South 3rds' final game in Division 4NW provided an opportunity for a number of new or newish faces to make their presence felt. This was somewhat out of necessity given a spate of injuries and unavailability, most notably the skipper who preferred to take in Saracens vs Quins at Wembley after he had "got confused about when the season ended." With vice-captain JB also unavailable for less lemonic reasons, authority was delegated to club stalwart Neil. It promptly went right to his head, as he dictatorially changed the meet location from Milton (convenient for most) to Madingley Road (convenient for Neil). This gave Ali some unexpected competition in the Lemon voting, though not enough to overcome abandoning his men to their fate.

As it turned out, Neil wouldn’t even be fit to play after coming down with a heavy cold 24 hours prior to the match. With Paul also out of the original side due to a muscle tear, Jan volunteered to travel and was at one stage going to take the armband, only to also drop out during the warm-up after discovering that hamstring strains don’t heal within a week, even if one really, really hopes they might. The battlefield commissions continued as Coops was put forward by his teammates, before Hopalong C-bomb was finally settled on, mostly on the grounds of being nearest to the umpires when they wanted to toss the coin!

Despite such chopping and changing of who was actually going to be in the team, we started the match very coherently, passing in simple triangles to create a first minute chance and then keeping the pressure up to win an early short. This was played back towards injector Coops but went a little behind him. He tried to manufacture a deflection goalwards from there, a terrible idea that had absolutely no chance of working. Surely this was a perfect opportunity for one of Jack’s patented twirly-spinny things?

The Saints settled down after that and an even match ensued with both sides probing away but not working either keeper overly much. The hosts struck first in somewhat comical fashion, as a diagonal ball in from the wing of no great pace was missed by (conservative estimate) FIVE successive players, two attackers and three defenders. When someone finally put a stick on the evasive object it precipitated a goalmouth scramble that was eventually finished on around the fourth attempt. We ended the opening half behind, but were well in the game and generally feeling pretty positive that this mix of 3rds and 4ths was competing successfully. So well in fact that one wondered if this wasn’t the shape of the future...

It got even more positive early in the second period, as another spell of pressure earned our second short of the game. Once again it was directed towards injector Coops, once again it was behind him and once again he tried to manufacture a deflection goalwards from there, a terrible id... a splendidly marvellous idea that was always going to work, finding the net via the feet (both of them) of the defender on the line. A much better solution than twirly-spinny things, which as I understand it boast a 100% failure record.

The play was still pretty even and not exactly overburdened with goalmouth incident (combined short corner count between the two sides was around five), so the next goal was always likely to be crucial. The Saints got it when one of our clearances was cut out and the ball quickly recycled to a free man in position near the post. Rob W, on his last South appearance before moving to the West County [good luck to him and Lyn, btw], flew off his line to try and nullify the danger but he was undone by a neatly slipped reverse stick finish.

With time ticking down, we threw more men forward looking for a way back and also to try and exploit the period when the Saints were playing with ten men (their star player, Danny Rowland, having taken his traditional spell of R-and-R when playing against us). We knocked on the door a few times, but were not quite composed enough in the circle to make it count. We were also leaving the door open at the back and it took a great double save from Rob to deny first Mr Rowland, refreshed from his break and racing clean through, and then springing back up to kick away the second shot. It would prove a mere reprieve as the Saints did made it 3-1, another counter against our short numbered defence ending with Rowland finally getting his goal, rounding Rob and placing the ball into the open net with literally the last touch of the game. And season.

Have a good summer, and see everyone again for 2014-15’s Division 5NW promotion challenge?