were required. Tadd coming back from a knee injury gradually got into the game but didn’t throw himself about like the Taddy Waddy we know and love. A further 5 minutes pass and Norsemen make it 3. Ossie do some good running down the right won a throw in. TT launches one in and Jarrett gets his bonse to the ball. The ball goes up in the air so Muzza steps in and gets his massive head on the ball. The ball drops to Leroy’s feet and he lashes it in.

Reed then makes way for Macca as Norsemen look to keep a clean sheet. We looked very strong at the back despite Tajae going on 4 or 5 late nineties Sol Campbell esq runs up the pitch. Tajae never lost the ball though to be fair to him.

With 10 minutes left on the clock we made it 4-0. Tommy Morgan played the ball to Mordi who showed some explosive pace down the left, beat a couple of players and then passed to Leroy (as he says, but I think he over-ran it). Leroy cut inside on his left foot and curled it passed the keeper. The little chap only went and bagged himself a hat-trick!! Well done him.

We saw out the match and ended victorious. Leroy tried to keep the ball but the ref was having none of it. Don’t normally dish out Man Of The Match awards but if I did Leroy and Tajae would get a joint award today. Have a stretch and then run to the really small changing room for a shower. The meal today was pie and beans. Tajae didn’t like this and went hungry.

Got a lift home with my folks and stayed out of trouble. Don’t know what the rest of the team got up to. I could have a rough guess though.

Ballers would have gone home to Jarrett’s so they can organise their joint wedding. Thomas drove down to Brighton to see his mrs. Tadd got put back on his leash and let to look out the window of the train. Leroy and Tajae drove home listening to Boys II men. Ossie probably drove to Sunderland or somewhere equally far away for a night out. Macca went to a child’s birthday party. Gav Reed drove Mordi back to the door of his flat and then went to a secret rave in a disused organic allotment in Stoke Newington. Tommy Morgan went home to watch casualty. Muzza went to his 2^nd job at MacDonalds. Muzza dresses up as Ronald MacDonald for kids parties. He doesn't require a wig. Phillip went home to do the ironing. Now these predictions aren’t 100% factual but in my head they are.

Quickly refering back to the breakfast. It gave me a belly ache and some windy pops.

Good night diary.

BB Eagels vs Norsemen FC

2010-11-22T08:10:00.000-08:00

BB Eagles vs Norsemen FC

Saturday 13^th November

Somewhere near Boston Manor

2.15 KO

Eagles hatch a plan to thwart Norsemen

Dear Diary,

So, another Saturday and another game of footie. I know what you are thinking, what did I have for breakfast. Well diary I will tell you. I had a milky cup of Earl Grey tea, 3 slices of homemade French toast, a generous spreading of Nuttela and a big heap of raspberries. Another cracking start to the day. My Mum has always told me that Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. (She actually has never said that to me but it is the kind of thing that parents normally say. My Mum only tells me stuff like remember to wash your sheets, remember to send Auntie Margaret a thank you card etc etc. No words of wisdom, just chores!)

Meet everyone at Kings Cross for a very early meet. Lots of people are standing outside the train station but I manage to spot Macca, James, Macca’s pa (or whatever they use for Dad up north), Muzza and Jarrett. I am already with Ossie and Mordi. Hempsey quickly nips off for a McDonalds and as a result Macca’s pa has to wait around for him whilst we choose to get the tube.

The tube on Saturday 13^th November was manic as fuck! We manage to lose Hempsey and Macca’s pa. I think a lifelong friendship was struck up between the two in the following 2 hours they spent together. Everyone else met up with Phil, Tadd, Jacko and Tajae on the tube platform. They aren’t pleased as we told them we would meet them 40 minutes prior to the time we turned up. We all got on the tube and then Ossie went silent. He had a toothache. Bless him.....

A lot of jokes were made on the tube about what Hempsey and Macca’s dad were up to/talking about. I still can’t believe Hempsey had a pre match McDonalds. Probably gets a discount with his Network Rail card. Forgot to mention everyone’s moustaches. Hempsey and Macca are probably sporting the best ones at the moment. Hempsey does look a bit rapey though.

After spending the best part of an hour on the tube we arrive at our destination. Ossie still isn’t talking. We wait around on the platform for Hempsey and Macca’s pa. I get told off by Phil for getting the football out. Turns out the people we were waiting for were already at the station and waiting outside. Cheers Hempsey for a quick call to tell us you had arrived..........

We walk to the ground and meet Leeroy and Reggie. For some reason they decided not to talk to each other. Beats me. The pitch is looking good and the oppo are here so we decide it is time to put our blue uniforms on. Ossie still hasn’t muttered a word.

The team for today is as follows:

GK – Jacko

LB – Muzza

RB – Ossie

CB – Macca

CB – Tajae

RM – Jarrett

LM – Hempsey

CM – Tadd

CM – TT

CF – Reggie

CF – Leeroy

Subs

Mordi

As soon as we are kitted up we hit the pitch. It is lush. Ossie sits in the changing room whilst we go through our warm up. We manage to do a nice little once touch pass exercise. I would rate it in my top 5 team performances as far as the warm up goes. There was a buzz about the team after the warm up.

Saying that as soon as we kick off the ref gives one of the most dubious penalty kicks I have seen. A long ball from the BB Eagles right back is ushered off for a corner via Macca’s face. Ref gives a penalty for handball. Shocking. From the resulting penalty Jacko pulls off a great save. Only problem is he is so busy admiring his save that he forgets to save the rebound. Not our best start! BB Eagles 1 – 0 Norsemen.

However within 5 minutes we start to get hold of the game and play some very attractive football. We are awarded a penalty shortly after for what was again a bit of a dubious decision. The ref obviously felt like he had to make amends for giving the earlier penalty. A nice threw ball from Jarrett finds Leeroy’s feet who is tackled by the centre back. Hempsey steps up for the spot kick and manages to hit it not only high but also wide. Not sure his pre match McDonalds agreed with him. Well done Hempsey.

Nether the less we picked our heads up and went at BB Eagles again, and again and again. We completely dominated play for the next 20 minutes. This was probably aided by the fact that Ballers was in South Africa. Around about the 20 minute mark Norsemen got their just deserved. A long ball from the BB Eagles back line (They like a long ball) was chased down by Macca. Macca showed a bit of composure with the ball and instead of kicking it out for a throw, found Muzza’s feet. Muzza in turn found Hempsey who in turn slipped in Leeroy. Leeroy smoked the BB Eagles left back and slotted the ball well past the BB Eagles goalie. 1-1.

For the rest of the half we played some great football, spreading the ball from side to side. BB Eagles always looked dangerous on the counter, but we managed to keep them to just counter attacks.

Half time come and we knew if we carried on playing the way we did in the first half then chances would come. Phil and James gave some inspirational speeches. Again I didn’t really listen so I can’t relay what was said.

