Morning has Broken, with apologies to Cat Stevens
‘Morning has broken, like the first morning,
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird….’
The Groundsman’s in a jolly old mood, though ‘Praise for the singing,’ is definitely an 8-foot step too far and a future airing on ‘The Voice’ still some distance away. Several Light Years perhaps.
Father Vye doesn’t do singing, but he does do five advertising boards at a time, which is a far more productive use of the minutes leading up to 7am on a Saturday morning in mid-November.
Coach Kelly is in situ, sporting his usual rather fetching, interestingly knitted headwear, an item that wouldn’t look out of place at a Tea Cosy reunion or adorning the old wooden tables at Upwey Wishingwell Tea Rooms just north of Weymouth, where the TV picture is still black & white and the waiters of both genders wear back-in-the-day flares.
With the temperature into double figures and plenty of moisture in the ground, it’s ideal conditions for spreading four buckets of grass seed and a bag of slow release fertiliser that the players will hopefully tread into the hallowed turf over the next few hours. Any prying early-morning eyes will observe that there’s no stopping The Chef as he tears around the field with his little green fertiliser dispenser, while Father Jones II is a little more considered in his distribution of the rye grass flecks, with every non-green inch nurtured with a high degree of both care and consideration.
With eight people on early-morning parade, the stadium rises skyward in seemingly no time at all and by 10:40 both Gloucester Yellow teams are in action, with the Newport and Brent goalkeepers respectively getting a good workout for their troubles. The early ‘A’ Team arrivals shiver beneath a canopy of hand-held umbrellas and the early Plymouth arrivals below an appropriately green canopy that just about supports itself, but only the players get free hot chocolate to offset the otherwise imminent onset of hypothermia or suchlike.
WC jogs over to join the warm-up drills, smile on face and bottle carriers in hand, and promptly falls over the Stroud & Swindon advertising board, much to the merriment of the three spectators standing beside it.
Kick-off’s delayed a couple of minutes as The Photographer senses a sale or ten and lines the Green & Whites up for an impromptu pre-match photograph, then has an anaphylactic reaction upon discovering his camera’s equivalent of a SIM card is missing and fifty quid’s worth of Devonian currency’s gone straight down the proverbial drainpipe.
Plymouth forge ahead with just two minutes on the eating room’s digital clock thanks to a fine header from Rodwell, who rises impressively to convert a left-wing corner via the inside of the back post.
Gloucester are rocking for a few minutes; there’s a fine save from High Definition and some stout defending from Iron Man, before the home midfield restores the balance to what is now a very even contest. The better chances fall to Gloucester however, with Obieri three times finding himself one-on-one, but on each occasion the Devonian keeper stands big and three times Plymouth remain ahead.
High Definition is quickly off his line on a couple of occasions to thwart a brace of dangerous-looking Plymouth breakaways, but on twenty one minutes there’s a handball on the edge of the away team’s penalty area and the industrious Pathfinder restores parity with a side-footed free kick that is precision personified.
The pavilion touchline throughout looks hugely impressive and despite a non-segregation policy being in place, the green & whites largely occupy one half of the pitch border and the black & yellows the other. One Devonian man plonks himself in the stand, realises too late that there’s a puddle where the seat should be and spends the next half hour bolt upright, with impatient hands that disappear every couple of minutes to check if the affected area has dried out at all. It hasn’t.
Noticeable amongst the black & yellows is Mother Freeman, who’s modelling her wasp-coloured umbrella and a black bobble hat similar to that worn by Tensing Norgay during the first ascent of the roof of the world and Mother May, whose headwear would make Sherlock Holmes just a little bit envious. Well, Mrs Holmes, at any rate. The Weatherman (aka Teddy Peirce), an icon of GPSFA history is also here, his Hitchcock-like cameo appearance in shorts and T-shirt and another horrendously incorrect atmospheric forecast no doubt the reason behind the imminent threat from the accumulated greyness above.
Father Burgess has returned in shorts & Duke of Wellingtons, an unlikely combination, but well suited to the climatic conditions, as your feet stay dry and your legs’ll get wet anyway. He’s brought another uncle with him this week, Sam from the U.S. of A, who thankfully fails to attract the unwanted attention of either GCHQ or The Chairman as last week’s visiting uncle did. Father Jones is similarly attired to FB, though his footwear is a cross between the aforementioned Sherpa and a hod carrier from the nearby building site. Dan, Dan the University Man is noticeable by his absence without leave, so the possibility of another 4-0-er was dead in the water before we’d even started.
The second half sees the hosts now in the ascendancy, with Jones and Burgess having the better of the central midfield duels, while Lettuce, WC, May and Slider each look threatening down the flanks.
Obieri thrashes one free kick against the upright and goalkeeper Flower twice more keeps his side level, before Pathfinder spots the narrowest of gaps and threads in Obieri to steer the ball into the far corner before the heavens, which have been considering what to do for the last five minutes, well and truly open.
