(at The University of Liverpool Playing Fields, Mather Avenue)
Bobby Mimms reports
The Mancunian had stayed on at the APH longer than he usually does and just before leaving he stood and waited for a bit of quiet from those around him. It looked as though he were about to give some sort of laudatory speech, but instead he raised a silver trophy, about the size of the one Jules Rimet gave his name to, and as socially awkward as ever cheered, “Championes, Championes, Olé, Olé, Olé” several times. In fairness, it was probably much more sensible than anything he would’ve normally uttered. In the vicinity others joined in, while tables were banged and half-empty glasses clinked, but though Chris McNally’s alcohol vapour-induced performance was the equivalent of dad dancing meets football celebration, he did have a point: after the disappointment of falling at the final hurdle last year, and having beaten off opposition from hundreds of other… body organs this time around, Convocation have at last won their first ever LOBAL competition.
About an hour-or-so earlier the Captain had first lifted Ol’ Little Ears at Wyncote – it was noted that he’d sent his soon-to-be deputy Jon Welsh to receive the runners-up shield twelve months ago – after his charges had held on to beat Business School in the Emrys Hughes Invitational Trophy final. As inaugural tournament triumphs go this had been a peculiar one: for a start the visitors from Fazakerley (they weren’t ‘the away side’ as the fixture was technically being played at a neutral venue) had finished bottom of the Old Boys League and were, without meaning to be cruel, a bit shit; on top of that, prior to Saturday the competition had only consisted of one group of four and the last two standing had faced each other in it just a fortnight ago, when Storm Hannah was lashing the country. But, beggars can’t be choosers and Convocation haven’t exactly had the trophy engravers checking the spelling to their name on a regular basis over the years, so it was nice to finally win something, and with families and friends in attendance to boot – there wasn’t exactly a party atmosphere pitchside, but certainly a ‘meeting up for a couple of pints in the pub’ one.
It’s a shame then that the game had left a lot to be desired: Convo had scored their two goals by the fifteenth minute, Business School got their consolation before the half-hour was up, and apart from occasional fleeting opportunities the rest of the final was about as exciting as watching dust build up on a window ledge. Mind you it was infinitely more enjoyable than Convocation’s fixture last week in which they got caught up in a sting operation on Woodstreet by the Karma Police, and where the recipients didn’t take at all kindly to losing their one hundred percent record on the last day of the season to such undesirables as the chaps from Wyncote. Their collective mood was as awful as the weather’s been ever since, but on Saturday the sun had reappeared to bathe everyone in its warmth – perfect conditions for a showpiece occasion, although it was still rather breezy.
Decked out in what had been described as “a new kit” (it was actually the same old blue-and-white hooped one, but with some recently purchased socks and shorts to make up for the originals that had been ‘borrowed’) Convocation had fifteen bodies at their disposal, with McNally the Merciless having had to disappoint numerous others by informing them they were surplus to requirement. The starting line-up of destiny saw Alex Hendry in the nets, behind a back four of Liam Byatt (left), John Farrell (right), and Jon and Andy Welsh, the latter, possibly overcome by superstition, having partaken in some sort of pre-match ritual that involved wandering around the pitch picking up goose shit – a reminder, if it were needed, that games don’t come much bigger than this. As usual the captain had sent his charges out in a 4-5-1 formation and Anthony Lewis was once again the ‘1’, while the midfield quintet comprised of Mike Nawrocki and Mattys Long and Shore, flanked by Mike Kent and Jamie Long, left and right respectively.
Convocation got the ball rolling, literally, playing into the wind blowing down the pitch (the one next to the 4G), the greensward looking to be in near perfect condition – apparently the Wyncote ground staff have been using some sort of special avian fertiliser. Theirs was a fast-ish start (Convo’s, not the ground staff), taking the game to their opponents straight from the kick off, but equally as prompt was Business School’s first claim of bias of the afternoon as after little more than ninety seconds their #5 flipped on passing linesman John Topping for what he perceived to be an incorrect flag call – whatever happened to the bonhomie of frequent defeat? It was another throw-in moments later though, that began the undressing of the side from L9: they offered minimal resistance at it allowing the ball to reach Lewis just inside their penalty area, and when he then went on a Benny Hill-esque scamper around the box, in possession, their players gave a pretty good impression of what happens when a wasp is let loose in a room full of schoolgirls, until eventually the forward rolled a short pass back from the chalk boundary into the path of the inrushing Long (M), and from about eight yards out he fired into the net past the ‘keeper and two defenders on the goal line.