Second half started and Norsemen were on top from the whistle. BB Eagles sent up camp early doors and looked to look after the draw. They did look dangerous on the counter but we managed to keep these to a minimum. Norsemen carried on passing the ball quickly and kept it simple. Ossie hit the post with a long range effort. The keeper nearly knocked himself out on the post in attempting to save the shot.

Macca and Jarrett also hit the bar with headers from set plays and Leeroy managed to miss a low cross from Hempsey. BB Eagles had an effort late on that Jacko tipped onto his bar.

Despite our efforts the game ended 1-1. I think with the balance of play and chances we should have won the game. However saying that BB Eagles are always a threat on the counter attack and despite our possessional advantage, they had their own chances to win the game.

After the game we all had a shower but was unable to show off our willy dance routines as there was only 5 showers for both teams to share and it was a very confined space. Leeroy the slippery little tyke tried to run off without taking the kit. I ran after him and made him come back and get it. You think you know someone and then they go and do something like that. Unbelievable!!!!!

Walked to the pub where Hempsey and Macca’s dad had another chat. Had a couple of beers and then got the tube home. Ossie still has opened his mouth to speak. When out of nowhere he puts his hand to his ear and with a Cheshire cat grin royally mugs of Hempsey:

“Reports are just coming. BB Eagles have just found the ball Hempsey used for his penalty”

Ossie was so pleased with himself. We all point and mug Hempsey off. He has his normal little grin on his face. Bless him, he just likes to be involved in the group.

The tube was ridiculously busy. I got pinned into a corner by a fat American family. The woman kept on asking me questions about my “soccer team.” Fyi her son was extremely camp. After 20 minutes of small talk they waddled off and I was left in peace. Got home, watched a bit of match of the day and then went to see my lady friend. All in all a long day of travelling.

Good night world

Norsemen FC vs Hale End FC

2010-11-10T15:08:00.000-08:00

Norsemen FC vs Hale End FC

Edmonton Sports Ground

Sat 6^th November

Hale Come To The End Of The Line

AFC Cup

Dear Diary,

Another Saturday and another game of footy. Today was to be an early meet due to the clocks going back and today’s game being a cup tie. My lady friend woke me up with French toast today. She is very nice like that. She also gave me a massage on my neck. What a start to my weekend. Before I knew it I was on my way back to the flat to rendezvous with Thomas.

A number of the 1^st team are doing Movember this year so Thomas and myself had to make sure of two things before we left.

1. Moustaches were looking tip top

2. We had the camera to take photos of everyone’s tash’s

The moustaches were looking as good as they possibly could after 5 days and we had the camera. Time to leave. We hopped in the car and made the weekly homage to Edmonton. We seem to be at home a lot recently! Nothing really to report from the journey to the game apart from a weird chap in the petrol station. Firstly, he was wearing ladies pyjama bottoms whilst just standing around in the shop. Secondly, it was if a flip switched in his head and he went bonkers, running around the forecourt like a mad man. We quickly got in the car, buckled our seat belts, checked the mirrors, indicated and pulled off in a sensible manor.

Arrived at Edmonton Sports ground and went to meet our chums in the changing room. All the good ones were there. Bit of a shame Ballers decided to turn up early. We had a lovely warm up in our new training tops. Ossie has OI on his training top. This entertains me for hours. Ossie doesn’t find it very funny. Ossie doesn’t find much funny though. In fact the only time I see Os laugh is when Ballers tries to play football.

We line up as follows:

Gk – Jacko

LB – Muzza

RB – Ossie

CB – Gav Reed

CB – Tajae

LM – Hempsey

RM – Gav Morais

CM – Ballers

CM – Tadd

CF – Leeroy

CF – Jarrett

SUBS

James

Mordi

A god looking side to face Hale End who have arrived in their pretty little green outfits. Hale End are having a decent season in the AFC Division 1. The AFC is the sister league to the SAL.

Kick off

Neither team starts particularly well but Norsemen manage to create a few half chances with Ballers going close with an early drive. Some more half chances come and go for Norsemen. With all the half chances we are having I decide it is safe to go and kick the ball around behind the goal with James and Mordi, thinking we will definitely score soon. The opposite happens and we concede. Not sure what happened really as I wasn’t paying much attention. All I saw was Jacko palming a cross/shot out and the striker nodding the ball into an empty net.

Norsemen then play terrible for the rest of the first half. Hale End have a couple more chances but end up going in 1-0 up at half time. As I went to walk into the changing room at half time I was told to stay on the pitch with Neil and James and kick the ball around. Because of this I cant tell you what was said at half time. Soz.

Hale end choose to stay out on the pitch at half time. Norsemen come out in drips and drabs for the second half and they look like they have been told off! Rightly so as well. Too many lacklustre performances in the 1^st half.

The half time rollicking seems to have done the trick and Norsemen start the second half with a bit of purpose. Ballers is moved out to right mid and Gav Morais moves into centre midfield. We start to put some nice moves together and about 15 minutes into the half we are rewarded. A neat move down the right hand side of the pitch sees Leeroy lay off a lovely ball to Hempsey who with his rapey tash strokes a lovely effort high into the goal. “yessssssss” is the shout from Thomas.

I knew at this point that we had the game in our hands and went to play football tennis with Mordi. We used the rope around the pitch. It was very fun and it kept us entertained for at least 10 minutes. Mordi was giggling with glee for the first 5 minutes. I did manage to catch a glimpse of Norsemen’s second goal. A corner/free kick was swung into the danger zone. Jarrett who decided he wanted to play in the second (dont think he fancied it in the first half) got his noggin on the cross and headed goal wards. I believe Gav Morais got the final touch. Jarrett runs off celebrating the goal but we all know it was Gav who got the final touch.

Shortly after this Ballers was involved in a nasty clash of heads. The verdict was he was concussed and would have to come off. He said he was fine. A good tactical move from Thomas though as Ballers is finding this football thing harder and harder each week. Coleman comes on in Centre midfield and Gav Morais moves back out to the right.

2 minutes later and Norsemen have their 3^rd goal. Norsemen are awarded a freekick on the left hand side of the pitch. Hempsey takes the kick and whips in a smashing little ball to the far post. Leeroy nicks in unmarked at the back post and slots into the unguarded net. At this point Hale End concedes defeat. Norsemen’s second half performance has deserved victory. With 10 minutes to go Jarrett and Leeroy make way for James and Mordi. Both teams have a couple of half chances. The final whistle is blown and Norsemen win 3 goals to 1. The back 4 for Norsemen have all had solid games today with Tajae standing out as man of the match.

Do a half hearted warm down and then walk to the changing room. A few nerves start to kick in as it is now the time for people to show off their Willy dance routines that we have all spent the whole week choreographing! Muzza probably gets the nod for best dance with the self titled ‘Go for it’ routine.

