Chapter 1 can be found here: Rollercoaster Last Three Games of a Men's Third Team Captain: Chapter 1: The Loss to Ely

Last week's loss made this week's game all the more important. Sam gave us a grueling Monday training that utilised "half double doggies" to the team that lost, followed by pressups for the slowest, but it did serve us well, as the hockey was looking tight and controlled, and the team really gave it their all, wanting to make up for the weekend.

Bad news came Thursday night, Josh R the consolation scoring man himself, had done his shoulder in, and with the M1s and 2s having solid but not overwhelming numbers meaning no flows up or down, it was back to James with cap in hand. "Think I might need Ivo" I asked knowing full well it wasn't a might, and James every bit the stand up guy responded "If you need Ivo, you need Ivo" .

Game day, both teams had spells of control, but it was Spalding that struck first when during a short corner they were quicker to respond to the ball after two good saves from Ben, only for the goal to be disallowed for a foul just before. The game returned to an even affair, but Spalding did find the breakthrough with some well worked passes into the D followed by a small touch to fool the defender on the line. Spalding looked slightly favoured after the goal, as we played a bit nervously and a little wasteful.

Half time, and a few voices are heard, "we're in this game", and a few tactical words are soon replaced by the motivational speech of an era, think braveheart but with less blue paint and no horse. Was this delivered by the captain, no, I might yap, but I'm no great orator, no, this speech was delivered by Tom Anns, and might just have saved our season. "This is what seasons are made of, are we going to fold here and face relegation, or are we going to go out, win this thing, and prove we're good enough to stay up!" (the irony here is this is all paraphrased and so is in fact my take on Tom Anns’ speach...)

The words had taken hold in Riccardo, Gabe, and Jamie, who after a quick break, worked the ball between themselves to  great effect. Gabe slid the ball to Jamie, who banged it across the D to Riccardo at full stretch (and now finally playing with a 37 and a 1/2" stick, which we'll say made all the difference). We had a good spell of pressure after this, punctuated by the occasional Spalding break, but both defences stood firm, until Spalding gave up a short corner, where sometimes the simple routines are the best. Ball to top D, shin with the shin high scoop, lucky deflection of the second runner to carry it in. Umpires discuss it to be sure, and give the goal. Some breathing room, but still nervy. We gave some gifts to the Spalding side but luckily Ben was happy to play the grinch, and so we made it to the final few minutes. Chris collects a loose Spalding 16, ball into Jamie (who is both high and wide), holds it, draws some players in, simple ball back to Menz, Chris with the little dink, and Jack sweeps it into the bottom corner. Great team goal. The extra breathing room calmed the nervous play, and we saw the win out.

I didn't get to celebrate at tea with the boys, but Shin took some great photos, so I felt like I was there (I was playing "Blood on the Clocktower" at a friend's birthday, with themed cocktails to boot. Would recommend).

Sunday's hangover was greeted with WhatsApp going off saying we're "Mathematically" safe due to how other games had gone. The start of Monday's training and coach Sam drops the bombshell that apparently 4 teams could be relegated from our league, and all of a sudden the game vs CoP5s means something.... hopefully Chapter 3 brings another win.

If I’d been writing this on Tuesday, as I meant to, that would be the end, at least until Chapter 3. However there have been two developments, one I won’t go into as I barely know the details but it could make this match matter, end of. The other is that the latest update only has one team in the drop zone. Is this an error? It’s too late to be doing the permutations, but if you fancy trying to work out what went on, its here.