Come on the Northerners

“How to dominate against 11 but collapse against 9″ bonus marks awarded for references to famous Spurs comebacks with nine men and England RU victories against the All Blacks with two people in the sin bin.

It happens boys.

It was an early start for North Sydney Council, for it was declared that 7am was pitch inspection time. As the Rangers white 4×4 pulled up at the ground, a couple of Lorikeets circled overhead, the ching ching of the bells, a reminder of the boats gently rocking in the harbour, could be heard in the distance, the sound quickly carried away on the breeze. As the ranger approached pitch no. 2 his thoughts turned to the strange remark his wife made as they were getting into bed last night, what did she mean by it, did she know, never mind that would have to wait, he had another job in hand. He strode confidently to the centre of the field, 100 lives were affected by the decision he was about to make, Oh the power of it. He dialed the number pre-set into his phone, a gruff voice answered, the ranger only uttered two words before hanging up.

GAME ON

The ressies were straight off the back of humiliating West Pymble 2-0 at their own Manor, inflicting their first defeat in 45 outings, confidence was high, as well it might be, for Murray was back.

In the first real attack of the game Scud came very close forcing a great save from their keeper tipping his roundhouse kick from a crossed ball over the bar, Scud’s effort much better than the crap he was attempting before the game, Oh well, bad dress rehearsal and all that…. Iain was confident in net and shouting orders at his defence when they displeased him, it was obviously a mistake to let them know we had a Scottish keeper so early in the game. Not even midway through the first half and player manager Armstrong tried to demonstrate the skill and flair that has not made us famous this season or any other, he backheeled it to Adam midway in his own half, the opposing striker latched onto it like a greyhound chasing a 3 legged rabbit and hit a speculative 30 yarder that was never going to go in. Or was it. Iain showing the goalkeeping form that has made his countrymen famous realized half a second later he was in a lot of trouble, froze to the spot except for his head that tilted back to watch the bail sail over his head and into the net. 1-0 down.

In a game that pleased the crowd that had stayed at home, North Sydney eventually got back into the game after an impressive run down the right, Murray crossed with pin-point perfection for Neil Gross to slide in with perfect timing and force the ball into the back of the net with his RIGHT foot. 1-1 Heady stuff indeed.

Later in the game Iain and Tad managed to emulate Basil Fawlty and Manuel whilst trying to deal with a harmless ball in the area, the end result being Iain pushing the ball to the oncoming striker who said ‘thank you very much gentlemen, very generous, don’t mind if I do’ & smashed the ball into the net 2-1 down.

With 20 minutes to go Manager Armstrong abdicated responsibility to Chalky by asking me to do the subs for the last 20 minutes if we needed any more changes. I promptly called a press conference to announce my new position as ‘caretaker manager’ The press asked the obvious questions, ‘Did I think Manager Armstrong had done a good job’ naturally I said he performed to the best of his ability but mistakes had been made. ‘Did I think Armstrong had suffered from his dual role as player manager’ I replied that after seeing him play for the past five minutes I realized it wasn’t the fact that he wasn’t on the sidelines that was the issue, it was the fact that he was on the pitch that was of greater concern! Then the strange looking journalist from Sydney Uni with the hair line receding faster than an Italian front line in a World War asked what changes I would make and where I could make a difference. I replied that I thought it would be wrong to meddle too much with the team that he had already put out however I would be working intensively with the 1^st team over the next and final 15 minutes of my reign to change some things and make them a more cohesive unit that scored more and conceded less. I’d let history be the judge of my achievements.

Anyway back to the game, we produced some good work especially down the right hand side, Murray and (I think) Neil providing quality crosses from the right, Scud managed to miss a sitter from a yard out, we should have put more pressure on their keeper from our long throws to restrict the keepers movement but at the end of the day it’s all academic as the ref called time and the game was lost. Graeme was vocal of his condemnation of the performance but had every right to be as it was pretty poor especially after last weeks ‘Lord Mayor’s show’ Disappointing as we could have beat this side but as Coxy might say ‘the season starts again next weekend’

Sorry for all the bullsh!t but to be honest I watched 4 games at Primrose this weekend and can’t really remember many of the details now! On the positive side I’m confusing this match with 3 others where we scored 14 goals and conceded 1, on the negative side 2 of the games were girls, go figure.

MAN & MUGS

No MAN today as crap performance in most respects

Dual MUGS go to the aforementioned Iain and Tad, well deserved boys, well done!!

At the eighth attempt and to the great relief of the coach and players, North Sydney’s O35 Division 1 first team finally recorded their first win of the season!  Now watch us go!

During the week I received the news that four of my first team squad were still out injured and would be missing this game. I also received the good news that Mitch had decided to quit the All Age Premiers and would be joining us for the remainder of the season. He went straight into the starting line up alongside Jules Glass Jaw Garness in attack. In midfield we had Micky the Greek Goat Shagger Mick, Salmon,Jurassic and Gary ‘pinky’ Clark. In front of Paul ‘Pick me’ Hughsie in goal we had a back four of Kieran ‘I’ll fight anyone’ Ryan, Pat yiddo Acheampong,Gary Tummy Wummy Skipper Fallowfield and Mike ‘red card’ Stephenson.

