Category Archives: football

Sunday 2nd February 2014 – THE FOOTY RESTARTED TODAY

Well, it shouldn’t have done, but there are so many matches in arrears that Pionsat’s 1st XI hastily rearranged a postponed match against Lapeyrouse.

And hasty was the word too, so hasty in fact that Pionsat were short of five or six regular players and they had to pad the team with players from the 2nd XI who play 3 divisions lower down the pyramid.

Of course, Pionsat lost, and by 2-0 too, but then you can’t expect half-a-dozen players from Division 4 of the District league pyramid to compete against a team that last year was playing in the Elite pyramid.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire lapeyrouse puy de dome division 1 franceThe first goal was quite avoidable though and Pionsat’s defence should be pretty depressed with that. All the defenders drawn to the near post and then the ball driven across the goal to a couple of Lapeyrouse players standing unmarked at the far post.

The second goal from Lapeyrouse was a peach, though, and worth the price of the admission … "it’s free!" – ed. A free kick about 35 yards out played to an attacker standing about 15 yards from goal and he hits the ball on the volley. It’s one of those shots that could have gone anywhere – the stand, the school playground, the cemetery, the abandoned railway line, but this one chooses to go into the far top corner of the net despite a despairing dive from Michaël.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire lapeyrouse puy de dome division 1 francePionsat had their moments too and they were desperately unlucky on a couple of occasions.

We had a moment where a confusion between the centre-half and the keeper saw the former back-head the ball over the outstretched arms of his keeper. The ball hit the cossbar and in a desperate tangle on the line, neither the Lapeyrouse keeper nor Frédéric could make contact with the ball and the Lapeyrouse n°14 hacks it away before Cedric can get to the ball.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire lapeyrouse puy de dome division 1 franceIn another moment of desperation in the Lapeyrouse defence, a really good corner from Pionsat is won in the air by one of the Pionsat forwards and the other Frédéric just can’t make a contact with the ball to force it into the net.

Nevertheless, with most of the Lapeyrouse defence paralysed, the defender covering the far post (the near post in this photo) manages to hack the ball off the line at the very last moment to avoid a certain goal.

Pionsat also had a clear penalty denied when Nico was blatantly pushed off balance as he went for a loose ball in the area, and there was another incident in the Lapeyrouse area that some referees might have punished with a penalty for Pionsat for holding.

But then again, to be honest, I don’t really remember either goalkeeper having a proper save to make. Pionsat’s attack looked well below par today.

But the weather was quite impressive this morning. We had clear skies for a few hours until early afternoon, not like winter at all today in fact. I think that when winter does finally come, it will come in spades.

-2

Saturday 14th December 2013 – WELL, IT DID RAIN …

… during the night, all 2mm of it. First time for ages too as I said. And when I woke up this morrning there was a hanging cloud to greet me. Consequently I stayed in and read a book, and then reorganised the bookshelves a little and did some housework.

It cleared up this afternoon so I had a quick run to St Eloy-les-Mines and the shops, and spent almost nothing there either. I’m back into my old ways again.

After a late lunch I did some work on the laptop and then wznt to Marcillat-en-Combraille for the last match prior to the winter break. AS Marcillat were playing Vallon, top of the table, and to everyone’s surprise they won 1-0. Once again, they could have had a bagful of goals but couldn’t hit the nether regions of a ruminant animal with a stringed musical instrument. Some of the misses were comical to say the least.

Vallon offered nothing up front although they were the better team. And they can consider themselves unlucky, if now downright cheated, of a good goal. An AS Marcillat defender handled a cross just outside his area but the shot fell to a Vallon attacker who volleyed it home. The referee blew his whistle … for the handball, thus disallowing the goal and the Vallon players were furious. The ref said that he had blown prior to the shot but I am totally and utterly convinced, as was everyone else around the ground, that the goal had been scored before he blew. And why blow anyway. Hasn’t he heard of the advantage rule?