‘Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from heaven,
Like the first downpour, on the first grass……’
Slider goes close following May’s fine run and cross and is then rebuffed by the keeper, while May himself is inches away from his first score of the season, but is denied by a last-gasp goal line clearance as the city team can’t quite finish the game off.
Plymouth rally in the closing minutes but Wasp, who’s contributed another fine display on the left, the redoubtable Iron Man and the tenacious Millward, backed up by HD’s impeccable handling give nothing away and the reaction at the final whistle gives us another ‘says it all’ moment.
Credit to both sides in difficult conditions, soaked to the bone with kits weighing three times their usual mass, for not giving – or expecting, an inch – and for the second week running, we’ve seen a ‘proper’ game of district football.
‘Praise for the sweetness of the wet grass,
Sprung in completeness, where their feet pass…..’
It’s Remembrance weekend, but the sentiment has little effect on either Jones or WC, who remember little and conspire to leave their warm-up top (Jones) and showerproof & tie (Myatt) in the various nooks & crannies of the nook & cranny-less changing room.
With sales struggling to get past the second rung, The Photographer’s pro-activity in turning darkness into cash is impressive, to say the least. Checking that the final Gloucester family has departed, as he can only use the same ruse once with any particular group, he ushers the entire troupe of Plymouth Brethren outside, says ‘smile’ and clicks, then lines them up by his big red machine and charges them each a fiver for their efforts. Alan Sugar, eat your beater out.
On this Noah-like day, it’s no surprise that the Brethren depart two by two to the sanctity of their Barnwood Premier Inn, where they’ll grab a wink or forty before descending on the bowling alleys at Ten Pin, which lie just across the car park some hundred yards distant.
Meanwhile, it’s a time for reflection at the Home of Football. The Chairman considers how and why there was a padlock on the flapjack box when he hid it up his jumper a few short hours previously, while The Photographer ponders popping along to Quedgeley Wanderers on Sunday morning in an attempt to unashamedly flog the visiting hordes the remainder of his off-cuts. For one the morning was well and truly broken, for the other it almost was. For everyone else in black & yellow it was wet, cold, but ultimately fruitful. Because on this bit of suburban Gloucester, the sun, proverbially at any rate, has shone brightly all day long.
‘Mine is the sunlight,
Mine is the morning,
Born of the one light, football they play,
Praise with elation, praise ev'ry morning,
God's recreation, of the new day.’
Gloucester: High Definition; Subway, Iron Man, May; WC, Slider, Pathfinder, Lettuce; Obieri; Wasp, Lawrence.
Blackbird has spoken, like the first bird….’
The Groundsman’s in a jolly old mood, though ‘Praise for the singing,’ is definitely an 8-foot step too far and a future airing on ‘The Voice’ still some distance away. Several Light Years perhaps.
Father Vye doesn’t do singing, but he does do five advertising boards at a time, which is a far more productive use of the minutes leading up to 7am on a Saturday morning in mid-November.
Coach Kelly is in situ, sporting his usual rather fetching, interestingly knitted headwear, an item that wouldn’t look out of place at a Tea Cosy reunion or adorning the old wooden tables at Upwey Wishingwell Tea Rooms just north of Weymouth, where the TV picture is still black & white and the waiters of both genders wear back-in-the-day flares.
With the temperature into double figures and plenty of moisture in the ground, it’s ideal conditions for spreading four buckets of grass seed and a bag of slow release fertiliser that the players will hopefully tread into the hallowed turf over the next few hours. Any prying early-morning eyes will observe that there’s no stopping The Chef as he tears around the field with his little green fertiliser dispenser, while Father Jones II is a little more considered in his distribution of the rye grass flecks, with every non-green inch nurtured with a high degree of both care and consideration.
With eight people on early-morning parade, the stadium rises skyward in seemingly no time at all and by 10:40 both Gloucester Yellow teams are in action, with the Newport and Brent goalkeepers respectively getting a good workout for their troubles. The early ‘A’ Team arrivals shiver beneath a canopy of hand-held umbrellas and the early Plymouth arrivals below an appropriately green canopy that just about supports itself, but only the players get free hot chocolate to offset the otherwise imminent onset of hypothermia or suchlike.
WC jogs over to join the warm-up drills, smile on face and bottle carriers in hand, and promptly falls over the Stroud & Swindon advertising board, much to the merriment of the three spectators standing beside it.
Kick-off’s delayed a couple of minutes as The Photographer senses a sale or ten and lines the Green & Whites up for an impromptu pre-match photograph, then has an anaphylactic reaction upon discovering his camera’s equivalent of a SIM card is missing and fifty quid’s worth of Devonian currency’s gone straight down the proverbial drainpipe.
Plymouth forge ahead with just two minutes on the eating room’s digital clock thanks to a fine header from Rodwell, who rises impressively to convert a left-wing corner via the inside of the back post.