The Kissing Point team did not know what hit them as Norths started the game at a terrific pace. We dominated possession in the early stages of the game with some great passing and movement off the ball. When we did lose the ball then the tackles went flying in to regain it.

We took a deserved lead after 15 minutes after a great move up the left. Tummy Wummy won the ball in defence and went charging up the field, he played a great one-two with Mitch ran into the box and hit a blinding shot past the Keeper at his near post. He celebrated his goal as if his beloved Hammers had just won the League title……!

Gary had been finding scoring a bit difficult this season……1 to be exact ; )   Coach Armstrong had moved him back to centre midfield to give him a chance to work his magic there…….no luck. This week he got moved back to centre half and bingo he scores!  What insight!

The remainder of the first half was even with a couple of chances missed by both teams. It was also a very physical game with crunching tackles flying in all over the place from both teams. The ref was handing out yellow cards as if he were Arsne Wenger handing out sweeties to kids…(the yids will know what I mean). Sean the superstar from the Div 3 O35 team had arrived to watch because their game had been called off. I had a spare spot on the bench so he went on the card. He came on with 15 minutes of the first half remaining in an unfamiliar left wing position. With 10 minutes remaining he had gone right through the back of a hapless KP player and received a yellow. Fearing this experiment was about to leave me red faced and Sean red carded I am afraid Sean’s 15 minutes of fame ended at half time……sorry mate but I needed 11 men out there for the second half.

1-0  at half time.

In the second half Norths really stepped up a gear. We were 2-0 up after a couple of minutes through Mitch. Although this reporter has to admit I missed it as I was taking a pi$$ !!

Chris ‘The other Preston supporter in the club’ Hanley had come on at half time at right back and so had Iain ‘The mad Pole Vaulting Professor’ Black at right midfield. We completely outplayed KP during the 2^nd half and our cause was helped by the ref who sent off a KP player after he had tried to snap Mike the Salmon in half with an outrageous tackle that In my heyday I would have been proud of !

With 15 minutes left Jules was taken off and the Old Scottish warhorse that is Iain ‘Muirton’ McLean came off the bench to show the ‘young’ pups exactly how to play this game he calls Fitba. I thought he had killed himself after watching the silly old bugger try an acrobatic bicycle kick….LOL. But then somehow he found himself free and bearing down on goal, only to see his weak right footed effort saved and cleared straight to Mitch. Rather than put the ball into a gaping goal Mitch decided to take the piss out of the KP defence and keeper by dragging the ball back and sideways before tapping it in.

There was still time left for the Coach to sub Mitch so he could receive the plaudits of the watching throng after a great debut. The real reason was I did not want him scoring a hat-trick on debut as we would never hear the end of it!

Well done team, a great effort by all. Now all we have to do is win our next 6 games and we will be in the top 4 and end of season finals!

MOM…..Mitch for a great display up front scoring 2 goals on debut.

MUG……none of the players are deserving of mug so it goes to the injured Andy Norton who for some strange reason keeps on turning up to watch dressed as a cross between a Gay Ski instructor and an even Gayer Ballerina in black tights.

Very busy at work so no time for the normal analytical Monday email you’ll all be glad to hear!

Kissing Point…Reserves. Poor finishing, too much f*cking around on the ball (me being the biggest culprit), stupid error between GK and Left Back did us in.

We were beaten by a sh*t team and we only have ourselves to blame. But we are still only 1 point below 4^th spot on the table!

First…..Excellent win and performance. Without getting carried away but you looked like a team and played like a team for the first time this season. The shape looked good and without pi**ing in his pocket too much, the arrival of Mitch up front has given us movement, pace and aggression. But football is a team game, you all played a part. Play with the confidence that win has brought you and put together a few more wins and we will soon be moving up the table.

Sunny weather forecast all week so training will be at Cammeray this Thursday, 7.00pm start.

Please let me know if you cannot play this coming weekend. I would have picked the exact same first team however Pat and Chris Hanley are away.

Also Iain McLean is away…..Gary Fallowfield will play GK for the reserves this weekend.

Maca and Alen Rogina are still away……but Coxy is back. Anyone else?

Can the injured players also let me know if they expect to be fit this week?

Finally…….We have a KDSA O35 cup game this Sunday…..12.00 noon KO v West Pymble Firsts !  at Auluba Rd, Sth Turramurra.

Please let me know if you want to be considered for this cup squad. I will not be in charge as I am handing over the cup team management duties to Coxy. He will pick the team on his return to Oz at the end of this week. There will be some All Age O35 players included in this cup team.

Cheers

Mark

More of the same please.

Last weekend, the semi final in 2005 and round 17 in 2005.