And anyone who says that football is a man’s game is clearly unaware of Marcillat’s n°13 this evening. Only been on the pitch two minutes and he’s booked for having a ‘frank exchange of views’ with the referee. And 30 seconds later, as the Vallon keeper goes to clear a ball out of his hands and upfield, the n°13 goes up and impedes the clearance. A second yellow card, and so into the dressing room, and not been on the pitch 5 minutes either. Two of the most stupid bookings that I have ever seen.

Vallon had a player sent off too right near the end. He was rather too vocal about a bizarre refereeing decision and while one never condones that sort of behaviour, I do have to say that some of the decisions made by the referee were totally bewildering to say the least.

Ahhh well.

-4

Sunday 8th December 2013 – JUST FOR A CHANGE …

… I saw Pionsat’s 2nd XI go a goal down early in a game (that’s not really a change), but come back strongly and score three times in the second half to win 3-1 to get their show back on the road.

But never mind that for a moment – this morning started as I meant to go on, by dropping my breakfast tray and all its contents all over the floor downstairs. I’d had a nice sleep too – an early night, a lie-in until 10:30 without any inerruption through the night, a good dream, and then the bright burning sun shining in through the windows. And then of course the breakfast all over the floor.

I managed an hour or two catching up on some recording that I needed to do, and then in the glorious sunshine off to Charensat to see the footy at 13:00.

Pionsat had 11 players, but no more, and it was a fair team too, and as I said, they ran out winners 3-1 after being down 1-0 for a long period in the game.

It was particularly important for young Vincent. He came up from the juniors last year and he’s finding it something of a big step up, but he’s doing what he can and he showed that if you have a genuine striker’s instinct, then nothing much else really matters all that much.

vincent malnar football club de foot fc pionsat st hilaire as charensat 8 decembre 2013 puy de dome league division 4 franceHere, a high ball into the area had the keeper stretching and … he dropped it. It’s not easy hanging on to a ball in this cold weather with the sun streaming into your eyes.

And there was Vincent, following the ball in like every good striker should, whether he thinks he’s going to get it or not, and when the keeper fumbles the ball, it lands right at Vincent’s feet and that was 3-1 to Pionsat.

Back here, I finished off the recording and then watched the Packers against the Falcons. The Packers came back to scrape a dour win, having fallen behind to the most bizarre touchdown that I have ever seen. The Pachers’ quarterback overthrows, a Falcons defender sticks out a hopeful foot, and kicks it right into the hands of a colleague wide open on the left wing, who, totally unmarked, runs it back 72 yards for a touchdown. The Falcons won’t ever do that again, that’s for sure.

-4

Saturday 7th December 2013 – I FINALLY MADE IT …

… to the shops in Montlucon today – first time in ages. And I spent a pile of money too, which is not at all like me, of course.

Mind you, it was an effort to get out of bed which was hardly surprising seeing as it was absolutely taters outside. And scraping the ice off Caliburn’s windscreen didn’t improve things either. But in Montlucon I did the usual round of the usual shops.

Just for a change, LIDL turned up nothing exciting apart from a big box of clementines (yes, it’s nearly Christmas) but everywhere else did me proud. At Noz, the cheapo shop, I bought a full set of the Piorot Series I DVDs and also some of the home-made fizzy lemonade that they have. Three bottles of that, for me over the Christmas / New Year festivity period, and not only that, the bottles with the drink inside are those with the wired stoppers and cost less than just the bottle alone at IKEA.

In Brico Depot, I bought 24 planks of shuttering board – €3:95 a plank and three joined together widthways makes a decent 50cm shelf 3 metres long. I can crack on and build my shelving now, once the rain restarts. But it didn’t restart today – we had another one of these glorious Alpine winter days.

Before leaving Montlucon I went to the Centre Aqualudique, which is the posh way of saying “swimming baths”. It was cold in there, but not as cold as it would have been at Neris les Bains, and I made history by not only forgetting to take my clean undies with me but also my soap and shampoo. Something of a wash-out, if you pardon the expression.