I am annoyed for two reasons for leaving the club house early today:

1) Radio saying to Muzza “you were sh1t today Muzza”

2) Radio offering a suggestion to why Tadd isn’t partaking in Movember “is it because it too rough when you head downstairs on your girlfriend”. Not the kind of suggestion expected but a suggestion none the less.

Whilst Radio is offering up his pearls of wisdom in the club house I am sitting on the 149 bus with Mordi. When I get back home I then trek down to Fulham and then trek all the way back up to Shoreditch. A lot of time spent on public transport today!

Just a quick rundown of the nights highlights:

· Somebody got trapped in the doors of the 149 and the driver pulled off, claiming not to have seen the person. Eventually the driver stops and the woman goes fing mental! Bit awkward having to sit there and listen. Even more awkward was I was on the phone to somebody at the time and I completely stopped listening to the person on the phone in order to listen to the woman going mental. I think they hung up in the end.

· At the party I went to in Fulham I had the following conversation with my lady friend:

Paula “I wish I had a shotgun with one bullet”

Me “why?”

Paula “Because I know who I would use it on”

Me “Where would you shoot them?”

Paula *Points to middle of the head*

Me “Who would you shoot”

Paula *Points to person standing on chair blowing toy instrument as hard and loud as humanly possible*

Me “ok”

(Note to self, don’t blow toy instruments loudly near Paula)

· Nearly got turned away from an eighties themed bar for wearing trainers. Most people in the club were wearing trainers, including the bar staff......

· Took about 3 hours to get home, despite the fact that from Holborn we were on a bus which defied the laws of physics by the speed it was travelling. For love nor money I can’t tell you how that bus didn’t topple when it went round corners.

Got home about 2 and went to bed. End of.

Good night world

Norsemen FC vs Crouch End Vampires

2010-11-05T10:04:00.000-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Crouch End Vampires

Saturday 30^th October 2010

Edmonton Sports Ground

Vamps don’t have enough bite for victory

Dear Diary,

I woke up this morning not feeling a picture of health. The reason being, and i am going to be brutally honest with you, i had been suffering with what the French like to call Le runs. The last 10 minutes, be it asleep, was the longest I had gone without having to run to the toilet. My special lady friend then mentioned there were sausages and eggs in the fridge for breakfast. I thought to myself if anything is going to be a test for my stomach ‘issues’ then a greasy sausage and egg bap would be such thing. I put on some clothing and trot to the kitchen. I decide to delay the cooking in hope that the Mrs. might cook instead and decide to watch ‘an idiot abroad.’ This delights me no end. Nobody comes out to cook so I go back in and get cooking away. I start on the sausages and then am joined by my lady friend. I plead that I am useless at cooking eggs and she takes over the duty. Yessssssss. An early victory for Ross James Coleman.

I then settle down on the sofa, eat the food and have a spoon. The stomach doesn’t like what is put in it but none the less it decides to hang on to it. After a good long spoon I notice I am running late so put my shoes on and run back home. Thomas is running even later than myself so I am off the hook! We pack our bags and set off for Edmonton.

It is a special day today for everyone involved with Norsemen football club as it is the president’s lunch. Our glorious chairman Radio has some of his friends over for fish finger sandwiches and then they watch the 1^st team play a game of football. Luckily for the spectators it was a clash with local arch rivals, Crouch End Vampires. I arrive to find a full car park. Thomas isn’t happy as he has allocated himself “the gaffers spot” in the car park. This space was occupied so he had to park in the playground! We walk into the changing room and are handed nice new training tops from Macca. About time he did something right..... In all seriousness though he has come up trumps with these little beauties. They did cost 45 quid mind. Thomas instantly spoils the mood by not allowing us to wear the tops for the warm up. Something about not wanting to look like flash twats or something.

Get changed and go out to kick the ball in the goal. Not sure what the 2’s were up to but they felt they would warm up with us. When I say warm up I actually mean nick our balls and ruin the pitch. I had the last laugh though as I put in a formal complaint to Ronnie. I hope he goes biblical on them and unleashes that famous Scottish rage he poses!

We lined up as follows:

GK – Jacko

LB – Ballers

RB – Ossie

CB – Tajae

CB – Macca

RM – Thomas

LM – Hempsey

CM – TT

CM – Tadd

CF – Leeroy

CF – Jarrett

SUBS

Muzza

James

Gav R

One thing to mention from the team talk. Not even 10 seconds had gone after Thomas announced Muzza on the bench, when Thomas then said for Muzza to take corners. Talk about rubbing salt in the wounds. Lots of snigger and pointing filled the next minute or so. Muzza was royally mugged off!!!!!

Despite the inclusion of Ballers this week (squad rotation policy) we look solid. I haven’t messed myself yet so all is looking good.

Kick off

Both teams start with a good pace. Crouch End probably have the better of the early possession, however they lacked end product. A couple of meaty tackles go in early doors with Tadd being the main culprit. It has been a bit of a rainy day so players are sliding about. I warned Tadd before the game to not wear mouldies as it was wet. Did he listen?! Did he f@ck. He got his punishment in the shape of a £10 fine though because of his silliness. A slip due to his footwear made him put in a late challenge and he is booked for this. Probably not as bad as Ballers tackle in the second half though. We will come back to that though.

First of all I have to mention the first goal. Some would say against the run of play, others would say good use of a counter attack. Who cares really as all that matters is that it was Norsemen that scored the goal. I believe a ball down the left from Hempsey found Jarrett who did very well the keep the ball in play and cross a low ball for little Leeroy to neatly put the ball in the back of the net with the outside of his right boot. Yey for Leeroy.

The rest of the first half was quite scrappy due to the intensity of the game. I will hold my hands up and quote Muzza “I was having a b@stard of a game.” This didn’t really help the team. This didn’t really make much of a difference though as Maccas aerial dominance and Tajae’s covering at the back allowed Crouch End no joy in front of goal. The whole back 4 all had excellent games. We knew it would be a tough game against Crouch End and as long as we got a goal we knew we would be in with a chance of winning the game.

We went in at half time one to the good. Thomas gave us a team talk at half time but for the life of me I can’t remember a word. No changes were made at half time so we lined up for the second half with a strong line up again (that is if you ignore Ballers.)

Early doors in the second half and Ballers showed two things:

Why he was included in the starting 11 this week. He put a crunching tackle in on the Crouch End right winger. It was a very naughty challenge to be fair and was probably lucky to just get a booking.
Ballers trade mark foul and run away tactic in order to go unpunished. He did this to perfection but the ref had a sharp eye and managed to pick Ballers out from the crowd of players already lining up for the resulting free kick.

Unlucky on that one Ballers. 5 minutes later and Thomas was put through on goal. The Crouch End right back made a great challenge to prevent Tom from being 1 on 1 with the keeper. As a result of the challenge Thomas landed on the defenders knee and winded himself/broke a rib. He had to be replaced by Muzza. Muzza slotted in at left back and Ballers moved to right mid. To be fair to Crouch End as much as they like a physical game and a moan, they do play a fair game.

