Dead Poet’s Society
Sick - 'I cannot go to school today,'
Said little Peggy Ann McKay.
'I have the measles and the mumps,
A gash, a rash and purple bumps...’
So wrote the twentieth century American poet Shel Silverstein, though he may as well have been writing about the GPSFA ‘A’ Squad in the run-up to the opening fixture of 2018, instead of the fictional schoolgirl who he named after a week-long search for a title that rhymed with ‘day’. The festive period is well and truly over, and in an act of perfect symmetry, St Albans were our visitors in the first game of the first half of the season and they’re once again on their way to the city for the first game of the second half of this hugely enjoyable campaign.
It’s Thursday evening though and there’s a very long sick list. Big Sam has been off school with Dinglewell ‘flu which he’s passed on to The Weatherman, whose appalling climatic prophesies have been put on the back burner for the time being due to an unsavoury combination of abdominal gripes and even more unpalatable things. Billy BS has also gone down with the Hempsted equivalent of Big Sam’s ailment, while Margaret has had to choose between having another lesson on how to tie his errant boot laces and contracting a dose of chicken pox. The thirty four facial scabs are all the evidence that’s needed to show which option was preferred.
Saturday 6th January and the groundsman’s aches and pains have permeated inwards, this week’s malady having reached a variety of organs including his prostrate (sic), which probably explains his early-morning inclination to recline at will.
The B Squad have eleven ‘here’s’ when the register is called, though Coach Wixey has succumbed to the lurgee, leaving Coach Harris to oversee ‘the best Friday coaching session and finest Saturday performance from The Yellows for many a year.’ According to himself, that is. Vanity is a wonderful ally and as Edward Schmitz might have penned:
‘I am a coach, I really am,
The mirror’s telling me I can,
A tactic here, a system there,
I can’t see Wixey anywhere...’
The ‘A’ Team roll call takes place – prayers have been answered and Big Sam’s back in town, having returned to the educational fray on Friday morning and, ignoring the nurse’s well meaning advice, completed the Daily Mile fitness test in the afternoon. Billy is also here, having discharged himself from The Gallops Hospital at 10.07am to take his place at the front of the line barely an hour later.
Nureyev takes up Margaret’s mantle in the centre of defence, Scarface drops back in place of The Weatherman and immediately (correctly, as it happens) forecasts the result will be a draw, while The Colonel, never backwards in coming forwards, drops into right midfield. At least Kenny has no delusions of grandeur and dons the grey numero uno shirt and big white gloves on which his ever-growing reputation is rightly and properly based. Knees Knight shivers, regretting his ‘hard man’ standing and wishing he’d brought the sheepskin mittens he’d surreptitiously pushed under the settee at 8.08am on 25th December, while Dele has no pretentions whatsoever about adding yet another extra layer to the thirteen he’s already wearing. Sizzler rolls up his sleeves, ignores the thermometer reading and simply growls.
St Albans have the better of the first half, but Gloucester create the best chance before the visitors go ahead with a sharp finish from a corner just before the break. Billy lasts twenty nine minutes longer than his physical condition warrants and is replaced at half time by first Smiling Leo Taylor and then One ‘M’ Shamar.
As part of his R & R, Big Sam moves into centre midfield for Part Two and despite The Weatherman’s assertion that, ‘He won’t last ten minutes,’ heroically completes the whole match, together with the ensuing warm down. Sizzler covers every inch of the pitch, tackling, passing, running, shooting, crossing, getting knocked over, getting up, scowling and smiling in equal measure.
Scarface on the right, Dele up front, Knees on the left and The Colonel in all three, run and hound and compete till the end. And with time running out, Nureyev, a colossus at the back throughout, strides forward, Lewis Dunk-like, to level matters with a low drive into the bottom corner with three minutes remaining. The unscripted celebration says it all really.
Inside the last minute and Kenny sticks out a big hand to ensure the points are shared and secure a draw that has determination, resilience and non-stop effort written in capital letters over every player. For those who saw the pre-match ‘Achievement graph’ on twitter, this was the ‘grit bit’ that every successful person in
the world has always had, does always have and will always have; it’s the bit that you don’t see explained in books, taught in schools or coached in the ten thousand hours of myth and legend. Yet it is the difference.
If M & M (Margaret & Michael) could possibly have made it, they’d have been here. Big Sam didn’t stop for an hour when clinically he may have been better off with a trio of blankets, a decongestant spray and a mug of Lemsip. And Billy Ballet Shoes has taken on the role of a modern day Lazarus, because it was probably he who drew that graph of grit in the first place.
There’s a scene near the end of the rather alternative 1989 film, ‘Dead Poet’s Society’, when (the dismissed) Mr Keating (Robin Williams) is about to leave the school for the last time. If you haven’t seen it, go to Youtube, grab a tissue and take a seat. In support of their inspirational leader, the boys stand on their desks and take Walt Whitman’s most famous line to show everyone what they think. It is three words long and captures the moment perfectly. It says, ‘Captain, My Captain.’
Gloucester: Kenny; Scarface, Lewis Dunk, Big Sam; The Colonel, Sizzler, Billy BS, Knees Knight; Dele Adi. Subs: Smiling Leo Taylor, One ‘M’ Shamar.