This evening I froze to death on the terraces (well, terrace) at Marcillat as the home side’s 1st XI took on Varennes in a squalid bottom-of-the-table match.

Two worse attacks I have never ever seen in my life. Varennes never even tested the Marcillat keeper once during the entire match and while Marcillat had plenty of opportunities, they couldn’t hit the nether regions of a bovine animal with a stringed musical instrument. They could still be playing when the winter break is over in February and the score would still be 0-0.

That is – except for a very dubious penalty and a woeful calamity of a mix-up between the Varennes n°3 and his goalkeeper. And tule n°1 of any defence is and always has been “when making a backpass to the keeper, always send it wide of the posts”.

Are you reading this, Varennes n°3?

But it was a niggly, argumentative match – a typical foot-of-the-table affair, and when the referee finally did have enough and brandished the first yellow cards, I would have had half the teams in the dressing room a long while previous to that.

-3

Sunday 1st December 2013 – SUNDAY IS A DAY OF REST …

… and so I rested. In fact I didn’t even get out of bed until 10:30, and that was only because I needed to visit the beichstuhl.

I didn’t do any housework either. I had a nice relaxing morning reading a book. As you know, I’m fully of the opinion that everyone should have the right to have one day per week where they can sit and do nothing at all if they so choose, and not feel guilty about it.

I didn’t even set foot outside my house until 14:30 – not because there was nothing to set foot outside for, but merely because it was so perishing cold.

However at 14:30 I set out, for Terjat as it happens. No footy again in the Puy-de-Dome today but Terjat’s 2nd XI had a rearranged match against Quinssaines and so I reckoned that I would toddle off over there to see whether we were going to have a repeat of the humiliation of a couple of weeks ago when, even playing with 11 men against the 10 of Premilhat, they still managed to be well-and-truly stuffed 7-0.

as terjat football club de foot quinssaines allier decembre 1 2013 franceWell, Quinssaines were pretty poor, although quite well-organised, and Terjat were even worse. But somehow Terjat managed to win. And not by just one goal, but by an astonishing 5-2 scoreline.

The big difference was that while both goalkeepers were, shall we say, guardiens de fortune and so couldn’t really be expected to do too much, Terjat actually put the Quinssaines keeper under quite a lot of pressure, shooting from just about everywhere there was a sight of goal. And of course, it paid off in spades.

On the other hand, even though the Terjat keeper never made a clean catch during the entire 90 minutes, no-one followed up the balls into the area to pounce upon the dropped balls, or even had a serious attempt at trying to beat him. In fact, when finally Quinssaines did have a go at really testing him, a free kick blasted over the wall into the goalmouth from about 25 yards out, it went clean through the keeper’s hands into the net.

Ohhh what might have been!

No gridiron tonight either. The internet connection isplaying up and I was seeing nothing but a stop-start freeze-frame slideshow. That was a shame as we were to be treated to a bottom-of-the-table grudge match between the Falcons and the Bills. It doesn’t get more desperate than that.

-5

Saturday 30th November 2013 – IT WAS THE DRIVING RAIN …

… that woke me up early this morning and as I was lying there in my stinking pit I was thinking that if this keeps up for the rest of the day it’s going to be quite amusing in Pionsat this morning for this little open-air celebration.

But never mind. By the time I plucked up the courage to tear myself away from my stinking pit it had stopped raining and there were even a few little streaks of blue in the sky. Only a couple, mind you, and they didn’t last for very long, but they were indeed there for a moment and that was encouraging as I hurtled off to Pionsat.

patrick poivre d'arvor olivier poivre d'arvor pionsat puy de dome franceHere in Pionsat, at the Old People’s Home, we were treated to the spectacle of a couple of ex-celebrities doing the old book-signing bit. Nearest the camera we have a certain Patrick Poivre d’Arvor, a name that might mean nothing to anyone reading this rubbish, that’s for sure, but in fact formerly a well-known French TV presenter and author, one of whose books we found in this house when I bought it.

