Sunday 16 March 2008 vs. Oxspring United (away)

With a lot of rain yesterday and overnight, the pitch was never going to be wonderful, but the quagmire that awaited us in the wilds of Oxspring was something else! Real mud-puddles and boggy holes in both goalmouths, and a strip of churned mud right through the middle, all down the length. The only decent part was the wing (on our right as we kicked towards the 'road end' in the first half).

The game? A scrappy, mucky, sticky, dirty affair - not football as we know it. Anxious too, as the ball continually stopped dead in the mire and players lashed wildly trying to clear their lines.

We took the lead through a Danny Tinsley shot that beat the keeper and, on another day, would be down in the books as Danny's goal. However, the mud conspired to take the sting out of the shot, and, even though it had by this time beat the keeper, it slowed to a trickle, and it was Conor (right place, right time) who put it in the net.

Conor had a storming game throughout, but early in the second half the referee (don't get me started just yet!) gave an absolutely ludicrous penalty for a goalmouth scramble that ended with one of their players losing his feet and then sent Conor off for bringing him down! No way, no chance, not in your wildest dreams, ref! But 1 - 1 it was then.

Then Sam put us back in front with about 30 minutes of the half gone. And what did we do? Having defended so well, for so long, we let them straight back in! Two apiece!

And so the two teams battled it out on this corner of Oxspring that will forever be mud (or so it seems)and maybe a draw was a fair result in the end. Maybe?!

The referee was a young man in his mid-teens (I would guess) who gave us nowt all day. Throw ins? Forget it. Free kicks - no way! Offsides - well yes he gave a lot of those against us (some valid, some absolutely not). To be fair Chris the Oxspring manager, told me afterwards that he too thought there had been some very poor calls against us. But but hey-ho - that's life, that's football, and we wound our way home over the hills and moors - older, wiser and much, much muddier that before!