Said little Peggy Ann McKay.
'I have the measles and the mumps,
A gash, a rash and purple bumps...’
So wrote the twentieth century American poet Shel Silverstein, though he may as well have been writing about the GPSFA ‘A’ Squad in the run-up to the opening fixture of 2018, instead of the fictional schoolgirl who he named after a week-long search for a title that rhymed with ‘day’. The festive period is well and truly over, and in an act of perfect symmetry, St Albans were our visitors in the first game of the first half of the season and they’re once again on their way to the city for the first game of the second half of this hugely enjoyable campaign.
It’s Thursday evening though and there’s a very long sick list. Big Sam has been off school with Dinglewell ‘flu which he’s passed on to The Weatherman, whose appalling climatic prophesies have been put on the back burner for the time being due to an unsavoury combination of abdominal gripes and even more unpalatable things. Billy BS has also gone down with the Hempsted equivalent of Big Sam’s ailment, while Margaret has had to choose between having another lesson on how to tie his errant boot laces and contracting a dose of chicken pox. The thirty four facial scabs are all the evidence that’s needed to show which option was preferred.
Saturday 6th January and the groundsman’s aches and pains have permeated inwards, this week’s malady having reached a variety of organs including his prostrate (sic), which probably explains his early-morning inclination to recline at will.
The B Squad have eleven ‘here’s’ when the register is called, though Coach Wixey has succumbed to the lurgee, leaving Coach Harris to oversee ‘the best Friday coaching session and finest Saturday performance from The Yellows for many a year.’ According to himself, that is. Vanity is a wonderful ally and as Edward Schmitz might have penned:
‘I am a coach, I really am,
The mirror’s telling me I can,
A tactic here, a system there,
I can’t see Wixey anywhere...’
The ‘A’ Team roll call takes place – prayers have been answered and Big Sam’s back in town, having returned to the educational fray on Friday morning and, ignoring the nurse’s well meaning advice, completed the Daily Mile fitness test in the afternoon. Billy is also here, having discharged himself from The Gallops Hospital at 10.07am to take his place at the front of the line barely an hour later.
Nureyev takes up Margaret’s mantle in the centre of defence, Scarface drops back in place of The Weatherman and immediately (correctly, as it happens) forecasts the result will be a draw, while The Colonel, never backwards in coming forwards, drops into right midfield. At least Kenny has no delusions of grandeur and dons the grey numero uno shirt and big white gloves on which his ever-growing reputation is rightly and properly based. Knees Knight shivers, regretting his ‘hard man’ standing and wishing he’d brought the sheepskin mittens he’d surreptitiously pushed under the settee at 8.08am on 25th December, while Dele has no pretentions whatsoever about adding yet another extra layer to the thirteen he’s already wearing. Sizzler rolls up his sleeves, ignores the thermometer reading and simply growls.
St Albans have the better of the first half, but Gloucester create the best chance before the visitors go ahead with a sharp finish from a corner just before the break. Billy lasts twenty nine minutes longer than his physical condition warrants and is replaced at half time by first Smiling Leo Taylor and then One ‘M’ Shamar.
As part of his R & R, Big Sam moves into centre midfield for Part Two and despite The Weatherman’s assertion that, ‘He won’t last ten minutes,’ heroically completes the whole match, together with the ensuing warm down. Sizzler covers every inch of the pitch, tackling, passing, running, shooting, crossing, getting knocked over, getting up, scowling and smiling in equal measure.
Scarface on the right, Dele up front, Knees on the left and The Colonel in all three, run and hound and compete till the end. And with time running out, Nureyev, a colossus at the back throughout, strides forward, Lewis Dunk-like, to level matters with a low drive into the bottom corner with three minutes remaining. The unscripted celebration says it all really.
Inside the last minute and Kenny sticks out a big hand to ensure the points are shared and secure a draw that has determination, resilience and non-stop effort written in capital letters over every player. For those who saw the pre-match ‘Achievement graph’ on twitter, this was the ‘grit bit’ that every successful person in
the world has always had, does always have and will always have; it’s the bit that you don’t see explained in books, taught in schools or coached in the ten thousand hours of myth and legend. Yet it is the difference.
If M & M (Margaret & Michael) could possibly have made it, they’d have been here. Big Sam didn’t stop for an hour when clinically he may have been better off with a trio of blankets, a decongestant spray and a mug of Lemsip. And Billy Ballet Shoes has taken on the role of a modern day Lazarus, because it was probably he who drew that graph of grit in the first place.
There’s a scene near the end of the rather alternative 1989 film, ‘Dead Poet’s Society’, when (the dismissed) Mr Keating (Robin Williams) is about to leave the school for the last time. If you haven’t seen it, go to Youtube, grab a tissue and take a seat. In support of their inspirational leader, the boys stand on their desks and take Walt Whitman’s most famous line to show everyone what they think. It is three words long and captures the moment perfectly. It says, ‘Captain, My Captain.’
Gloucester: Kenny; Scarface, Lewis Dunk, Big Sam; The Colonel, Sizzler, Billy BS, Knees Knight; Dele Adi. Subs: Smiling Leo Taylor, One ‘M’ Shamar.