Standing at the table, further away from the camera, is his brother Olivier who is also a well-known author (however, not well-known to me, I have to admit) and who is also supposed to be signing copies of his books, not that there were so many of his on display.

nouvelle salle de fetes pionsat puy de dome franceThe book-signing isn’t actually the main reason for the presence here in Pionsat of the brothers Poivre d’Arvor – it’s a mere opportunism.

The real reason for their presence is that if you have been following these pages over their many reincarnations, you’ll be aware of the story of the “Maison Ducros Maymat”. A fine Art-Deco house of the late 20s and early 30s left to abandon and bought by the town of Pionsat simply to demolish it and to use its enormous gardens for building housing, a new medical centre and a new salle de fetes

patrick poivre d'arvor olivier poivre d'arvor rue jean d'arvor pionsat puy de dome franceThis necessitates the construction of a new road through the site and it was decided to name the road after the famous early 20th Century French poet Jean Jeuge dit d’Arvor who was born in Pionsat back in 1883.

The town asked Patrick Poivre d’Arvor and his brother if they would perform the opening ceremony and now that Patrick has “retired” from the silver screen he could spare the time to come down to the birthplace of his maternal grandad and do the honours, and at the same time do some rehearsing for the local gurning championships. The brothers were born with the simple surname “Poivre” – meaning “pepper” – but Patrick, at least, added his grandfather’s pseudonym to his own surname upon the death of the latter in 1970.

patrick poivre d'arvor laurent dumas pierrette ray brice hortefeux pionsat puy de dome franceWe were also highly-honoured by the presence of all kinds of dignitaries here at Pionsat for the ceremony.

The well-built man standing to the right of the image is Laurent Dumas, mayor of St Magnier and the representative of the Canton de Pionsat at the Conseil General of the Puy de Dome. To his right, cropped unfortunately from the image, is Pierrette Ray, mayor of Youx and Vice President (yes, they cater for all kinds of things) of the Conseil Regional.

Patrick Poivre d’Arvor is there of course in his raincoat, and to his right (and our left) in the expensive suit in centre-shot is Brice Hortefeux, the area’s Member of the European Parliament and with whom I later had a very friendly chat about Brussels.

foule maison de retraite pionsat patrick poivre d'arvor puy de dome franceThere followed the usual round of speeches and presentations, under cover back at the Old People’s Home. Hardly the many millions of telespectateurs to which Patrick Poivre d’Arvor is accustomed, of course, but a crowd is a crowd is a crowd, as any celebrity will tell you.

The mayor treated us to his vision of the Pionsat of the future, which includes some kind of shopping mall at the Intermarche supermarket. And while I for one applaud his vision – he is quite right in saying that we need to progress in order to survive – but
firstly, I’ve seen the shopping mall at the Intermarche at Commentry, a town 10 times bigger than Pionsat, and that can’t sustain half a dozen independent retain outlets

secondly, there are enough empty shops already in the town, with several businesses having closed down since I’ve been here. If exisiting businesses with exisiting clients can’t sustain, what hope for any new ones? And what hope for the ones that remain when the new shops open? It reminds me of the situation when the main-line standard-gauge railway arrived just up the road in Marcillat in 1932. They had closed the narrow-gauge tacot that had run into the town for years, and built the new line right through all of the old earthworks, totally destroying them. However the new railway never made a bean and closed in 1939, but because the tacot had been destroyed, the town was left without any rail connection at all even though the rest of the tacot system was running quite happily everywhere else. I can see this happening in Pionsat with the shops. And we’ve also seen, for those of you who were with me in Labrador in 2010
 that while the town of L’Anse au Loup may well be growing in importance due to the concentration of coastal Labrador’s services there, that has led to the collapse of the infrastructure of all of the other towns along the Labrador coast. I can see this happening in the Combrailles. Other towns will be forced to compete with Pionsat to keep themselves afloat, we’ll have a spending war, and it will all end in tears.
thirdly Pionsat is one of the communes of France with the largest per-capita indebtedness. So where is all of this money going to come from?