The Wyncote natives couldn’t have wished for a better start to the game, and even after just three minutes it looked as if Business School might be in for a long afternoon (no pun intended). They’d clearly done their homework though, and fairly quickly a somewhat cynical approach to the tie began to get noticed, particularly when their #6 shoulder-barged Long (J) halfway to Mather Avenue as they both chased a loose ball down the flank – there was no way the foul was reckless and it should have just been filed under ‘an early(ish) getting-to-know-you challenge’, but the referee, Spaniard Antonio Perez (who sent off Adel Ahmed in last year’s Alan Brown Trophy semi-final, and who has also red-carded Graham Roberts in the past), was obviously determined there’d be no funny business on his watch and cautioned the miscreant; once again his team mates cried foul play: “Just because someone’s watching you” one of them sneered, referring to the dignitaries from the league that were present.
Whether or not Business School had deliberately opted to employ negative, stymieing tactics is open to debate, but what was incontrovertible was that it was the wrong approach to take to the game as, initially, it played right into the hands of the Convo midfield. Its inhabitants had begun the final like a well-oiled machine, an intricately built clock with all the cogs performing their own individual tasks to perfection, but also in unison, so with their red-and-black-striped opponents seemingly intent only on solo missions of disruption those in hoops were able to whir around the pitch without missing a beat.
Long (M) was a rock in the middle, offering his side extra security and, let’s be honest, a bit of ballast, although he was never afraid to drive forward as he showed for his goal; alongside him Nawrocki would take a spot in the shadows for this one, letting his work off the ball speak volumes (to those that recognised it), making space for others, while Shore was the heartbeat for all that was good on Saturday, as he has been all season, and it was no coincidence that when he was shining Convo sparkled. Kent was his usual self out on the flank, a cup-final terrier for the day, and on the other side of the pitch Long (J) oozed inventive determination and couldn’t have been more alert to his colleagues’ intentions.
Business School were clearly targeting him though, as he was regularly on the receiving end of their rough-housing, including another challenge that nearly knocked him into the middle of next week, yet which inconsistently went un-carded. But then in the fifteenth minute he responded to their brutality in the best way possible: he picked up possession inside his own half and played a beautiful pass (“I closed me eyes”) through the Terracotta Army defence of his opponents for Lewis, who was suddenly away with nothing ahead of him but grass, the ‘keeper, and the target, and his eventual shot across the second of those from about fifteen yards out bobbled ever so slowly into the latter. The goal was in the record books before the ball reached the net.
As inconceivable as it seemed there and then, that was the last time Convocation would get anywhere near the Business School goal until well into the second half, and for what remained of the opening three-quarters-of-an-hour they even struggled to get into their opponents’ final third of the pitch. Unfortunately on one of the rare occasions that they did so, after about twenty-five minutes, Lewis challenged for the ball on the edge of the penalty area and fell awkwardly, injuring his shoulder, and that was the end of his match; Divin De Buffalo Irakiza was the first cab off the rank, although he went left wing while Kent – who, it had been suggested moments earlier, “loves a slow-motion pirouette” – was pushed up front.
It was at the other end of the pitch that things had started to happen though. Shortly after Convo had doubled their lead Business School had a great chance to pull a goal back when one of their players attacked down their left, outmuscled Welsh (A) and ran on, eventually squaring the ball to a colleague who should have done better with his side-footed shot from about ten yards out, although nothing must be taken away from Hendry, who made himself big, ahem, and blocked the strike with his shoulder.
The boys in red-and-black went close again just after the Lewis-Irakiza substitution although they failed to keep the ball under the crossbar, but then on the half-hour mark they did get the goal that their increasing dominance deserved. The seeds of it were sown when Farrell made a great scything tackle (albeit one that was wholly unexpected – as the Chairman went flying in there was a collective intake of breath from those watching on the sideline under whose noses the rather impressive rara avis occurred) to concede a throw-in and the Business School #5 – Topper’s mate – launched one of his regular Dave Challinor specials into the box. There followed some sort of systems failure between Long (M) and Welsh (J) at the front post that allowed an opponent to nip in between them and back-flick a looping header over Hendry, which dropped into the net close to the other upright.
Somewhere not too far away someone was having a barbeque and its aromas were wafting across Wyncote, where Convocation were beginning to get grilled. There was a worry amongst their supporters that they’d peaked too early – something that wouldn’t normally be sniffed at – but undoubtedly they were now finding it difficult to escape from their own half; a nice (sort of) metaphor for their plight was being played out on the Business School sideline, where a kid chased an orange balloon that was bouncing around in the breeze, unwittingly evoking comparisons with Patrick McGoohan’s regularly doomed endeavours in Portmeirion. This was the hooped midfield’s most taxing phase of the game, as their opponents had found a bit of pizzazz after such an adverse start and with it the upper hand in the middle third of the pitch: Long (M) was being bypassed intelligently, Nawrocki had been temporarily shackled, and Shore was suddenly chasing shadows.
