27/10/21: Men’s Blues 2-2 UEA 1
4 goals, 2 penalties, serious UEA shithousery, dubious refereeing: the only thing missing today was a blues winner.
The pre-match changing room atmosphere was much improved this week. My own personal highlight was watching Braggy pull on the smallest shirt he could find, one tense away from tearing it in half. I couldn’t help but notice that soon after sonny began to tense every muscle in his body, pushing his chest out. Annoyingly, we were still missing a few pairs of blues socks that Edmondson still hasn’t returned: last seen in lolas on Sunday, as he waved them in girls’ faces trying to convince them he was a blue.
We went through the usual rounds at the warmup, including sonny’s usual best attempts to look fresh and not-hungover. It took a sour turn when Matt Harris keeled over, clutching his groin. Sonny started taking his boots off, Ben began to walk towards their captain ready to forfeit until Harris arose, shaking it off. Similarly, as James brownsey appeared from fullbrooke road, the UEA captain walked towards us ready to forfeit, before he realised brownsey was not in kit: we’re saving him for the cup.
The game began. A scrappy first 5 had us on the back foot, with Timmy making a few saves. The next 35 minutes saw us dominate. Ben Adam‘s diagonals close to playing wingers through; Brody and Cai linking up on the left; paddy winning the ball over and over again; Lumi’s shinpad falling out every time he took a touch; sonny dry heaving when he thought nobody was watching. It was a shame that most of our attacking plays were flagged by a line-o camping out on the halfway line. The dubious officiating was perhaps epitomised by the referee’s attempt to book Lumi for one of Cai’s fouls: if you squinted really hard and put both of them in a dark room they still wouldn’t look similar. The deadlock was finally broken by a perfectly weighted outside of the foot pass into Cai who finished it with ease. “Perfectly weighted”… who else but matt Harris. Just before the break, UEA equalised. A scuffed driven shot that somehow ended up in the bottom corner.
The start of the second half saw the beautiful game underminded. UEA CM decided to bring the ball down with both his hand before finishing from the edge of the box. No handball given? The rest of the half was characterised by more cuafc dominance. Lumi, Cai and Brody linking up to produce chances down the left. Sonny and JP overlapping and beating players; Bragg going on mazy runs into the opposition half. It didn’t take long for Pughy having been subbed on to win a pen and then miss that pen. Fortina came on, hitting the post from 20 yards out, causing problems for their left back before also trying to break his leg. Sonny played through from a free kick took the worst touch I have ever seen, probably because his head was pounding, and somehow won a penalty. Cai scored his second, 2-2. With the rest of the game impeded by UEA and refereeing shithousery, Reece stopping several counterattacks, and having missed a few serious chances, the game ended underdeveloped 2-2.