Slowly but surely in the second half Norsemen were finding a bit more time on the ball and they created a few chances. Crouch End did too and they managed to hit the bar with a goalmouth scramble. Our unlikely outlet for most attacks was Ballers. Ballers seemed to relish the chance at playing right mid and started to weave a bit magic down the right flank.

Our second goal started with Ossie who played a neat ball down the line to Ballers. Ballers did the old show and go, completely taking the Crouch End left back out of the game. Ballers then composed himself (whilst being watched closely by 4 of the old boys) and whipped in a delightful cross which Leeroy met with a diving header. The ball hit the back of the net and there was a loud cheer for the club house and the watching old boys. However I wasn’t watching this as I heard a loud shreek for Tadd’s dad who runs onto the pitch in jubilation! What seemed to be a common Heath floor on the day was choice of footwear. A step too quickly and Mr Heath is lying on his back. This didn’t stop him from celebrating though. I personally am a big fan of the Heaths enthusiasm for life and everything that excites them!! Well done all. James replaces Jarrett with 10 minutes to go.

So we see out the game and manage to hold on to a 2-0 victory. A nice change for the spectators as this is my first victory on a presidents lunch day. We all do our little warm down and then head back to the changing room and display our willy dance routines we have been working on throughout the week.

Next task is to head into the club house and see how the old boys thought we played. Hopefully well as we are unbeaten this season and sitting handsomely at the top of the league. Everyone has a couple of victory beers and mingles with the old guys whilst watching Tottenham gift a game of football to Manchester United.

Next port of call for some members of the team is Shoreditch. I have to go to the Misses birthday in Angel whilst Macca hangs with some northern folk in Shoreditch and Thomas heads to Farringdon for a rave.

Fast forward 5 hours.

Ring Ring, Ring Ring

Me “Hello Macca”

Macca “Ey up”

Me “How can I help”

Macca “Were at t pub”

Me “ok”

Macca “You mentioned summit bout a party”

Me “That I did”

Macca “Is it alreet if I bring some mates”

Me “why not”

Macca “Super, see you in 5. I’ll bring some tins”

Me “see you soon precious”

And with that 5 minutes passed and Macca turned up at the flat. When Macca and his mates rocked up at about 11.30 there was give or take 25 people at the house party. There were some random eastern Europeans in the corner acting out some very sexual dancing! I didn’t watch them though as my lady friend was around.............

Macca mingles and his friends start playing pool. After half an hour Macca feels comfortable enough to start asking strangers for a dance off. Most people just politely smile at him. This is a polite way of saying f@ck off. Paula (Special lady friend) then surprises Macca and takes him up on the offer. I have never seen Macca look so happy. He finally has somebody to play with! A song is chosen and Macca starts to get down.

What I haven’t mentioned is the fact that Macca likes to think of himself as a bit of a mover. To give Macca his credit he has beautiful technique and rhythm on the dance floor. Some would say the best dancer at Norsemen. That is a hell of a claim though considering I have only seen at a push 10% of the Norsemen dance.

Anyhow back to the dance off. Paula is a little intoxicated as it is her birthday, so I thought Macca would walk the dance off. I was wrong. Macca was played at his own game, literally. Paula somehow managed to copy every move Macca pulled off and basically mugged him off! Macca 1 down on the dance off. Several hours later after Macca had plucked up the courage to dance again he was mugged off again by a chappy that goes by the name of Mr Woody who pulled out caterpillars and all sorts. Macca left soon after this. Thomas arrived home to the flat and decided to bring half of Shoreditch with him. Must have been at least 100 people. I bailed out at 4ish and went to bed. Thomas carried on till about 7 and then pulled the plug on the fun!

All in all a good day. Won football, had a good drink and didn’t sh1t myself!

Good night world

Norsemen FC vs Weirside FC

2010-11-01T08:02:00.003-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Weirside Rangers FC

Edmonton Sports Ground

Oct 23^rd 2010

Dominating Norsemen Take Rangers Up The Weir

Dear Diary,

My favorite day of the week has come around once again. I get to have a lie in and not go to work. I also get to play football with my friends and Ballers. So I wake up and have some breakfast and then head home. When I get home I am met by Thomas who is pumped about the game vs Weirside. And rightly so as it is a clash of the early leaders. I was talked out of getting in Thomas’ lovely sports car by Dobbo, who made me get London’s loved and trusted public transport. The 149 bus to be more specific. Two things that angered me about this. 1.Boris has been a little sod and changed the 149 service from a bendy bus to a double decker. This has put an end to free travel to and from lovely Edmonton. 2. It took 30 f ing minutes for the 149 to show its ugly new face. This made me late by half an hour. Thanks very much Boris. Well done you. I hate you. Not because you are a babbling idiot but because what you have done to the 149 bus. Unfuckingbelievable.

So I turn up for football half an hour later with Dobbo. Dobbo shoots off to make his Norsemen debut for the 7’s and I go and get changed. I meet Leeroy in the changing room. I don’t think he was expecting me to walk in as he was blearing out some Disney songs on his IPod. Funny lad our Leeroy.

Finally managed to get out with the other chaps and what do you know, Jacko goes and falls over on his finger. He only bloody injures himself doesn’t he. What a klutz! Thomas then runs off in search of a new keeper. Ricky wont give us JJ. I have always said he is spiteful. Thomas then goes to ask the vets for the use of Shay. The first thing Casey asks is “why don’t you take JJ?” Thomas thinking on his feet replies “The 2’s game has already kicked off.” A complete lie as Joe Morris is running back to the grocers pitch with the corner flags in his hand. The lie seems to work though and before you know it Ballers is attempting to warm Shay up. I say try because Ballers struggles with football and he normally kicks the ball wide. Shay has a good warm up fetching the ball though.

We line up as follows:

GK – Shay

LB – Muzza

RB – Ossie

CB – Macca

CB – Tajae

LM – Hempsey

RM – Gav Morais

CM – TT

CM – Tadd

CF – Leeroy

CF – Jarrett

Subs:

Arda

Ballers

Thomas

We have possibly the strongest line up possible now Ballers is on the bench…… He is good for team morale though.

It is 15.00 and it can mean only one thing. The referee lines up everyone on the centre spot and makes us shake each other’s hands. Think the referee thought he was refereeing the premiership or something. Anyway we all exchange our handshakes and well wishes and then line up for kick off.

Norsemen started where they finished off the week before at HSBC. There was some nice one touch passing and great intensity throughout the team. This could have something to do with Ballers being a spectator but I can’t confirm this. Leeroy went close very early on but unfortunately managed to lob the keeper and the goal.

