South and Nomads Men’s O40s teams gathered for a match on Sunday lunchtime. O40s, or ‘Masters’ as England Hockey would have us greybeards called these days. However, just like MAs from a certain institution, this honorific is indicative of nothing further than the passage of time.

That said, the game was actually played at quite a lick as both clubs included players from up and down their sides. Nomads were the first to strike, their left winger left unaccountably unmarked on the far post to turn neatly home. Where was his marker (reader – I had been attracted to the ball like a moth to a flame… and like the choices of said insect was just as ineffectual).

Out visitors were probably on top at this stage, but as the half progressed we came more into it and equalised towards the end of the half when Browney deflected cleverly home on, or rather from quite a way outside, the near post. 1st XI standard Hockey. If I had wrote this report promptly, I would remember who it was that got to the byline and fired the cross in from the right. But nearly two weeks later that detail has gone, so [runs finger over team list] good work Kerny!

We chatted at half-time about it being a good game, a winnable one but left unspoken also a losable one. Maybe we should have continued with the experiment of Martin at centre-forward. I liked that, and he even had a shot in his brief cameo at the top of the team. I’m not sure if son Thomas, still on the sideline from the earlier County Juniors session, would have cheered if that had gone in or groaned on realising he would never hear the last of it.

But no, Martin was back in more familiar territory just in front of goalie Ben for the second half. Neither could do anything against Nomads 2nd though [Ed – Martin wasn’t even on the pitch at the time, so hard to hold him to blame], the ball switched twice in rapid succession to be fired in at the post. That was too good.

South were not done though, fighting back when a quickly taken free-hit from the right flank by, er, me found Mariano at the top of the circle. Maz danced his way past a challenger and flicked goalwards. The Nomads goalie made a superb stick save of the shot… only to the ball fall perfectly to Kerny who immediately roofed the rebound. Classy play all round… particularly the ball in [modesty, pah!].

Brilliant. We were level. Don’t concede again within 30 seconds. Oh.

Hmm. Nomads got another late on which I missed as I was on my way over to Cantabs to rescue the post-match pizzas. They needed rescuing. I heard the cheers, but can’t say exactly how it went in. Then again I don’t remember how the third was scored either… and I was on the pitch for that one. The hair greys, the memory goes, but the Hockey continues. There may even be one more game before Christmas, and certainly more in the new year.