This evening, Pionsat’s match against the Goatslayers was postponed – a waterlogged pitch which is hardly surprising as everywhere is waterlogged around here right now. There was footy at Marcillat though – the 2nd XI taking on Montmarault and so in the freezing cold and frost I went to see the worst football match that I have seen for some time. Marcillat were awful, Montmarault were even worse but were better-organised and from a 3-2 lead, Marcillat suddenly found themselves 3-6 down. They clawed their way back to 6-5 before the final whistle, but I can’t say that they deserved to.

As a matter of interest we had a female referee this evening – that’s quite a rare event here. And I’ve seen worse referees too.

And my chips, beans and burger for tea were absolutely gorgeous. A good investment, this woodstove.

-7

Sunday 10th November 2013 – THERE’S ONE THING …

… about owning a bright yellow van, and that is that everyone knows who you are. So at about 12:15 when I was on my way to Villosanges, a red saloon car suddenly sat on my tail and started desperately flashing his lights.

It turned out to be Fabien from the football club. It seeemed that the heavy rain over the last few days has caused the river at Villosanges to burst its banks and seeing as how the footy ground is right at the side of the river, the ground is now under three feet of water. So that was that.

Mind you, listening to the weather this morning, I didn’t feel much like going out. In fact I didn’t feel much like getting out of bed either, but then again it’s Sunday and Day of Rest so there’s no problem with that.

I had a late breakfast and did some desultory cleaning up here – the typical Sunday stuff – and then I went off for the footy. The bakery in Pionsat is open on Sunday mornings and so I went in to pay my respects and restart the bread round that I cancelled when I went off to Brussels. No point in me going every day or every other day to buy my bread when I can have it delivered for less than the cost of the fuel to go and fetch it. And it was shortly after this that I was turned back.

Back here, I made some butties and did a little job of work. I’ve been buying loads of CDs just recently and keen readers of this rubbish will recall that a good while ago I had bought some CDracks from IKEA. I’d put up four of them but now the collection has overflowed, so I installed a fifth one. Just one more left, so I might make a little trip to IKEA in due course to buy a couple more.

After eating my butties I went off to Terjat. I’d heard that the 2nd XI were playing Premilhat at 15:00 and as you know I try to get out and see Turgid whenever there isn’t any local football here.

football club de foot as terjat premilhat allier franceThis was a match that had everything. Torrential rain, sleet, hailstorms, as well as bright sunlight. But the howling wind was pretty much a constant and made play from east to west rather a tricky proposition.

It also had a few other features as well, including a right hook that would have put Joe Frazier to shame and which put the Terjat right-back into the dressing room iwthout any help from any of his colleagues. This led to controversy, as you might expect, for at this level (the basement of football as far as I’m concerned) there are no bookings and no sendings-off. The offending player was taken off by his captain, but a substitute ws sent out and this threatened to bring the game to an unceremonious end.

However, wiser councils prevailed. The referee blew for half-time a minute or so later, and at the start of the second half, it was clear that Premilhat had returned to the field with just 10 men.

football club de foot as terjat premilhat allier francePlaying with the wind in their favour but with 11 against 11, Terjat were only trailing by 3-0 at half-time. But playing against the wind and against one man less, they were completely overwhelmed and let in another 4 goals, to lose by 0-7.

The fact that the score was 0-7 is laregly due to the Terjat goalkeeper who was effectively playing on his own against 5 or 6 Premilhat forwards and made probably 7 or 8 high-quality saves that would not have been out of place at Conference North level, and also due to the Premilhat attackers who missed a penalty, who hit the woodwork four times and who missed a load of sitters. If Premilhat had scored a dozen, no-one from Terjat could have complained.