About 15 minutes in and Norsemen go one up. After a neat move down the right hand side, Coleman is pushed over. Very uncharacteristically Coleman gets up and starts moaning at the ref. Thomas in turn moans at Coleman for giving up. Coleman doesn’t like this and thinks to himself “I will show Thomas giving up.” Coleman heroically picks himself up and chases a pass back to the Weirside centre back. Coleman just lashes at the ball and luckily puts a sliced cross into the Weirside area. Jarrett found himself in acres of space and calmly nods the ball into the corner of the goal. Norsemen 1 – 0 Weirside.

Norsemen gain confidence from the goal and start to dominate the game. A nice move down the left this time sees Hempsey whip in a ball that is half cleared to the edge of the area. Gav Morais takes a lovely first touch to take the ball away from the onrushing defender. Most people in this situation would just lash the ball aimlessly at the goal in this situation. Not Gavin. What Gavin did was calmly place a very slow volley into the corner of the net from the 18 yard line. Some would say it was a scuff but I have played with Gavin enough times to know there was no scuffing going on. Norsemen 2 – 0 Weirside.

Norsemen carry on with a very intense tempo and allow Weirsdie no time on the ball. Shay still hasn’t touched the ball at this point. Norsemen come close a couple more times before Leeroy pounces on a poor ball across the Weirside defence. Leeroy punishes the Weirside defence with a neat finish into the corner of the net. Norsemen 3 – 0 Weirside.

With 5 minutes left in the first half Norsemen scored a fourth. However the ref didn’t see it. Leeroy again pounced on some sloppy defending and played the ball across the goal to Jarrett. A will try and paint a mental picture of the scenario. Jarrett was standing about 4 yards from the goal line. The goalkeeper was laying on the ground about 6 yards to the left of the goal. A Weirside defender was standing on the near post. Jarrett blasted the ball into the back of the net. He blasted it so hard that the ball went through the net. There was no hole in the net though so Jarrett must have hit the ball so hard, the ball broke down into a molecular form, allowing it to pass through the net. Well either that happened or Jarrett actually missed an open goal from 4 yards. I am sticking with my original story though. Surely a player of Jarrett’s quality can’t miss such a chance.

Half time and Norsemen lead by 3 goals. Thomas gets us to sit down in the changing room and doesn’t have much to say. The reason for this being that we played a very good half. Simple as.

The second half begins and Norsemen are still buzzing. The Weirside team must have been on the end of a telling off as they seem to have upped their game by somewhat. Norsemen start with a couple of chances. One falling to Coleman who tried to bend the ball into the far corner with the outside of his boot. However he scuffed it and the ball nearly ended up in the bowls green.

Weirside then put together their first meaningful move of the game and with a ball being whipped in from the right hand side the Weirside central midfielder threw himself at the ball and scored a neat diving header. Best goal of the game. Probably Coleman’s fault for not tracking his man. However I believe his honesty will get him off the hook for the goal.

As the game went on it became a bit more stretched with Weirside looking to get back in the game. Norsemen tried to play on the counter. Leeroy made way for Arda and Muzza for Ballers. Arda managed to miss from 3 yards and Ballers managed to find touch with most of his touches. Safety first. Thomas came on with 5 minutes to go for Gav Morais and saw the game out to safety. The second half was a more balanced game. The game finished Norsemen 3 – 1 Weirside. Norsemen deserved the victory from their heroic first half display.

We all went in and did the usual array of willy dances in the showers and then got drunk in the bar after. All in all a lovely day.

Went home and stayed out of trouble.

Good night world.

HSBC FC vs NORSEMEN FC

2010-10-19T08:02:00.000-07:00

HSBC vs Norsemen FC

16^th October 2010

HSBC pay out dividend

Dear Diary,

Here it is. The game that everyone wants to play. HSBC away. Woke up all excited having not played for two weeks. Was made a lovely breakfast and watched a bit of soccer am. What a morning! Walked home to find Thomas in his pants playing Pro Evo with our other housemate Dobbo. Dobbo isn’t very good at Pro Evo. He has one move where he runs down the line with the ball and then passes it across the box and hopes one of his little cyber men kicks it in the goal. We like to call this “scoring a Dobbo.” I had some more breakfast in the shape of tea and toast and then packed my bag. Thomas was running a little late so we hop in a taxi and motor on down to London Bridge. The taxi driver was a bit of a d1ck and kept trying to talk over myself and Thomas. He was like a needy little lap dog. “oo oo look at me I can do tricks and know really cool facts. The police in the city get paid more because they work in the city!” I was thinking to myself “F@ck off with your rubbish facts and keep your eyes on the road.” I obviously didn’t say that because my Mum has brought me up well. Saying that I have now used a naughty word in my Diary and she is more than likely to read this. I guess that means I am going to be grounded for 2 weeks.

Get to London Bridge and catch up with the gang. Everyone is buzzing. Leeroy turns up after a morning of Clay Pigeon shooting. He must have been in a rush as he forgot to give his shooting jacket back. Anyway we all make our way to the platform to get on the train. All of us apart from Leeroy who forgot to get a ticket. Leeroy runs for the train but misses it so myself and Tadd get off and wait with him. We then get told off on the Tannoy system for holding the train up. Cheers Leeroy. Managed to get a train 5 minutes later but had to sit next to the loo. The smell was quite high pitched to say the least. The only place I have been that smelt similar was at a public toilet in Delhi. Once again cheers Leeroy. Everyone arrived at HSBC apart from Tadd, Leeroy and myself. We got left with all the rubbish kit. Cheers Leeroy.

As we got off the train we entered what is possibly one of the best places you can play football without being a professional footballer. I would even be tempted to say many Professionals would get excited about playing on the HSBC first team pitch. We run to the changing room, listened to some drum and bass and quickly get changed. As we ran out we all giggled like excited schoolgirls would. We did our warm up with Phillip and James. Tajae nutmegged me and then I fell over. Probably not my best moment of the day. If anything it was quite embarrassing! The bibs lost the warm up game.

Thomas called us back into the changing room and gave us a talk and named the starting 11:

GK – JACKO

RB – BALLERS

LB – MUZZA

CB – TAJAE

CB – GAV REED

RM – THOMAS

LM – HEMPSEY

CM – TADD

CM – TT

CF – LEEROY

CF – JARRETT

SUBS

ARDA

MACCA

OSSIE

So that is how we lined up. Quite a strong starting 11 despite the fact Ballers was playing right back.....

Norsemen win the toss and kick off. Within the space of 25 seconds we have ourselves a penalty. HSBC are not amused. From kick off the ball is played to Tadd who plays it to Hempsey. Hempsey found Ross who in turn lays it off for Muzza. Muzza then uses his lethargic left foot to pop a ball over the top for Jarrett to chase. Jarrett shrugs off the centre back and rounds the keeper. The keeper coughed on Jarrett and he went down. Ref gives a penalty. Rightly so as well. You should put your hand over your mouth when you cough. Does the HSBC keeper know nothing about the spreading of germs and disease? How does he think the Plague started? Hempsey steps up and ups his penalty conversion rate to 50% for the season. HSBC 0 – 1 Norsemen.

