A Team London Tour

The 30th GPSFA London tour, but the first to be four days / three nights long, began at 1pm on Wednesday 19th and ended at 5pm on Saturday 22nd – 76 hours of football and fun with a few hours sleep thrown in for purely R & R considerations.

Football-wise, the Hackney game on Thursday provided food for thought in how to successfully compete with physical, pacey, athletic players who possess a good degree of skill into the bargain. Despite not turning in our best performance (yet hitting the woodwork on three occasions), we weren’t too far away from getting a draw.

The late switch of Thursday’s match to 3G meant no faffing around with a post-match launderette visit, while Friday’s encounter with St Albans saw a much better display, with everyone contributing hugely to a classic 1-0 away win which saw the team defend valiantly, while always looking dangerous on the break. The final game saw a 4-0 victory against a much-improved Woking side at the very well-appointed Gordons School in leafy suburban Surrey on a rare sunny, late-February morning.

Off the pitch, RAF Hendon proved to be an interesting visit and seeing the size of some of the planes alone made the trip worthwhile. Thankfully (for the budget, anyway), admission was free, something which is a distinct rarity these days. With ‘Britain Since 1930’ / World War II being a Year 6 history topic, there was already lots of background knowledge, which helped make the exhibits even more interesting to the Gloucester contingent.

The Tottenham Hotspur Experience is arguably the best current UK stadium tour available, as it’s still glisteningly new. The interior would fit very nicely into any five-star hotel, while the economic contrast with the other side of Tottenham High Street, no more than ten metres away, is striking.

Evening activities included two lots of swimming, one at Westminster Lodge in St Albans and the other at the hotel, together with Ten-Pin bowling / pool in North Watford, while the Holiday Inn in Hemel, with its spacious rooms, excellent breakfast buffet and helpful staff remains an ideal base twelve years on from our first visit.

Enough of the overview – parents will already have heard the stories and read the journals, but here’s the inside view on each of the players’ 76 hours away.

Cole Campbell

Sleeps in a motorcycle helmet. Doesn’t snore, just revs. Great hair, whether braided or let loose, but particularly when let loose. Enjoyed a successful tour both on and off the field. Supposedly good at maths, but after investing £6.58 in 20 BK chips and 2 BBQ sauces alongside his mucker in after-hours ordering, the jury’s out on this one. Left fingerprints on each chip to try to ward off predators, though it didn’t work as JS clearly enjoys digit dirt. Likes eating off tree stumps. Dreadfully-coloured boots.

Finley Chambers-Caine

Mr Dependable, who’s gone from a consistent 7 out of 10 before Christmas to a consistent 8 out of 10 since. Great last-ditch defending v Hackney in another no-nonsense display. Made a justifiable point in his Thursday diary that the Hackney winner came ‘when I was off.’ Begrudgingly rang home, but not very often and never for very long. Claims to be a good pool player, though there are those who beg to differ. No fuss at all when playing, eating, rooming or living; your proverbial ‘getter on-er’. Not great boots.

Dontaye Coleman

Also known as the Silent Assassin (Dontaye), which produces a very bad acronym. A man for all positions, so could be a government minister one day, but unlike a government minister, performs honestly and well in all of them. Great goal-line clearance against St Albans to keep our 1-0 lead intact. Brought a dictionary with him to London which was used as a room decoration. Sadly, though, it gained 246 not a single extra mark, despite not being opened or moved once. Likes brown rice. Horribly-coloured boots.

Abdul Diallo

Scored the winner versus St Albans, though there was much post-match conjecture about which bit of him the ball actually hit. Did his best to equalise for The Saints in the second half, but was rescued by the Silent Assassin. Man Utd supporter, so currently spends lots of time frowning. Currently memorising a school book about pre-revolution Russia, so knows more about the Czars than the Bolsheviks ever did. Very loud, but half-decent singer nonetheless. Wears proper black boots.

Alex Drobnjak

Top goalkeeper, though has yet to discover the corners of the six-yard box. Voted Gloucester POTM by the Hackney coach and no-one disagreed in the slightest. Considering setting up a business offering swimming lessons once his playing days are over, though Drobnjak & Fleetwood sounds more like a firm of undertakers than a pair of aquatic educators. Very loud on Wednesday, much quieter on Thursday when he became a self-proclaimed ‘New Man’. Very philosophical diary writer. Doesn’t like egg yolk. Half-and-half boots.

