Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to all our readers.    District coaching restarts at OSP on Friday 3rd January (5-6pm) & Monday 6th January (6-7pm).    Saturday 4th January: GPSFA A, B & G v Bexley (Home; 11.00am, 12.15pm & 1.30pm).

Gloucester 4-1 Newbury by The One Who's Left Behind

He's behind you,' as they say in all the best pantomimes.

Liggett’s left his school shoes at home. Or they’ve been thrown away. Or something. He’s also left half his clothes behind, but that was in Jersey. Mclean has left both his back teeth and abscess behind, meaning he can play. And the Chairman has left the A Team coaches’ P45 behind, meaning, ‘You’ve got one more game to turn it around, otherwise Wixey and Harris will be taking over.’ Charming.

Eight seconds gone and Blackburn plays in Blacker who leaves the Newbury defence behind to put us ahead with a left foot slice.

For the rest of the first half however, it’s Newbury who are the better side and we have a lot of defending to do to maintain our slender lead, until Page capitalises on a classic piece of non-defending to level just before the break.

The second period is better from a Gloucester perspective and a fine individual strike from Blacker puts the Black & Yellows back in front shortly after the restart, before Boris nets via a deflection to extend the advantage further. Blacker is impressed by this method of scoring and immediately picks out a second Newbury defender for assistance to net another in-off to take his game tally to two and a half.

Desmond is having a fine match down the right, defending well and threatening to score. Mclean is also defending well, but his scoring threat is severely limited. At the right end, anyway. Pain au Chocolat is becoming more influential as the second period wears on and Shut-Eye once again demonstrates his versatility by playing anywhere down the left.

No-one fancies a back-post tap-in after Blacker three times puts in fine crosses that traverse the Newbury six yard box before flashing just wide of the far stick. Then Dennis connects sweetly, only for the ball to ruffle the lower branches of the ‘house end’ tree.

It’s not a game for the connoisseur, but a win’s a win and the week ahead will feel a lot better for it.

A look back at the action reveals that Blacker left most green players in his wake. Four people leave their warm-up tops in the changing room, thinking someone else is going to launder them. They’re wrong. A nameless individual who should be wearing Yellow 8 has left their entire kit bag behind. A mole suggests it may be Baxter. And before he leaves, the Chairman watches the B Team lose a two-goal lead to go down to Bath by the odd score in five.

‘An hour’s a long time in football,’ he tells Wixey & Harris in no uncertain terms before he finally leaves them behind. ‘You’ve got one more game….’