Gloucester are rocking for a few minutes; there’s a fine save from High Definition and some stout defending from Iron Man, before the home midfield restores the balance to what is now a very even contest. The better chances fall to Gloucester however, with Obieri three times finding himself one-on-one, but on each occasion the Devonian keeper stands big and three times Plymouth remain ahead.
High Definition is quickly off his line on a couple of occasions to thwart a brace of dangerous-looking Plymouth breakaways, but on twenty one minutes there’s a handball on the edge of the away team’s penalty area and the industrious Pathfinder restores parity with a side-footed free kick that is precision personified.
The pavilion touchline throughout looks hugely impressive and despite a non-segregation policy being in place, the green & whites largely occupy one half of the pitch border and the black & yellows the other. One Devonian man plonks himself in the stand, realises too late that there’s a puddle where the seat should be and spends the next half hour bolt upright, with impatient hands that disappear every couple of minutes to check if the affected area has dried out at all. It hasn’t.
Noticeable amongst the black & yellows is Mother Freeman, who’s modelling her wasp-coloured umbrella and a black bobble hat similar to that worn by Tensing Norgay during the first ascent of the roof of the world and Mother May, whose headwear would make Sherlock Holmes just a little bit envious. Well, Mrs Holmes, at any rate. The Weatherman (aka Teddy Peirce), an icon of GPSFA history is also here, his Hitchcock-like cameo appearance in shorts and T-shirt and another horrendously incorrect atmospheric forecast no doubt the reason behind the imminent threat from the accumulated greyness above.
Father Burgess has returned in shorts & Duke of Wellingtons, an unlikely combination, but well suited to the climatic conditions, as your feet stay dry and your legs’ll get wet anyway. He’s brought another uncle with him this week, Sam from the U.S. of A, who thankfully fails to attract the unwanted attention of either GCHQ or The Chairman as last week’s visiting uncle did. Father Jones is similarly attired to FB, though his footwear is a cross between the aforementioned Sherpa and a hod carrier from the nearby building site. Dan, Dan the University Man is noticeable by his absence without leave, so the possibility of another 4-0-er was dead in the water before we’d even started.
The second half sees the hosts now in the ascendancy, with Jones and Burgess having the better of the central midfield duels, while Lettuce, WC, May and Slider each look threatening down the flanks.
Obieri thrashes one free kick against the upright and goalkeeper Flower twice more keeps his side level, before Pathfinder spots the narrowest of gaps and threads in Obieri to steer the ball into the far corner before the heavens, which have been considering what to do for the last five minutes, well and truly open.
‘Sweet the rain's new fall, sunlit from heaven,
Like the first downpour, on the first grass……’
Slider goes close following May’s fine run and cross and is then rebuffed by the keeper, while May himself is inches away from his first score of the season, but is denied by a last-gasp goal line clearance as the city team can’t quite finish the game off.
Plymouth rally in the closing minutes but Wasp, who’s contributed another fine display on the left, the redoubtable Iron Man and the tenacious Millward, backed up by HD’s impeccable handling give nothing away and the reaction at the final whistle gives us another ‘says it all’ moment.
Credit to both sides in difficult conditions, soaked to the bone with kits weighing three times their usual mass, for not giving – or expecting, an inch – and for the second week running, we’ve seen a ‘proper’ game of district football.
‘Praise for the sweetness of the wet grass,
Sprung in completeness, where their feet pass…..’
It’s Remembrance weekend, but the sentiment has little effect on either Jones or WC, who remember little and conspire to leave their warm-up top (Jones) and showerproof & tie (Myatt) in the various nooks & crannies of the nook & cranny-less changing room.
With sales struggling to get past the second rung, The Photographer’s pro-activity in turning darkness into cash is impressive, to say the least. Checking that the final Gloucester family has departed, as he can only use the same ruse once with any particular group, he ushers the entire troupe of Plymouth Brethren outside, says ‘smile’ and clicks, then lines them up by his big red machine and charges them each a fiver for their efforts. Alan Sugar, eat your beater out.
On this Noah-like day, it’s no surprise that the Brethren depart two by two to the sanctity of their Barnwood Premier Inn, where they’ll grab a wink or forty before descending on the bowling alleys at Ten Pin, which lie just across the car park some hundred yards distant.
Meanwhile, it’s a time for reflection at the Home of Football. The Chairman considers how and why there was a padlock on the flapjack box when he hid it up his jumper a few short hours previously, while The Photographer ponders popping along to Quedgeley Wanderers on Sunday morning in an attempt to unashamedly flog the visiting hordes the remainder of his off-cuts. For one the morning was well and truly broken, for the other it almost was. For everyone else in black & yellow it was wet, cold, but ultimately fruitful. Because on this bit of suburban Gloucester, the sun, proverbially at any rate, has shone brightly all day long.
‘Mine is the sunlight,
Mine is the morning,
Born of the one light, football they play,
Praise with elation, praise ev'ry morning,
God's recreation, of the new day.’
Gloucester: High Definition; Subway, Iron Man, May; WC, Slider, Pathfinder, Lettuce; Obieri; Wasp, Lawrence.
