Films only ever present one viewpoint don’t they? Well, apart from Austin Powers giving screen time to the families of evil henchman just prior to them being glibly bumped off. Therefore we only got to see Zulu from Michael Caine’s point of view [or whatever his character was called].

What would it look like from the other side? Well, this bunch of orangey-clad fellas pitch up and try to claim your gaff as theirs. They need confronting clearly. But it’s OK, you’re mob handed. Sheer weight of numbers will see this go your way, surely. However there is a co-ordination problem. You can’t get all the resources into battle at once. Wave after wave of attacks try, but they are all repulsed. And then there is the occasional cheeky counter-attack as the outnumbered opponents start looking for the win themselves.

So something like that. With the addition of goalkeepers saving when confronted with three Bury players and no South defenders after we were all caught upfield trying to force that ball home. In fact, Matt was probably the busier of the two stoppers. Rumours that the amount of effort the M3s’ asked from him contributed to the pulled back muscle suffered in the subsequent M4s’ game are strenuously denied. It was selfless by the M3s’ defence to let the Bury attackers through. After all it must be boring if keepers having nothing to do, right?

One very positive note from the match was the performance of the five (count ‘em) players in the side either making their debut for South or a return to action for the first time since uni. All played well and are very welcome additions to the fold, with Matt Kenzie in particular impressing in central midfield. He pushed Matt S-G hard for the man-of-the-match award but it eventually went to the stopper for, well, stopping things.

So that was the friendlies. Two good work-outs that will hopefully have us ready for the serious stuff from next Saturday. Bring it on…

Thanks to Steve and Shahbaz for umpiring.