This year we ran Club Night differently. For one thing, it was during the day. The weather cooperated and instead of the forecast grey skies, there was blazing sunshine. The result of this was many sweaty games and a number of pink faces at the annual dinner.

Thanks to everyone for signing up to make this possible. We had over 70 people participating, including 5 goalies and our very own Jack Chalk to keep the score and generally make things run ontime. Thanks to everyone who tried their hand at umpiring.

Congratulations to the Pink team for winning the coveted Golden Ball!

And now, a word from our captains…

White Team – Edam Good Time, Captain COOPS

Wow, it was hot, hot, hot. But, as I always say, if you can't stand the heat, get out of Simon Kitchen. Things started swimmingly, with Eimear banging in a couple of early goals and Jimmy Whizz practising his penalty shuffles. In our solitary win, Wizard was much to the fore, as was th eperceptive defensive play of Laurie and Laura. Matt K's early departure saw us finish a little short of numbers and, by extension, energy. Looking back, perhaps we should have put less effort into our Flying V starts and flamboyant goal celebrations and saved some energy for the last game, which saw us being flattened by Rosselli's rampant mob. The undoubted highlight of our day came midway through the midway game against the Red Team. Dave Monck was casually ambling through midfield, looking for all the world like a modern day vegetarian dinosaur that thought its predators long-since extinct, before he was casually flattened by a hurtling Hannah Kenyon. It was brutal.

Yellow Team – The Emmentalists, Captain Andi Caddy

The Emmentalists consisting of Ali Edge, Alex Pashley, Alice Wright, Catriona West, Liz Dunsby, Jason James, MeganM ylrea and captained by Andi C were in high spirits leading into the day'sfixtures. Captain Caddy had gone as far as laminating Hannah Kenyon’s match day pack in an effort to look ‘Pro’ only to surrender them to the strangely under-prepared Jack Chalk who appeared to be assisting in running the event. After a short huddle and team talk consisting of such inspirational words as ‘just play where you want’ and ‘sub when you’re tired’ the Emmentalists launched into Club Day X with enthusiasm and vigour, as befits any Cambridge South team!

There were some periods of great passing hockey displayed by the Emmentalists with great distribution from JJ who was ably supported by the resolute Megan. There was a fear that the heat would cause the team’s game to slow down to that of fondue-like consistency but this was not to happen! Our triple-A heroes (Alex, Ali & Alice) threatened opposition teams constantly with their instinctive stick skills and intelligent running patterns, resulting in goals of such quality that would make Pep Guardiola jealous. This of course could not have been achieved without the selfless support given by Liz Dunsby who was unfortunate not to score and Catriona West who played every minute of every game.

Unfortunately the powers that be conspired against us, leading to a final result for the Emmentalists of second from bottom. Not quite wooden spoon but everyone had a great time nonetheless! Thanks to everyone for making Club Day X a great event!

MOMs – All the Goalkeepers for getting toasted for a good 2 hours

LOM – Captain Caddy for viciously shoulder barging a teenage girl in the D (sorry Zara!) and conceding the subsequent penalty shuffle from which she duly scored.

Red Team – Grate Expectations, Captain Katherine Gibson

What we lacked in goals we made up for in spirit. Each game was fought with vigour and determination. The blazing heat was no match for the reds after three games straight at the start. I feel we did well to come third (from last). Sadly, I have absolutely no clue what the scores were for any ofour matches, except that we beat the yellows and drew a few times. But true champions don't count goals, and there was some great play across the team with flowing passes and skillz so silky I'll spell it with a 'z' .  Each game was close, with the red team narrowly missing victory. Overall a solid effort by everyone and hopefully everyone had fun!

Purple Team – Curds of Prey, Captain Owen Harrison

A quirky purple team started with a win against the reds before battling hard in two well-fought draws against whites and blues. Then purples faced a stubborn green team who were kept alive multiple times by South's very own David De Gea (AKA Jason Mann). A late winner for purples kept the title hopes alive! Next a yellow team who started brightly by taking the lead; purples were down but not out and a comeback was on the cards. Two well-worked goals proved to be enough to take the points.

One game was left, and purples knew victory could put them in title contention. After falling four goals behind, the purples needed to better the Liverpool of 2005 to enter eternal glory. With tired legs and sun-burnt faces, purples could not muster a win and finished a respectable mid-table.

Special mention to Hannah and Ollie for making Club Day possible!

Green Team - Looking Gouda, Captain Lauren Brown

So when Club Lady Kenyon asked me to write a short paragraph on Looking Gouda’s Club Day, it seemed a simple task. Unfortunately a combination of a slightly ropey memory and the passing of several days, including Annual Dinner, means recollections of Saturday are a little hazy. So here’s my take on what I think might have happened. All facts unverified.

While team balance was a regular topic of discussion for the day, for the green team this was focused around our 1 GK, 1 defender, 3 mid-fielders, 4 attackers make-up. Who needs defenders anyway?!Unfortunately this didn’t work out, losing to the Blue team in our first game(it feels like I should use the cheese-related team names, but if the prize-giving tells us anything it’s that no one pays attention to this and as a result no-one knows what’s going on!). Victories against the Pink (cracking goal by Alice!), White and Yellow teams followed (and a couple more defeats)resulting in us definitely finishing 3^rd (or maybe 4^th?).

Special mention to Zara for scoring the winning goal with a shuffle against the yellow team, George for being the only member of the team to be sent off for tardy stick collection and apologies to anyone whose short corner routines were distracted by our team mascot entering the pitch!

Blue Team - The Milky Whey, Captain Amalia Thomas

It was warm, it was sunny, and there was hockey. The Milky Whey’s game was mostly friendly, but our defence took their job very seriously, and both Tom Rosselli and Jan Brynjolffssen got green cards for dangerous play in the D. Whether because that intimidated the opposition enough, or because of their amazing skills, thanks to our strong defence made up of Tom, Jan and Nicky Simler we only conceded goals in short corners.

On the other end of the pitch, Annie Quantrill, James Matthews, Rebecca Frith and Amalia Thomas ran tirelessly despite the heat to get the ball to the forwards Andy Thomas and Sven Lake. With only two games left, Shin Kim arrived only to be shared with Grate Expectations (the red team) in the spirit of Club Day(Hannah said so). But both with and without him our front line was just as successful as the defence and managed to equal every goal conceded, and by the end of the day we counted four draws and two wins, gaining us second place overall.

We came close to winning the coveted Golden Ball and assorted chocolates but nevermind… It had been a day of perfect weather and friendly hockey, and we were all looking forward to the annual dinner in the evening; all in all a great Club Day!

Pink Team – R & Brie, Captain MC Hazzardous

All we do is Win Win Win no matter what (apart from drawing one and losing one). The R & Bries got off to a solid start, keeping a clean sheet in their first 2 games. Sadly the heat of the sun got to the best of us in our first back-to-back game where we narrowly lost our only game of the day. The team was feeling the heat but managed to scrape together a win before a double game break to put ourselves back incontention for the title.

We knew motivation was low and all we wanted was an ice cream but staying true to our team name we got the mix tapeout and pumped ourselves up through the power of music (mainly Seal, Kiss From a Rose). Mandatory huddle and sticks-in at the start of each match helped rally the team to a 5-0 victory over 'Edam Good Time' followed by a 4-0 victory over‘Curds of Prey’.

Thanks to the final two victories R & Brie were crowned winners of the tournament! A big shout-out to the team for working hard through the heat and making it a great day for all.