As the end of the first period neared it was clear that Convo were just about hanging on and needed the interval to regroup, and though they did make it with their lead intact it was a close run thing. In the only minute of injury time the Business School right flanker drove into his opponents’ area with the ball and seemed destined to equalise as a path to goal opened up before him, but just as he shot Byatt – who’d looked jittery for most of the game up until then – made a great last-gasp lunge to concede a corner. From that another player in stripes headed over the crossbar, which was literally the last action of the half as the referee whistled for its termination immediately.
The teams swapped ends knowing that they were both in next-goal-is-so-important territory, while at the same time a smell of weed wafted around and that Business School-affiliated kid ran amok in the penalty area Hendry was about to man: the restart was actually held up for nearly thirty seconds while the young scamp received a spot of on-pitch punishment from (presumably) his mother, surely the first time in Convo’s history that a spanking has delayed play. Probably. Also spoiling the occasion for some was Sr Perez – possibly the most hated referee in the Old Boys League – who continued to rub up the wrong way those in red-and-black, making them retake their kick-off because of an over-enthusiastic leg; he even managed to get under the skin of the usually unflappable Ray Fosberg: “What’s ‘get on yer bike’ in Spanish?” he enquired of Frank Burgana.
It was the players who turned long periods of the second half into an unwatchable mess though, not the official. Whenever it seemed that the game was there for the taking no one stepped up to grab it by the scruff of its neck and the lack of clout and direction meant it became scrappier than Scooby Doo’s nephew. Little thought went into anything resembling passing and moving, the number of wasteful long punts became alarmingly frequent, and at times it seemed almost impossible to keep the ball on the pitch for more than ten seconds – abandoned, all the basics. There was plenty of decent tackling throughout the entire ninety minutes, something numerous people commented on afterwards, but otherwise, to paraphrase notorious curmudgeon Alan Green, it was woeful.
By the hour mark the long afternoon Business School must have feared in the early stages of the game had come to pass, albeit for a rather more uneventful reason than was probably imagined, but the worst of the sterility was over by then and brief moments of what passed for entertainment did break out occasionally during the remaining slog. At about the same time Convocation attempted to woo the crowd with a triple substitution that saw McNally enter the fray up front in a straight swap with Kent, Breno Salgado relieve Long (M) in midfield, and Craig Kaye make his bow on the left flank, with Irakiza moving to right back to replace the hooked Farrell.
Initially the changes appeared to benefit Business School as several minutes later one of their men attacked along his inside-right and sold Welsh (J) a pup the size of Digby, allowing him to then knock a cross through the Convo penalty area for a colleague running in from the other flank, and he blasted a shot towards the near side of the goal from about twelve yards out wide that Hendry did very well to turn around the upright. Not long after that another of their ilk was sent clear through with a great chance to level the game, but as he scampered towards his hooped opponents’ box he took a horribly heavy touch on its edge and the ball zipped through to the #1 – the Wyncote regulars had had another let off.
Despite those slight blips the Convocation back line was defending reasonably well, admittedly against limited opposition. The two Welshes definitely benefitted from having played with each other for years – stop it – and in general read the game as though they had written it: Jon was as formidable an obstacle to his opponents as has come to be expected, while Andy had the bonus of there being far less of his blood on display than in last year’s final. After a slightly suspect first forty-five minutes when he constantly had McNally seeking a couch to hide behind, Byatt had improved considerably since the break and grown into the game, and on the other side of the quartet Irakiza seemed at peace with the world, hardly surprising really as Business School appeared reluctant to go too wide, which was definitely to Convo’s advantage. It was important though, that all four keep fully alert, individually and as a unit, because scrappiness could always become grievousness in the blink of an eye.
What Convocation needed was some breathing space; a gilt-edged chance that, if taken, could assuage any growing jitters as the clock ticked closer towards full time and glory, and with a little under twenty minutes remaining an opportunity to increase their lead duly arrived. Business School’s back line had been stationed fairly high up the pitch all game, but as the second period progressed and their need for an equaliser grew greater it got sucked further and further forward and was ripe for the picking, until eventually someone (?) in hoops carved it open with a Mensa-approved pass and McNally set off after the ball from the halfway line, admittedly like a bat into hell. The old legs aren’t what they used to be – which was never much – and with a younger opponent in chase the ensuing ten seconds were like an shoddy remake of Crisp and Red Rum’s run-in in the 1973 Grand National; it was painful to watch and almost inevitably the Convo captain was caught, just inside the penalty area as he was (presumably) gearing up to shoot.
