Good win at Flackwell

PTGFC Reserves  2  -  1  Flackwell Heath Reserves

It’s 09:49 am on a Saturday morning in September and I receive a message from Albert “I’ve just made myself a traditional Christmas dinner, good preparation for football? maybe not, but That’s. How. I. Roll.” Another message flashes through almost instantly “Albert sees the tawdry, unwanted orphanage of convention and burns it down with the matchbox of individuality. Today we destroy Flackwell, tomorrow we hunt geese.”

Saturday 10th September saw the visit of Flackwell Heath Reserves to French Meadows for the highly anticipated clash, a number of question marks surrounded this fixture however the main one on everyone’s mind was; How long would Weedon last at left back? I drew 15mins in the sweep stake.

Penn & Tylers Green FC were left struggling to get a squad together to fulfil the fixture with a number of players taking deserved breaks from the long season. Platty was forced out of the fixture due to “personal reasons” this was put down to him being under the weather. However the real reason was Platty also “allegedly” received an email, it simply contained a close up picture of their back side with the words “Ben Platt’s face?!”

The home side were strengthened by debutants Justin and Seymour as well as the youthful exuberance of Dame. Penn & Tylers Green FC set out 4-4-2 and looked to take control of the game against their far younger opponents.

The game started well for Penn & Tylers Green FC with them having all the chances in the first half hour with Seymour, Luke and Andre all going close. The deadlock was broken around the 35min mark when a lofted pass from Potts was beautifully met with a flick on by Seymour which fell into the path of Young Luke who slotted it past the keeper.

The first half rather petered out from there as Penn & Tylers Green FC appeared to be cruising and unwilling to really push for the second goal. The half time talk very much centred around the fact that “if we score more than them we win”, along with the gem “we want them to score because of them, not because of us.” Sadly Prenta was unable to attend the team talk as he was still on the pitch furiously chasing shadows.

A capacity crowd of 37 roared into life as Penn & Tylers Green FC re entered the wall of noise known locally as French meadows. The second half very much started the same as the first had ended with Penn & Tylers Green FC controlling the game and knocking the ball around with the sort of “Je ne se que” that got Thierry Henry a job with Renault. This however was until a beautifully whipped ball in from Weedon was met with a thunderous header from part time keeper Graham Potts. There was a stunned silence around French Meadows, not least because Potts had scored a header, but more so at the fact that Weedon had completed 65mins at left back.

With the goal however Penn & Tylers Green FC really took their foot off the pedal and allowed Flackwell to get into the game. Justin and Ben dealt admirably with the pressure and never really looked troubled, that was until a dubious off side decision allowed the Flackwell striker to nip in to make it 2-1 and create the sort of nervous tension that exists every time Platty opens his mouth and claims to have an idea.

A substitution in the 75th min saw Young Damo come off the bench to replace Seymour who to be fair had put in quite a shift for a bloke who was blowing in the warm up. Damo’s first action was to bring the ball down on his chest, turn his marker inside out and dink the perfect through ball for Luke to run onto, Luke beat the defender took the ball to within 5 yards of the goal and then proceeded to blast the ball 5 yards wide of the target.

No issue, another chance will come along soon. This time Damo had the legs to beat the onrushing before flicking the ball towards the box only for the defender to inexplicably catch it and then claim to have not touched the ball.

Luke immediately grabbed the ball and headed for the penalty spot and in a moment of sportsmanship not seen since Paolo Di Canio against Everton, Luke sportingly rolled the ball straight to the keeper to prevent Penn & Tylers Green FC capitalising on the situation. I think. Either that or it was a shocking penalty.

Penn & Tylers Green FC saw out the rest of the game and took the well earned 3 points in what is always a tricky fixture. Superb performances from all the team with special mentions for Ben and Justin who looked a real partnership at the back. Man of the match could easily go to Weedon for completing the 90mins, however this week I am happy to go with the selection committee.

Man of the match: Graham Potts

Match report by Graham Potts