The penalty clearly aggravated HSBC and as a result they step their game up for the next 10 minutes. Norsemen start giving away cheap fouls and HSBC go close with a couple of efforts. Shortly after the HSBC pressure lightens, a long ball is played football towards Jarrett. Jarrett chases the ball down and forces the keeper to come out and head the ball clear. Unfortunately the ball lands at the feet of Tadd. Tadd displays some lovely technique and volleys the ball into the empty net from about 30 yards out. Tadd being the excitable little chap that he is goes absolutely bonkers. Unfortunately for Tadd the closest person to him is Thomas. Tadd runs over to Thomas to celebrate, however Thomas just waves him away as Thomas is too caught up in moaning at me about poor positioning! Nobody else celebrates with Tadd. Tadd doesn’t care and starts doing cartwheels and forward roles in celebration. HSBC 0 – 2 Norsemen.

Norsemen then start to get into their rhythm and look solid all over the pitch. Some wonderful defending from Gav and Tajae allowed the midfield 4 plenty of time on the ball to spray the ball around. Some lovely one touch passing and moving from Norsemen opened up a few more chances in the first half; however the score remained HSBC 0 – 2 Norsemen.

One moment to quickly mention from the first half was the blossoming of a relationship between Ballers and the HSBC number 11 (I will give him the name Charles for the purpose of this report). I have seen Ballers in action before and he likes the hard ball policy when chatting up a bloke. I think Ballers saw Charles’ beauty early doors and was hatching a plan from the very first minute to get into Charles’ boxers. Their little flirt session went something like this:

Charles: “F@ck off mate”

Ballers: “Calm down mate I have only grabbed your shorts”

Charles “Look mate I don’t like stuff like that”

Ballers “Don’t knock it until your try it. I haven’t told many people this but I once attended a sex party wearing a suit. There was all sorts going on in there. I felt pretty stupid as everyone else was wearing gear for sex and I rocked up in my dad’s suit.” (Macca overheard this conversation and brought it up again on the train back to London Bridge. I will come back to the sex party story.)

Charles “Look mate just F@CK OFF”

Ballers “You cant get away from me whilst we are playing mate. I can touch whatever I want to touch”

Charles “Look just p1ss off and leave me alone”

Ballers “I like the way you are playing hard to get. Gets my juices flowing”

Charles “You lot are weird. I am not playing the second half”

On the balance of the first half performance I think Norsemen deserved to go into the break in the lead from their use of the ball when they had it in their possession. Thomas made way for Ossie at half time. Not a lot to be said at half time as we had a great first half and deserved our lead. We knew the next goal would be the decider. If HSBC got it, they would grow in confidence and be right back in the game. If Norsemen got it then we knew it would knock the wind out of HSBC’s sails and allow us to go on and get more goals.

And with that the whistle went and Charles only played 5 minutes of the second half. I think Ballers ended up getting his number though.

Norsemen started the second half even better than they had finished the first half. Some excellent pressing from the midfield 4 and some really good passing resulted in some good balls in from the wide players. A combination of poor finishing from Norsemen and good keeping from the HSBC keeper kept the score at 0- 2. One chance that spring to mind is a cross from Hempsey or Muzza that landed at Ossie’s feet. Despite the frantic calls of “TIME”, Ossie hit a first time shot which was so bad that it didn’t go off for a goal kick. It didn’t even go off for a throw on, instead it allowed HSBC to break on the counter attack. Ossie explained after the game that he saw the light and had to hit it. Well done Ossie. And he wonders why he started on the bench.....

Norsemen played some brilliant football in the second half. They are the words of the ‘Chef’, not mine. Leeroy and TT hit the bar with separate efforts and Ossie and Jarrett both had shots within the 6 yard blocked by the impressive HSBC goalkeeper. We found out after he game that the GK was in fact a defender standing in. Well done to him.

The score should have been 5 or 6 by this point but to give HSBC their due, they held in there and with 2 minutes to go got a free kick midway in the Norsemen half. I would just like to point out that it was Macca who gave this free kick away for a silly foul. Hempsey lost it with Macca and shouted at him. I would relay what he said but it is a tricky to pick out words from a northern accent. It was just a dreadful noise. The HSBC number 7 scored from the resulting free kick. Some question of a foul in the box but then again we were awarded a dubious penalty in the first half. Fairs fair. Jacko didn’t think so as this meant he had to pay his subs for not keeping a clean sheet. He threatened to do all sorts to the ref but as per usual with the youth of today, they were all empty threats.

Full time HSBC 1 – 2 Norsemen. On the balance of play we maybe deserved more goals but a win is a win. The HSBC lads are a good bunch and let’s hope they stay up. I actually hope they stay in the same league as us so that we can play on that pitch again.

We all have a stretch down and walk back to the changing room. A bunch of us then try and outdo each other with exotic w1lly dances in the shower. I think Ballers and Macca have been practicing at home. Fair play to them though as it is a fine skill to have and as my manager at work says ‘another string to their bow’.

We then drink some beer in the club house and have some pizza and chips. Not the greatest food but beggars cant be choosers. Travel beers are purchased and we get back on the train to head back into town. Couple of things to mention from the journey. Ballers going to the sex party in his suit. We had a good 20 minute conversation about that. think he got off rather lightly. I think he may have cut the bottom out of trousers though to make it a bit more kinky. Also Thomas called James chunky and James didn’t take too well to it. Something about “carrying” and “excess timber”. There was definitely a couple of tears so I felt it best to leave the conflict zone and go and sit with NRC.

The Nelsons retreat was the first port of call on the voyage to Shoreditch. Pool was played, beer was consumed and NRC’s Indie music from the 90’s was put on the juke box. We then journeyed to a tequila bar for a quick shot. The tequila bar was about the size of a small shoe box. Somehow we all managed to cram in there. The owner then claimed to have run out of tequila so we had to leave. That was after just 1 shot! He must have really hated us!! Then on to the bricklayer Arms. James and Thomas then decided to put their mean words aside and decided to have a push up off. Thomas won easily as James is actually carrying a bit of excess timber...... We all got really drunk and visited 2 or 3 more bars. Cant remember much after this as I was smashed. Think we ended up in the bedroom bar. I attempted to dance but could barely stand up. I was then saved by my lady friend who took me home to bed. As I was leaving I seem to remember Macca and James having a dance off. Somebody described James’ dancing similar to that of Mark Owen in his Take That heydays!

That’s it for another week.

Night World.