Sonny Fleetwood

Proper tackler and committer of proper fouls. Colossal performance v St Albans. Boot lender and part-time swimming instructor. Good eater. Liverpool fan so currently living a fairly happy and carefree existence. Very tidy room due to sharing with Henrietta Hill. Impressively knowledgeable about World War II. Posed for an unusually smiley photo after finding a ‘Supermarine’ jigsaw in the RAF Hendon gift shop. The other, equally uneconomic half of the 40p-for-a-Burger-King-chip pairing. Wears proper black boots.

Henry Hill

Nicknamed Henry van der Hill by Pathfinder, who for some reason spent most of the tour humming the original Van Der Valk theme tune. Produced an excellent finish to equalise against Hackney, after which he thought the CDM position was a hundred yards further

forward than it actually is. Top ten-pin bowler, much to his and everyone else’s amazement. Wants to be a sports journalist and judging by his diary, is already well on the way. Good knowledge of possessive apostrophes. Spent ages in the Spurs shop, fruitlessly searching for something that cost less than fifty quid. Very neat and tidy – both room and diary. Wears pink eye coverings in bed. Genuinely great photographic pose. Wears proper black boots.

Noel Holmes

Midfield dynamo who would love DREAM marks if the ‘E’ was removed. Can’t get enough of McDonald’s, though. Had 94 attempts on goal against Woking before finally netting just before the end. Family attendance has big influence on team results – dad came against Hackney and mum against St Albans and Woking. You don’t need an analyst to work that one out. Has proper hair that’s just there. Not surprising as he has it styled at Tyler Creed. Almost top bowler, but beaten by one by HH. Searched high and low for his great granddad’s name on the Spurs’ Honours Board, but the 2020 section didn’t reveal anything familiar. Wears proper black boots.

Nolan Manhiri

Claude – the Invisible Man, as he’s never there. Unless he is there, but no-one can see him. Forgets most things apart from his manners, which are excellent. Consistently blamed for minibus odours and not afraid to take the credit. Attempted to sabotage NH’s one-man mission to put Room 240 top of the rankings by leaving the entire contents of his toiletry bag in the bathroom on Saturday morning. Takes ages to eat fish & chips, largely because he’s spent twenty minutes eating everybody else’s. Or maybe, being invisible, because he can’t see his fingers. Wears proper black boots.

Harrison Palmer

Tigerish left-back who loves attacking when 1-0 up with twenty seconds left, a trait that does little to help the coaches’ blood pressure readings. Brushed his teeth for so long each day, the enamel started peeling off at 9 o’clock on Friday evening. Eats nothing without a dollop of ketchup. Last-day scrambled egg disaster denied him an eating prize. Ambition is to be an actor or an electrician, but the outcome will no doubt depend on which way he’s wired. Utterly hideous, fluorescent boots make him look like he’s got a pair of glowsticks on his feet, so will probably be good at night-time footy, if it ever catches on.

Josh Sullivan

The Swan. Loves posing for The Lens’s photoshoots. Wears a magnificent dressing gown which could double up as a tent if he ever became homeless. Scored high on his diary. Did everything but score on the pitch. Dreadful memory. Turned up in London with no trousers and no jumper, but loads of pants. Arrived at Longlevens on Wednesday sporting a beautifully manicured tuft of front-lobe hair, having had the rest of his head stylishly shaved for the trip, but still possessed more follicles than clothes. Walking thesaurus. Forgets his boots. Thankfully.

Simon Beardsell

Pathfinder. Enjoyed a productive first London tour, only directing us back to the town we’d just left once, unlike the Bournemouth debacle, when East and West merged seamlessly into one. Enjoyed a misspent youth watching too many Kung Fu films and 1980s’ TV series set in downtown Amsterdam.

Tony Hickey

Grasshopper. Don’t ask. Sleeps on bus in attempt to ignore childish, front-seat banter. Upset most members of the public at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium by shooing them out of the way so he could take whole-group photographs every thirty seconds, much to JS’s chagrin. ‘Eleven chances of sales,’ he explains. Dislikes Bath & Newbury parents as they don’t buy. Likes the Welsh parents as they always do. HMRC is none the wiser either way.

A big thank-you to all the players for being such good company and great fun and doing yourselves, your parents and everyone you represent, proud.

#Carpe Diem