The Bridge travelled to Laxton in their penultimate pre season friendly before the season kicks off on Sunday the 4th of September. The morning didn’t start too well as half of the squad were nursing usual Sunday Morning hangovers while the other half had no idea where the ground was (apart from Scott who managed to get there first despite getting out his pit last). The squad was down to the bare bones as some players were on holiday, working or watching some cricket game that was going on at Trent Bridge.
The last of the 12 players finally turned up at around 1115am (much to the delight of the hosts who had been warming up on the pitch since half 10). After Little Brittan got excited over new signing Quinnies cock swinging competition it was time to take to the field. The Bridge lined up with a usual 4-4-2 formation with Lormor between the stocks, Scott right back, James & Quiche centre back and Quinnie left back. Little Brittan played left wing, gay Ganna right, Danny and Mellors completed the midfield by playing in the centre. Up front was last season’s top scorer Gav and last season’s offside king Manq. Gav Bowen was player number 12 and rather unluckily had to run the line.
The game kicked off at a lively pace with The Bridge settling in well, there wasn’t much between the both sides until Gav Edwards opened the scoring round about the 20 minute mark with a crisp volley on the turn after some neat play by Danny. A physical Laxton side came back into the game and got a deserved leveller just before half time with a “lets lob Quiche style finish” over Lormor. Gav Bowen replaced an injured Mellors before the rather “weird” referee blew for half time. HALF TIME 1-1.
Second half and we had a bit of controversy, firstly a Laxton player took a foul throw and moaned to the Ref, the ref’s response was “It’s not my fault you can’t throw”. The Laxton player replied “It’s not my fault you can’t fucking Ref”. That was it, red card out and Laxton were reduced to 10. Qunnie was replaced by a recovering Mellors, who 10 minutes later was then going to come on for an injured James Ashley. However it was Manq who made way as Ashley made a rather quick recovery from injury when he was told to play up front for 10 minutes. Gav proceed to hit the crossbar from a tight angle before being put through one on one with the Laxton keeper. Gav tried going round the keeper, put the ball far too wide but got a lifeline when the home side’s keeper jumped on top of him. Definite red and Laxton were down to 9! The resulting free kick was wasted by Danny as it sailed high and wide over the bar. As The Bridge enjoyed lots of the ball and space on the park the inevitable happened, a long ball over the top and Laxtons mini-me up front slotted past Lormor into the bottom left corner. This finally woke The Bridge up a bit and as Manq (who replaced Ashley this time) was played through one on one with the stand in keeper he managed to hit it straight at him from 6 yards much to the embarrassment of the player manager. Luckily with 2 minutes to go Danny picked the ball up halfway inside the Laxton half and slotted home from 18 yards into the bottom corner. Manq tried to pinch it off him and didn’t get a touch (thank god) as he would have been offside if he had. FULL TIME 2-2.
After the game it was back to The Hop Pole in Old Ollerton from some vintage Sam Smiths ale and some snap (minus the snap). All in all it was a good run out for The Bridge, 1 more game to go against The Pheasant on Thursday night before next Sunday’s big kick off away to the Lurcher.
Attendance: 16
Man of the Match: Scott (because I wrote this report, I was the only one who knew where the ground was and because I can).