Can't Get Used To Losing (You)...It's 3am four days before the match and some of us simply cannot sleep. Instead of counting sheep, the names of players either injured, away or called into work drift through a worried manager's thoughts. Jimmie (knee), Marcus (broken arm), Mario (work), Jimmy L (work), Tom (work), Adam (father-in-law's birthday), Kali ("bird's birthday party"), Dario (bad back). It doesn't look good as we begin to wonder if we'll have to send our U11s team down to Clapham. Twenty-four hours before kick off and another three players text or email to say they are now not coming. There's kit all over the front room floor, socks being paired, shirts and shorts being folded as Preston Vs West Brom flickers on the telly.
Two match balls are pumped, first aid kit checked and everything put in the 'football cupboard' ready, the saturday ritual diligently carried out as the family step over shin-pads and goalie gloves and try to eat their lunch.
Two match balls are pumped, first aid kit checked and everything put in the 'football cupboard' ready, the saturday ritual diligently carried out as the family step over shin-pads and goalie gloves and try to eat their lunch.The phone is as busy as Harry Rednapp's mobile during the transfer window, as calls are made to try and get a team together
within 24 hours. John tracks down two mates, James can possibly get one, German Dan is duped into coming to watch unaware we will force him to play. Calls are made to Ivan, Chris's workmate, a goalkeeper from Mexico. We track down 15 year old Wala in the local park and rope him in and arrange to give Vico his first game, if only he knew how to get to Clissold Park from Homerton!
Sunday comes and we find ourselves driving all over the place to pick up players that we don't even know what they look like! "What are you wearing?...A bright orange goalie's shirt?". And after a long journey snaking through the roadworks of South London we arrive at Clapham.
Hands are shaken in the dressing room as six new players turn up, pull on the Recreativo shirt and are welcomed into the team. Aaron, James 2, Dan the Bayern fan, Wala, Vico and new keeper Ivan, we salute you! After a very decent opening 15 minutes we concede from a corner and then go 2-0 down before the break. Another two Barking goals hit the back of our net in the second half as despite some decent footballers out there, we simply didn't click. One of them days. But as is often the case, just getting 11 players together out there on a sunday afternoon with such short notice is a victory in itself and we leave the pitch happy to have found a half-decent new goalkeeper and an energetic and committed new bunch of lads who will hopefully pull on the blood red shirt of Recreativo a good many times to come. Next up, Lyric Celtic at home. The build up to that game begins tonight as the the kit spills out of the washing-machine and is hung, dried and packed away ready for next sunday. Let's be having you....
Team : Ivan the Mexican, Chris Read, Gregg Morgan, Aaron Belfast (James Humphreys), James 2 (John Megaughin), Lee Walsh, Joao Spinola, Russell Smith, Wala Hassan (Daniel Lucht), Nick Candy, Vico Welbeck.