Worse, though, is that Valentin, one of the heroes of Pionsat 2nd and 3rd XI’s valiant struggles, is now playing for Terjat, in his usual role out on the wing. He was an excellent player for Pionsat’s lesser sides but here he had a match that he would rather, I’m sure, forget completely. Not through any fault of his own, but simply that his colleagues were totally incapable of getting the ball forward to him.

I said to him after the game “what on earth are you doing with a team like this?”, for there’s no doubt that Terjat are the worst team that I have ever seen so far. And here I was – it was less than 8 days ago that i’d been watching a team that is playing in the Europa League.

Back here I lit the fire and made myself a pizza in the oven, and then watched some gridiron before going to bed. Tomorrow is a bank holiday so I’m going to have another lie-in.

-7

Saturday 9th November 2013 – DUNNO IF YOU REMEMBER …

… a couple of years ago and I posted a photo of the local village shop in Ronnet which had caught fire and burnt out.

burnt out shop restaurant fire ronnet allier franceThe owners moved to other premises in the village with their shop and opened a little café-restaurant there too. But that’s not lasted too long, because this was what I discovered when I went through Ronnet at midday today.

We’ve had another fire and all of this seems to have gone for a Burton too. Even more importantly, when the first place caught fire they had a tarpaulin up and over it almost as soon as the flames were extinguished. Here though after the fire at their second premises, they seem to have abandoned everything to its fate and that seems to be that.

Yes, I was in Ronnet today, on my way to Commentry for shopping, and rather later than intended too. I’d heard the alarm go off but I decided that, seeing as how I’m still recovering from my exertions, I was going to have another morning of rest.

But what a beautiful morning it was though, not a cloud in the sky and the batteries were fully-charged by 10:45. I emptied some more stuff out of Caliburn and tidied up some more in here, slinging some filled rubbish bags into the van and then went off to Commentry, via Ronnet.

Christmas isn’t too far off and so I’ve started buying Christmas nibbles today. And nothing else of note or excitement, except that at Centrakor I picked up a couple of small pepper mills on special offer, to use for grinding my cardamon seeds and so on, and also some waxed table cloth. That was what I wanted, because I don’t want to ruin this new table when I use it as my kitchen worktop up here.

As the weather deteriorated, clouded over and started to rain, Neris was next, and the swimming baths. Ages since I’ve been there and it was freezing in the building. About 25 of us poor souls braving the extremes, but at least I’m clean for once.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one franceSo now that I’m back home I can return to my usual haunts and habits, FC Pionsat St Hilaire being one of them, and tonight the Ist XI were taking on Chatelguyon.

I had to get dressed for it too as it was freezing outside, although the rain had stopped. And it’s as well that I did for nothing that happened on the pitch served to warm me up at all.


fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one francePIonsat started the stronger and were peppering the Chatelguyon goalmouth and it was no surprise that they took the lead. A beautiful cross across the goalmouth from Nico and Pavel, this new Polish striker, volleying in a superb shot at the far post.

In that opening spell wre had shots kicked off the line, shots pounded into the woodwork and shots put wide when it would have been easier to score and I can’t think how it was that they missed. Pionsat were threatening to run riot.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one franceThey were however living dangerously at the back and it was no surprise to anyone that Chatelguyon equalised – with just a few minutes to go before half-time.

A break down the left wing saw a Chatelguyon forward clean on with the ball and although Michael managed to get down and stop the shot he couldn’t hold on and as the ball ran free from his grasp, another Chatelguyon forward following up had a pretty simple tap-in and that, dear readers, was that.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one franceThe second half started just like the first half. Pionsat came out of the trap like a rocket and for the first five minutes had Chatelguyon pegged right back in their own half and under something of the cosh.

We had the Pionsat missed chances, the woodwork peppered with shots, the Chatelguyon keeper making some excellent saves, and then the unbelievable happened.


fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one franceWell, it isn’t unbelievable if you have been following what I was writing about the matches three and four years ago. Back in those days Pionsat were struggling because they had a defence that had a tendency to switch off and gp to sleep at important moments, and this was exactly what we had here.