Norsemen FC vs BB Eagles FC

2010-10-09T04:16:00.000-07:00

Norsemen FC vs BB Eagles FC

No more grocers

Lashing it down with rain

BB Gun Fires Blanks

Dear Diary,

No more IKEA!!!! Praise the lord, if there is such a thing. What I ask myself when I wake up is what is there to do on a Saturday without IKEA? Turns out there is extra time to sleep and eat. Had another cracking little breakfast from the Grocer store across the road from the flat. Because of the extra sleep I was running a bit late so I quickly put a football inspired playlist together, put the freshly washed kit in the bag and hopped in the car for football. It was a bit of a muggy day but we thought what the hell “lets drop the top”. What do you know, as the roof is going down Bruce bloody Springsteen only comes on! The ‘Boss’ and football. What else is there to life?

Interesting sight on the way past Seven Sisters tube station. Old chap at the lights. Lets say 80+. He was sitting in his car stretched over two lanes doing what looked like trying to send a text message. He had all sorts of horns and swear words being thrown at him to get a move on. Did he listen or care for that matter? No is the simple answer. He was in his own little world. Good on him I say. I only say that as Thomas made a dangerous manoeuvre to get round him and that meant we didn’t get stuck behind the incompetent old fool….

Arrived at the home of Norsemen Football Club a little subdued, as I knew I couldn’t play this week. Everyone was in the changing room listening to the Scissor Sisters on Macca’s Ipod. They all rushed out when the balls arrived. We all had a little kick about. Me less so as my leg hurts. Ballers just stands at the side of the pitch, as he doesn’t want to display his lack of footballing skills. Then out of the blue an old face appears. Nicky bloody Morgan!!! They are all flooding back now we are top of the league….. first Ossie and now Nicky. They are both very talented though so I welcomed them both back with a hug and a kiss on the cheek. Arda thinks this is gay. Arda has been misinformed of the difference between gay and friendly! I promised Arda I would mention his shot that nearly went in. There I did it!

Ok so they lined up as follows:

GK – Jacko

RB – Ossie

LB – Hempsey

CB – Macca

CB – Ballers

RM – Arda

LM – Gav Morais

CM – Tadd

CM – Pearo

CF – Nicky Morgan

CF – Jarrett

That left Reg and Erkan on the bench.

Oh yes I forgot to mention it was p1ssing it down! This made it really fun to stand by the side of the pitch and watch a game of football……

15.00 – Game kicks off. Norsemen start the better of the two teams. However the adverse weather was hindering their passing game. BB Eagles always looked dangerous on the counter attack with their two strikers both being physical and quick. What Ballers does lack in football skills, he makes up in sneakery. After about 10 minutes Ballers had identified the BB Eagles number 9 as a potential threat. What he must of thought to himself is “I am going to kick him.” Kick him he did. What Ballers is extremely good at is exit the scene of a crime very quickly. What was clearly a booking went unpunished as by the time the ref had spotted the foul, Ballers was already back in position giggling to himself. Well done Steven.

The number 9 then got his revenge on the Norsemen back 4. When I say back 4 what I actually mean is Macca. Macca had a good 10 yard head start on the BB Eagles number 9 to get to a loose ball. Macca thought to himself “there is no way I am going to run in a straight line to get this ball.” What he decided to do was take like a swing shot method, using the gravitational pull of the moon to try and propel him to the ball. This all clearly went wrong and the BB Eagles man got to the ball first. Jacko had to make a very good save at his near post to deny BB Eagles the opener. I think we all now the look on Macca’s face at this point. If you don’t then I will tell you. Imagine a young boy taking his sisters pet gerbil and putting it in the toilet to see if it can swim. When he finds out it cant he flushes it down the toilet to erase all evidence of what he has done. His mum is standing behind him all the time and he is correctly punished. That is the kind of face Macca had.

Norsemen had the two best chances of the half with Jarrett being denied of a deft chip over the keeper by the keepers out stretched arm. A very good save. The second chance was a ball in from lets say Hempsey for arguments sake. Jarrett found himself unmarked at the back post where his header was saved well again at the near post by the keeper.

Other points to mention in the first half was Tadd being pushed over in the penalty box, it stopped raining and me and reg played a bit of keepy ups.

Half time and the score is 0-0.

Don’t know what happened at half time as I stayed outside but I was informed of one incident after the game. Nicky Morgan offered some words of wisdom after the half time team talk “I think we need a goal boys.”

Second half began and so did the rain again. Second half was very stretched and a bit messier as there was some tired legs. Arda was bought down in the box in the opening 10 minutes with quite a brutal challenge. Ref gave a goal kick and why not! Arda had to come off and was replaced by Erkan. Jarret was put through 1 on 1 with the goalkeeper and was again brought down in the box. Ref gave a free kick and hempsey took a rubbish free kick that went wide. BB Eagles always looked like they could nick a goal on the counter attack, however saying that Mark only touched it once or twice in the second half.

Nicky Morgan made way for Reg as Norsemen went looking for the winning goal. Jarrett back healed an effort agonisingly wide. A little bit of frustration then creeped into the Norsemen play and there was some arguing. Eventually the ref blew his whistle and the tie finished 0-0. I think Norsemen deserved to win the game with the balance of play but at the same time BB Eagles deserved their draw with some solid play at the back.

I went in to the club house and was duped into staying and watch the golf. I hate golf! Then went to Winchmore Hill with Tadd and Hempsey and got smashed. Job done. Well kind of.

Good night world.

Norsemen FC vs Old Parkonians FC

2010-09-30T05:06:00.001-07:00

Norsemen FC vs Old Parkonians FC

Saturday 25^th September

Grocers Pitch

Norsemen Give Park A Hyding

Dear Diary,

Guess what I did this morning (apart from waking up), that’s right I made some more flat pack furniture. I think I could get a job at IKEA with the skills I have recently picked up. There are no cardboard boxes left now so this could be an end to me having to use the ‘bloody bloke’ skills that my dad passed down to me. Although the skills that he has are much better than mine. When he was a young gent I am pretty sure he could have chopped down a tree and made a cabinet from said fallen tree. What I need today is a physics degree to understand the instructions of a flat pack IKEA bed frame. Anyhow back to matters in hand. I short walk to the Grocers and I found Thomas just finishing his breakfast. I sat down with my plus 1 and had a lovely eggs Benedict. When I say lovely it was top notch. Finished that, climbed into Thomas’ car and zoomed off to footy.

Arrived at Edmonton Sports ground a little sleepy if I am going to be honest with you. Saw NRC walking into the car park. Gave him a quick beep and he sh1t himself. This firstly made me feel good about myself and secondly woke me up somewhat. Walked into the changing room and saw all my chums. We had a nice group hug and then started kicking balls aimlessly at the broken bin again. We all missed. Some burke turned the shower on again with a wild shot and I got wet once again. Got changed whilst asking NRC train times. Macca did the honours with the music this week. A bit of Michael Jackson was played (I think it was Heal the world). Jacko and Tajae really feel the beat and have a private sing along. Macca then showed his spiteful side and stopped the music because he wanted to put his phone away. We all sat in silence. I don’t think I will ever be able to forgive Macca for what he did. No apology, nothing, just a smug little midland grin.

