Cue Freddie:-

The M3s ended the 2016-17 season with a trip to Horncastle that had little riding on it. Our hosts sat in lower mid-table, many points clear of the drop zone, whilst we had been crowned champions of Division 5NW the previous weekend. Warm spring sunshine added to the lazy, hazy feeling for the day. That and a diversion due to an accident on the A14 that pushed the planned breakfast stop rather closer to push-back than was ideal (cancel it? are you kidding?!?), which meant around six Full Englishes were sitting heavy on stomachs in the opening fifteen minutes.

The heat and strong light was also causing problems for winger Will, struggling after a Regal night had ended mere hours previously (his breakfast baguette going half-finished). Clearly a darkened room and pin-drop silence would have been much preferable, though to be fair he didn’t sack off the game.

We rode out the dodgy early play thanks to an important save from George and impressive aerial picks of goalbound shots from Matt and JT. However the lassitude did prove indirectly costly, as some weak defending allowed a dribble to get into the circle, followed by an attempted undercut. This clonked Raj on the side of the head with a sickening thud. After a couple of minutes to compose himself, he walked gingerly to the dugout to ice the bruise.

By now the L1s, who had been playing in the match before us, had rolled back out to the astro to watch the goings on. We weren’t giving them much of a display until we finally pieced together a good move in the dying minutes of the half, the ball being worked in and out in a couple of triangles to feed Ed in the circle. Ed’s shot was saved but with our players swarming the circle we were the most likely to benefit from any rebounds, with Matt being Johnny-on-the-spot; he collected at the top of the circle and his finish was cool, flicking low into the exposed far bottom corner. Cue chorus of “I Like To Move It” from the sidelines and a King Julien impression from Matt on his way back to halfway.

Half-time saw the return to action of Raj, feeling somewhat better, not quite to doctor’s advice but not quite against it either. He showed no immediate ill-effects in a storming second half performance and was involved in our next goal, which came from another decent build-up. Once again this went through three or four of our sticks in passing triangles, which opened up acres of space for Ed at the top of the circle. His shot beat the keeper but not the post. However, the rebound plopped obliging in front of the gaping net for Alex to tap home.

The final quarter of the match was reward for a season of ear-bending by Joe, who finally got his chance to play at centre-forward following promises made and reneged on by various skippers throughout the campaign. Liberated, he promptly scored, taking a right-slip from a penalty corner and blasting through the keeper. Three up was a decisive lead, with the remainder of the game drifting by in the afternoon sun.

The match finished with champagne (prosecco) and cake kindly donated by the L1s, i.e. the half of it that they hadn’t managed to eat! Matt took MoM honours, with Raj’s stalwart performance not far behind. Will was the runaway LoM winner. However the important ones here are the overalls for the season. The most MoM awards went to…drum roll…Max, who claimed the crown four times. Chris and Ed ran him a close second with three each. Meanwhile, three names dominated the Lemon standings: Jan and Jason each 'achieved' four, an impressive effort but one topped by Simon, who collected this coveted gong on five occasions. And was also our top scorer. Minor detail.

One final thing. We heard after the game that one of the Horncastle players had done something to his back late on in the match, badly enough that he was unable to leave the astro under his own steam, with an ambulance being called. We wish him a speedy recovery.