The "Official-ish" Report from the Hampshire Legends Cup Tournament.For a more entertaining view of the day, you'll have to wait for Matt to recover his breath.
Hawks 50+ Walking Football: The Hampshire FA Legends Cup
Hawks Blues: P 6, W 1, D 2, L 3, F 3, A 7.
Our day started against our old adversaries Eastleigh 1. As expected they ran and pushed and shoved their way to a predictable 3-0 win. They obviously enjoy playing the way they do, and we enjoy playing the way we do. Our inclusive squad was made up of people of a range of ability/skill, whereas this was very much Eastleigh’s “first team”.
Second up was Emsworth Seniors B, against whom we had a far more enjoyable contest, but after a very even game we were edged out 1-0. Emsworth are one of the teams that we might be playing more often in friendlies soon, and their playing philosophy was like ours, very much in the spirit of the game.
Next we played Portsmouth, resplendent in pink, and once again fell to another narrow 1-0 defeat, and once again a very enjoyable experience it was. When teams are focused on playing the game properly, it is so much more fun. That said, the Pompey team were no pushovers and weren’t averse to a bit of jogging on the side.
For our fourth game, we came up against TSS Red Rovers, and earned our first point, our first clean sheet, and our first controversial incident. With the ball in play, we called for a “time out”. The Reds all stopped, and Robbie Brown hammered the ball into their net, for what we thought was a 1-0 lead. The stand-in “ref”, an Eastleigh player who was injured so not playing on the day, disallowed it saying that a time out had been called. We understood that the time out stoppage happens when the ball next goes out of play, otherwise you could simply use them to stop a striker who is in on goal. Well, you would, wouldn’t you? Robbie naturally requested that the “ref” be made aware of this interpretation, to which the “ref” suggested in two words that Robbie should go away, the second of these words being “off”. We took exception to this and several of our players threatened to walk off, the “ref” threatened to walk off, and eventually two FA “Respect” officials came onto the pitch and relieved the “ref” of his duties. Bless ‘em the Reds were good sports about it all, and that moment apart the game was played in a good spirit to a 0-0 conclusion, but we could perhaps feel with some justification that just this once “we woz robbed”.
A win had to come, as we were playing far better football now as we got to understand the way the game is played. Cove Jammy Dodgers (yes, really) were the victims, and after an even first part of the match, we burst into a two-goal lead courtesy of Matt Bartolo’s double strike. We were now in nose-bleed country, not having had a lead before, and when Cove pulled one back with a couple of minutes to go, it was squeaky bum time. They pushed us hard, forcing a series of corners, but we held on for a maiden 2-1 win.
Finally we were up against Southampton DFA, a team containing a few female players. This was strange, as they are obviously quite competent and capable players, but instinctively you don’t mark or challenge them as robustly as might be the case with male players. This turned out to be a mistake as they were able to take a lead when a strong shot from one of the ladies squirmed through Derek Trapp’s gloves and into the net. It turned out that their player-manager used to be an England Ladies International and managed Pompey Ladies for a while. Undaunted we rallied, and got our just reward when another Robbie Brown thunderbolt found the back of the net, no dubious refereeing decisions spoiling the moment this time. With the last kick of the game, their ‘keeper came up to the half-way line to smash a spectacular free-kick against the outside of our post. It was so nearly a stunning winner, but a 1-1 draw was an enjoyable and just result. For us it highlighted the importance of the “inclusive” aspect of Walking Football, as for mixed matches to be able to take place means that the sort of game we experienced first thing cannot be allowed to become the norm.
We tried to give our whole squad roughly the same pitch time, but suffered a few injury blows: Joe Mair didn’t feel able to come on at all due to a pre-existing injury, and we lost goalkeeper Tony Jewell during the third game to what is probably a thigh muscle tear, then during the last match we felt compelled to take Jeff Hooper off against his will as his knee injury was making him look in such obvious discomfort we couldn’t bear to watch. The complete squad was: Matt Bartolo, Robbie Brown, Jeff Hooper, Tony Jewell, Joe Mair, Dave Richards, Stewart Russell, Paul Sealey, and Derek Trapp. And a hard shift was put in by all.
Hawks Pinks: P 6, W 1, D 1, L 4, F 1, A 9
These are the views from the Pink team.....
As we had 4 subs we split into two teams, with John Morgan and Clive Wilkin taking turns in goal.
Team 1 (starting line-up as selected by Shaun) – Clive/John, Rob Kelly, Dave Hall, Dave Veal, and Steve Talman.
First game against TSS Golden Oldies we drew 0-0. Our second match, against Hayling Old Boys we won 1-0 (Rob Kelly scoring). This was the first ever win by a Hawks 50+ Walking Football Team. In the third game we lost 1-0 to Active Nation Soton courtesy of a free kick! In all we played very well as a unit, passing the ball around well and covering for each other. We wanted to keep the line-up intact as we were playing very well as a team.
Team 2 – John/Clive, Mo Hill, Peter Dolamore, Dave Veal, and Barrie Gray.
This team didn't do quite as well and really struggled in all of their games, losing 2-0 to Cove Boca Seniors, 2-0 to Bournemouth 1, and 4-0 to Real Cove Rapidly Ageing Pensioners (yes really). They didn't really gel as a team and were on occasions too guilty of ball watching and giving away possession. However the 4-0 defeat was against the best team in our group!
Overall Rob Kelly, as captain for the Pinks felt that they had too many players, and it was hard to keep everyone happy playing the rotation system. It would have been better with just two subs. All of the teams in the Pinks’ group played fairly and with a good spirit which was refreshing!
For readers out there, a job opportunity arises, because as a squad we need another dedicated goal keeper, at the moment we only have Tony, and of course he suffered his leg injury which left us relying on people who don’t really want to be goalkeepers.
Thinking about the tournament as a whole, and some of the restrictions/rules applying:
No-one liked the two touch rule – it becomes very restrictive and frustrating.
We all liked smaller teams - having 5-a-side gives you more space and the opportunity of moving around more. You also get much more of the ball.
Goal scoring is becoming a big problem - only one for the Pinks and three for Blues - four goals in 12 games between us!!! That said we were playing an unfamiliar format of play, and when we were able to get the ball to feet in the right areas we began to look more threatening as the tournament went on.
Refereeing was very inconsistent, especially regarding running, but there was a feeling that they began to get more “observant” as the day wore on.
Our only real criticism of the organisation was to ask why we had to wait 1.5 hours between game 5 and game 6! We all stiffened up in the clubhouse, but on the up side we missed the rain showers that came along then.
Overall we enjoyed the day but need to practice two-touch football if that is going to be the rule for tournaments. From what we have seen of the other local sides in the Havant area, we feel confident that we would enjoy regular games with them, win, lose, or draw.
Full results from the inaugural Hampshire Legends Cup should be available soon at
http://full-time.thefa.com/Index.do?league=123845200
