Way back in the depths of pre-history, the Monckasaurus was but a young lizard making his fresh-faced way in the world. Back then, so the oral histories claim, he scored a hat-trick for his college in what was only his second game of hockey. Many millenia and matches later, he finally has that feeling again. The victims being his clubmates in the 4ths.

Prior to the first roar and foot stamp, we had lost Harry when a ball deflected up and hit him on the head at point blank range. Fortunately, Dr Croc was on the scene to provide emergency first aid and then Howard was on hand to run Harry around to A&E, presumably on the grounds that he knows the ropes. Thankfully we hear that there was no serious damage done.

After that hiatus, it was time for Dave’s first strike. The skipper had arranged short corner practice pre-match, working on a handful of routines. The short corner crew promptly ignored this and went back to old faithful, the Monck-blast. 1-0. Not long after it was 2-0 in near-identical fashion.

The 4ths' best chance of the match came shortly before the interval, as an ‘interesting’ pass across the back line from Jan went straight to Chairman Greaves. His cross was intercepted by Douglas, whose attempted trap bounced off his hand gripping the stick and out of play, which was rather unfortunately judged to be a deliberate action. Lino saved John’s first strike from the shortie and then pulled off a spectacular save, turning John's hammered rebound-strike over the top corner.

We were well into the second half without further addition to the score, as 3rds' attacks continually foundered on the twin towers of defensive strength, Sid and Shahzad. And when they didn’t stop us, Paul was putting the ball wide of an open goal from a range of six inches. What we needed was Dave to show us the way, which he did with his hat-trick goal; it was the best of the lot, coming this time from a hammered strike on the reverse stick.

Soon after we finally got a goal from open play: Paul picked out Jan with a cross-field switch of play, Jan moved it on up the line to James (making a welcome return from injury), who passed square to Ian. The ball was bouncing a little - well it is Long Road after all - but Ian timed his half volley beautifully to smack home.

Rob made it five, finishing a Paul South-esque opportunity after the ball had been pulled back across the face of goal. Then, with time expiring, Jan appeared in the circle. His first shot was saved by Shahzad but he appeared certain to score as the rebound dropped invitingly half a metre from an open net. In fact he did push it home, only to hear a whistle and see a short corner being awarded. His disappointment was evident to all (see Lemon). No matter. Dave drove the short towards the far post where Chris was on hand to deflect in.

The 3rds reach the halfway point in the season with a 5-2-4 record, 35 scored, 19 conceded. The aim for the second half of the campaign will be to improve on that.