Was nice not having Ballers about this week. He was off at some civil partnership in Morocco or something like that. I wasn’t really listening when he told me why he wouldn’t be at football.

So the team lined up as follows:

GK Jacko

RB Ossie

CB Tajae

CB Macca

LB Muzza

LM Hempsey

CM Tadd

CM Coleman

RM Pearson

CF Jarrett

CF Leon

Subs

Ross Davies

Arda

We had a nice little warm up and then just stood around for 5 minutes, whilst watching Old Parks warm up. They were good at warming up.

15.00 – Kick off

Both teams got off to a frantic start. Norsemen probably having more joy in the opening encounters. Leon and Jarrett both looked very dangerous upfront and causing the Old Parks defence so problems. Up the other end Old Parks were giving as good as they got. Jacko made two world class saves. The first coming from a great shot from just outside the penalty area. Jacko scrambled across his goal and got a strong wrist to a shot that was creeping in the far post. The second was a one on one from a Macca mistake. Jacko got down and saved well to his right again. Just going to quickly go back to Maccas mistake. You would have thought he would have learnt from his mistake in the last home game. You thought wrong. He dilley dallied on the ball for too long and was tackled by the Old Parks striker. Luckily Jacko was in goal. Just get rid Macca!!!! Again after the play had broken down Macca looked upset with the telling off he was receiving from most people. He had the face of a 5 year old girl that has just been told off for putting super glue in her brother’s hair. Again he doesn’t like being told off. Hopefully he will learn this time..........

Back to the game and after a couple of great chances for Leon a goal is scored. A cracking little move led to Tadd steaming into the left hand side of the box. Tadd unleashed a great left foot strike which the keeper got down well to but could only palm it into Leon’s path who in turn composed himself and lashed it into the net. Norsemen 1 -0 Old Parkonians.

Half time comes and I feel Norsemen had the better of the first half, with the attack causing a lot of problems. Saying that, Old Parkonians hadn’t been out played by any stretch of the imagination and were still well and truly in this game.

Norsemen started the second half spritely and within 5 minutes had stretched their lead to 2. Ossie played a nice ball down the right to which Jarrett latched on to. Jarrett laid a sumptuous ball back to Thomas who in turn swung in a cracking cross to Leon. Leon knocked the ball down to Tadd and on the half volley, Tadd placed the ball in the corner of the net. Delightful goal.

Old Parkonians picked up their game after the goal and started to find a bit more freedom in the middle of the park. A needless foul by the Norsemen defence saw Old Parks being awarded a free kick on the edge of the Norsemen box. The resulting free kick was hit extremely well and was very unlucky not to go in. Instead the ball hit the bar. The ball was then involved in a bit of scramble, eventually being blasted over.

Shortly after this scare Old Parks managed to get on the score sheet themselves. What looked to be a harmless ball over the top was latched on to by the lively striker and with the Norsemen defence and keeper at 6’s and 7’s, the ball was lobbed over the onrushing keeper and into an empty net. Game on.

The away side then had a bit of joy all round the pitch. The ball was played out to the Parks right winger who swung in a lovely cross. The cross was met by Macca who to be fair had done a good job with keeping the Old Parks striker quiet during the game. Macca rarely likes doing the easy thing. Instead of clearing the ball first time, Macca decided to play a one two with the post and then thump the ball away. It takes a lot of guts to pull off such a move in your own box but hats off to the brave man who tries it. Ballers would have just kicked it in his own net and be done with it. That is Ballers style though.

After this scare, Norsemen bucked up their ideas and started to get back on top of the game. We won a freekick just inside the Parks half. Tom and Muzza both stood over the ball, debating who should take it. I think their conversation went a bit like this:

Muzza “Tom”

Tom “Yes Muzza”

Muzza “Have you been working out?”

Tom “I have actually”

Muzza “You look a million bucks”

Ref “Lets hurry it up boys”

Muzza “I have never told you this Tom but I think the world of you”

Tom “Muzza you are really putting me off mate. I am trying to take this freekick and all I can think about is you”

Muzza “Yep no you are totally right mate. Shall i get in there and get my big head on the end of your kick?”

Tom “Yes mate. Go and stand near Coleman and I will pick you two out”

Muzza “Anything you say mate. Give me a minute as it takes me a while to get there”

Tom “Sure thing”

Muzza runs off and Tom kicks it straight to the oppo. Muzza has no chance of getting back into position.

Thomas makes way for Arda and Leon makes way for Ross Davis.

The harder Old Parks go searching for the equalising goal, the more gaps they leave and this eventually leads to Norsemens third and the final sucker punch. Not sure who crossed it in from the right, lets say Hempsey for arguments sake. The ball finds Jarrett at the far post who has a shot, it is blocked or saved and then bounces across the goal line. Ossie steams in and heads the ball home. Jarrett insists it was his goal but Ossie claims the ball was bouncing wide. I have decided to believe Ossie as Jarrett wouldn’t look me in the eye when he was trying to convince me that it was his goal . It wasn’t the best looking goal but they all count.

Final score Norsemen 3 – 1 Old Parkonians. I feel Norsemen deserved the win overall but Old Parks played very well in patches. They are a nice bunch of lads and it is only a matter of time before they start racking up wins.

After the game “The Chef” had a shower with the guys. I think he had heard about the naked exotic dancing that goes on in the shower and he felt like he wanted to be part of it. We all go into the clubhouse and get smashed. It is then decided we make a pilgrimage to Shoreditch and to the Nelsons retreat for some pool and juke box action. I dont remember much as I replaced food with beer.

Meet up with chums from the motherland and then head to a house party in trendy Shoreditch. At this point I am so drunk that I just about manage to stay conscious. I manage a little of something that resembles dancing and then ask if i can be put to bed.

Note to self – eat something after football.

Training Report 15/9/2009

2010-09-24T03:15:00.000-07:00

Tuesday 15^th September 2009

Another glorious day in London Town. Woke up at 8 O’clock on the dot to make a cup of tea for Thomas as punishment for losing Pro Evo the previous night. Probably got stitched up somewhere along the way. Had myself a little shower and ironed my shirt whilst wearing just a pair of pants. Bit miserable outside but hey this is Shoreditch, anything can happen on my 5 minute walk to work. Whilst ironing I spotted a couple of yummy mummies walking their kids to school. Made me feel good about myself. Thomas said goodbye and jumped in his cab and I set off to work.

9:12

Strolled into work. Had some 2 minute microwave porridge with a dollop of strawberry jam for breakfast. Lovely stuff.

9.30

Pretended to do work until 14:00.