There was little doubt as the game entered its final ten minutes that nerves were starting to get to Convocation and their opponents could sense it better than anyone, with one of their ilk calling out from the middle of the park, “Come on boys, these are shittin’ themselves.” He may have been literally off the mark but the Oscar Wilde of Fazakerley could see what was going on, and it was worrying that those in hoops seemed to have no reply to his embarrassingly transparent attempt at gamesmanship and continued to ghost around the pitch in near silence; one watching supporter quipped, “I think we’re using telepathy.” Nevertheless, Business School didn’t appear to have much left in their armoury either, at least goal-wise: their #8 was cautioned after shoulder-barging Welsh (A) on the edge of Convo’s penalty area with enough force to move an illegally-parked car, a foul that provoked Hendry – never a man to keep quiet when he could hijack someone else’s rammy – to stick his oar in, and then hector the referee tenaciously until it earned him that special cup-final booking.
It was almost certainly coincidence, but after that minor assault (and the concomitant insubordination) Convocation enjoyed their best spell of the game since its opening fifteen minutes and they finally created a couple of chances to put the thing to bed. Irakiza went on a marauding run along the right flank which culminated in him playing a low cross into the Business School goalmouth that seemed perfectly weighted for McNally, but a defender nipped in just before him to concede a corner – and the less said about Kaye’s attempt to take that the hekickeditstraightoutforagoalkickbetter.
“Come on Chris, unclip that caravan,” was Matty Long’s advice for his captain shortly after that when, again, the Mancunian looked leggy inside the opposition half, yet the midfielder-turned-cheerleader could hardly have imagined the effect his sideline aside would have: on the next occasion Convo knocked the ball forward McNally was much more alert and after it, although for reasons that defy explanation he did so in the manner of Bez dancing on Kinky Afro; mind you, he did get to the thing first and pulled it back for Welsh (J), who was gadding around upfield like Franz Beckenbauer, but alas his smashed shot from about fifteen yards out was straight at the opposition ‘keeper. Also getting in on the ‘needn’t have bothered’ act in the closing stages was the other Long, whose mid-distance effort was the very epitome of tame and nothing to trouble the scoreboard operator, just as his header at an earlier corner hadn’t been.
The taker of that quadrant kick, Shore, pulled up lame with about a minute and a half of the regulation ninety remaining and was replaced by Kent, but even so near to the end it still wasn’t possible for the hooped players to consider their job done as Business School launched one last offensive that culminated in Hendry having to deal with a cross into his goalmouth by fisting the ball over the horizontal, while at the resulting corner an unmarked header flashed only just wide of the target. Of course the best way to prevent the other side from scoring is to keep them away from your goal, and during added time Convocation did just that by camping out in their opponents’ half of the pitch, where they even managed one last shot, which sailed over the bar (in your correspondent’s excitement the shooter went unrecorded).
Moments after that, as the Business School ‘keeper launched down the pitch another of the huge kicks he’d been discharging all afternoon, the referee blew for full time while the ball was still in the air, and Convocation had won.
The players’ celebrations were a little muted considering that they’d just achieved what no one at the club ever had before, but there were still hugs for each other and acclamation from their fans, and respect from those who had donned Convo colours unrewarded in the past. Having decided it was worthy of his rank McNally collected the cup himself (a wobbly trestle table on the sideline serving as the royal box – and the captain must have taken thirty-nine steps from somewhere), but not before some of the beaten finalists harangued Sr Perez as he collected his medal. There was a champagne shower as the prize was raised aloft (although someone suggested it was actually Aldi Prosecco that McNally had supplied for the occasion) and then it was all back to the APH for some toe-curling celebration, one or two drinks – every day’s a party in St Mary Mead – and to pick the bones out of what had just happened.
And what exactly had happened? Well, there’s no point trying to make a silk purse from a sow’s ear about the actual football: most of it could only aspire to be watchable, and it wasn’t even entertaining in a traditionally incompetent way, but nevertheless the final was hard fought – some might say attritional – and a win to be filed in the draw marked ‘ugly’ is still a win, so who cares? In the grander scheme of things what had happened was that Convocation had finally joined their Old Boys League peers in earning a star above their badge, and they’d collected a second piece of silverware for the club trophy cabinet, a decade on from when the first was acquired (almost to the week).
It’s seems to be lucky for Convo when the year ends in 9 – they should get Chas and Dave to record a song about it. Well, Dave.
Quote Of The Week: “Championes, Championes, Olé, Olé, Olé.” It may have been naff, but it hit the nail on the head.
Man Of The Match: While the outcome of finals are occasionally determined by individuals, team spirit and unity are always the most important factors when it comes to who picks up the silverware – which was just as well for Convocation on Saturday as no one played any better than average for more than a few minutes here and there. Everybody who took part did their bit though – and that includes those cheering from the sidelines – so it has to be a group award.
Convocation (4-5-1): Hendry; Byatt, Welsh J, Welsh A, Farrell; Kent, Nawrocki, Shore, Long M, Long J; Lewis; Subs: Irakiza, McNally, Salgado, Kaye
