I don’t miss much stuck here in this old cemetery, but I wouldn’t have minded a run out to Clitheroe last Saturday. By all accounts Byrnes the wine merchants, suppliers to HM the Queen no less, was as interesting as ever with a few canny bottles picked up for Christmas, or to keep the wife happy as a newt; the local beer was very palatable, the locals were, comparatively, welcoming and the game itself, well OK I guess.
OK? OK? I don’t think so. The sort of game which nobody will forgot playing in or watching. My admirably even-handed reporters tell me that it was a game of three if not four halves. RCA started a bit shorthanded, played OK in the first half, but lost two key players to injury and ended up on the wrong end of four goals, came back ferociously in the second half, but forgot to defend as well, took it to extra time and scored twice when past the 92nd minute to get a draw. Oh, and the opposition managed to get themselves reduced to 9nine men with six minutes to go, scored again anyway, (how many teams over the years have conceded when playing 11 against 9? Some team, RCA), and ended up with RCA thinking they should have won it? Manic.
Anyway, a replay to look forward to next Tuesday, when no doubt Her Majesty’s Loyal Corps of Groundhoppers will be out in force, but in the meantime league business to focus on first. And at Seaham during the week that wasn’t without incident. Specifically, an incident before the game, police called, and the kick off delayed. Nothing to do with us, and we refuse to comment, very wise I think. But the performance and result were good, very good. Five excellent goals, good efforts by our younger players and solid defending. Hopefully Ashington will be the same.
Amazingly the adventures of RCA haven’t been the biggest story in canny old Sunderland this week. That’s been the new bridge of course. Undoubtedly a striking sight, and a great example of engineering. Some might say even beautiful. Thousands walking across it on Tuesday, and queues of cars on Wednesday, to cross a bridge that to be fair goes from nowhere to nowhere else, or Pallion to Castletown as they are more popularly known. A bit like the Humber Bridge. It will change when the new roads are built, and Nissan can export their cars with minimum fuss, unless of course Nissan have upped and off to Slovakia by then. Which I am sure they won’t.
And finally the never-ending saga of Lee Cattermole over at the S0L. Been here for ever, rarely scored, right up there on the daft lads hate list, and then he pops up with a double at Wimbledon and suddenly all is sunshine and light, and young Lee is back on the Christmas card list. I guess there may be a lot of twists and turns this season for both us and Catts, but how many happy endings will there be? Well, it’s not a Thai massage parlour.