So I'm pedalling hard through Camden with Regents Park in my sights when straight out of nowhere a word pops into my head - ‘Titfer’ - hits me like a psychic bullet in the back my head from nowhere... Funny that, how things just pop into your head sometimes, voices and stuff, what the fuc ks that all about? So I’m mulling over the strange word in various Rowan Atkinson voices as I’m closing in on the hub – titfer, titferrr, tit-fur? tit for tat, hat, nope, still makes bugger all sense...why??
And then I walk in the changing room and there sits Bernie sporting a brand new hat, a beautifully iconic, fu ck off warm brown trilby with sepia details crowning a big smile on DR’s boat. What kind of coincidence is that, I ask you. Phew, anyway, now I get it, it’s a sign, a premonition, shouldn’t ignore signs, just ask Coyley about the mice and men pre matcher, bullet in the head an all that.... especially before a game, risky.
So here we go then, tit for tat, he wears a new hat, today Bernie isn’t on the pitch, whats in store, he’s wearing a different hat, the manager's hat...the plot thickens...Tit for tat? isn't that another way of saying what comes around goes around – hmmm I'm thinking resurgence, its our time to resurge, and we've had some bad luck lets face it.The mood is light as the nets fly up but Bernie’s in heavy conflab with the skipper. At least half an hour later they break from the huddle and the all new Berniemanager furnishes us with a well polished masterplan to unlock another glorious victory.
The strongest Alliance line up ever listen intently to the bosses measured tactical zen and watch meanly as the InterMilanese lookalike refugees limp into the other half - ‘they’re all over the shop’ muses the boss... Glaring on were - Big Eddie filling the goal mouth, Gibbsy and Liam right and left with Tim's big arse in the middle – 3 at the back, liking this... hovering malevolently in the middle are Hudson, Dan, and Simon, looking good.Iain and Pete, tinkering and tampering with National’s nuts up the flanks. Captain Coyle and Micah, if there was a fight in a pub I know where I’d be stood.Steve, Colin, James, oozing quality and quantity on the bench.And whats more, everyone fulfilled their destiny on this fine day, written out already as it was.
John’s on the whistle and we played some great football on our beloved lovely grass pitch in the sunshine, truly, quintessential English (sorry Col) Sunday League.Our nerve was good, we held it together, communication was good, confidence was growing. Bernie’s direction from the touchline was making a difference, the hat was making a difference, confident, colourful, some would say (and did) that it was showboating. Capitan Coyle has a few pops that could easily slide in but swerve cruelly wide. Finally its Dan who buries the first one after a sustained period of gutsy pressure that pinned National in their own half for longer and longer periods before the inevitable. It looks like great stuff, a powerhouse team performance and great individual efforts collaborating to demoralise and outplay the Natioanles, and now they were knackered.Ours was a well earned goal, deserved you could say, nothing like the shi te penalty they Morten Gamst Pedersoned. Tim took it in his pragmatic stride but I could see he was gutted, were we going to get done again by a team that didn't earn it, can the footie Gods be that mean? 1-1 Half time and the sun goes in....
We switch ends and we've got wind in our faces and we're kicking uphill, (wheres the lovely quintessential bo llocks now ed) Strangely I dont feel that familiar sense of foreboding, I can hear 3 points, and buckets of belief from everyone. We stomp out and the second half sees much of the same ballsy head to head, Hudson leading by example and gets a yellow for getting well stuck in, there are warnings from John to other Alliance enforcers stepping over the mark. Play switches effeortlessly from left to right, we snuff out everything they chuck at us, everyone defends, everyone pushes out to strike back, good patterning I'd say, ask the Hat, whose inspired substitutions by the way tee up the next sequence of events. Timing it perfectly the fresh NA legs are taking it out of the flagging blues and Dan's in again this time with a juicy little lob over the orange keeper and it's 2-1. Give them their dues they kept havin a go and got pretty close, but there was no submission, no surrender, even at our usual vulnerable 5 minutes to go to meltdown moment. Eddie's last goal kick cues the final whistle and another victory for the yellers, 2 fu ckin 1. What a great game. What a great titfer, got to take your hat of to him eh?
Man of the match is as hard as ever, but thinking hard about it, it'd be 'The Northern Alliance' cos everyone of you threw 110 percent at it for the total 90. Oh, and if you do experience little voices in your head, especially if you're on your bike, dont panic, just share it with the group, its probably quite important.
This is Gibbsy, signing off.
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