…the worst football match that I have ever seen in my life.
I drove all the way to St Avit to watch Pionsat’s 3rd XI but when I arrived there I found that the match had been cancelled. And it was pointless going back all the way to Pionsat to watch the 2nd XI – I’d have missed the first half and then I would have to drive halfway back to see Liz and Terry. However I did see some action at Charensat’s ground and so I stopped off there, to see them play Marcillat in a 3rd Division game.
In the first half the score was 0-0, and the teams were lucky to get nil it was so dreadful. In the second half Charensat opened the scoring. The Marcillat keeper’s kicking was pretty dreadful and so after a while the captain decides to take the goal kicks. For his first effort he kicks it all of 15 yards, right to a Charensat forward who prompty volleys it right back into the goal.
Charensat’s second comes from a corner. A ball played right across the goal with everyone standing there watching it except for a Charensat attacker on the far post who just stoops to head it in. Simple.
And Marcillat pull a goal back. A harmless cross into the penalty area with no-one on the other side, and the Charensat keeper, for reasons known only to himself, puts in a really acrobatic climb-cum-twist and I’m still not sure how he did it, and he palms the ball into his own net.
With just minutes to go, a foul is committed and the ref gives it in the favour of Marcillat, even though he was the only one who reckoned it was in that direction. The Charensat trainer tells the ref what he thought of the decision, and the ref tells the trainer what he thinks of the Charensat trainer. The Charensat defence are arguing amongst themselves and still argue as the ref blows his whistle and they still argue as the ball is played over the top of them to an unmarked Marcillat attacker who heads into an empty net.
Marcillat, easily the worst team I have ever seen, have been let out of jail in no uncertain terms.
And it gets worse.
Charensat have a striker called Guillaume who is quick, speedy, skilful, with good ball control, and if he broke through the Marcillat defence once he did it a dozen times. And faced with innumerable 1-on-1s with a shaky Marcillat keeper, he blasted it over the bar every time. And with 50 seconds remaining, he’s through again, two yards out, the best chance of the game, and he blasts it 5 yards over. His trainer’s language is unprintable in what is a family show like this. It was appalling, but then again, so was the miss.
At Liz and Terry’s I was kindly wined and dined, and we rehearsed our radio programme. We are in the studio on Tuesday.
And it’s rained and rained all day too.
I’m on a car park on the banks of the River Eure at a town called Pont de l’Arche.