And it didn’t happen just once or even twice, but FOUR TIMES, would you believe, and what looked like a comfortable Pionsat victory turned into something of an absolute rout as they went on to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.


fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one franceI felt sorry for Michael in the Pionsat goal. He’s not a goalkeeper but with injuries to everyone else he’s in there keeping goal and doing his best.

No one could fault him for any of the five goals that he conceded, but with two Pionsat centre-backs standing too far apart so that an attacker can go straight down though the middle for a one-on-one with him, what is he expected to do?


fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire chatelguyon puy de dome division one franceWe had two of those, one after the other, and that was followed up by two balls over the top of the defence when the Pionsat defence was pushing too far forward and not quick enough to get back. For the fifth goal we had Michael on his own against three Chatelguyon attackers and no-one can do much about that.

Back home, I was skyped by an old friend of mine, telling me that he’s moved house. He has, but his wife hasn’t, meaning of course that their marriage of some considerable number of years has come to an end. That’s really sad news as between them they made quite an impressive couple with many qualities. But I suppose that it’s none of my business except to dole out the sympathy.

-5

Saturday 2nd November 2013 – WHEN THE ALARM WENT OFF THIS MORNING …

… I just rolled over and went back to sleep. Somehow I couldn’t summon up the energy to leave my comfy little bed here.

And when I finally did wake up, I decided that I would have something of an informal day of rest and not do too much. That was the cue for coffee in bed and a James Bond film, together with a good book.

That took me through until lunchtime and then I nipped out to the local shops for the baguette and the bits and pieces that I shall need for the journey home next week. Hard to think that this is effectively my final shopping expedition in Brussels, although I’ve said things like that before.

This evening, I went out again. No football in the Netherlands border area this evening, and none in the German border area either. There was however a match at the Argosstadionachterdekaserne, the home of KV Mechelen, where the home team was to entertain Zulte-Waregem.

Argosstadionachterdekaserne kv mechelen zulte waregem 2 novembre 2013 belgium jupiler leaguePeople, including Yours Truly, do say that Belgians have no sense of humour, but you would be forgiven for thinking differently when you see the sign over the entrance gate to the stadium. You can tell that KV Mechelen aren’t doing so well in the league at the moment.

But the stadium itself, which must qualify for having one of the longest names in mainstream football, wasn’t easy to find. It was hemmed in right in the middle of an area of what would be in the UK some kind of Victorian working-class terraced housing and it did remind me of going to a football match in the UK back in the good old days of when all stadia used to be like this.

There was however some easy – and free – parking on the old railway goods yard about 500 metres away, and there were even a couple of marshalls to help everyone. Long time since I’ve seen this kind of thing.

The next thing was something of a shock though – unlike at Breda in the Netherlands last week, the stadium doesn’t accept payments by card – it’s cash only. And I wish now that I had paid with a card at the supermarket this afternoon rather than with cash. The nearest cash point was 1500 metres away, so I was told, and me with a bad foot too after my exploits with the coffee table earlier in the week. I didn’t need any of this. Mind you it was a good job that I arrived early.

Argosstadionachterdekaserne kv mechelen zulte waregem 2 novembre 2013 belgium jupiler league
So having procured a ticket, at €16:00, it was into the ground. And this was a surprise as well. A First Division game in one of Europe’s leading national leagues and the stadium had probably over 50% of its capacity as standing. When was the last time that you ever heard of this?

And as for the stadium itself, you can tell that they’ve never heard of the Taylor Report in Belgium either because this place wouldn’t have lasted 5 minutes in England following the report on the condition of English football grounds after the fire at Bradford City. It really was like stepping back in time to the early 1970s in English football and you have no idea how comfortable it felt to be standing up on the terraces.

Argosstadionachterdekaserne kv mechelen zulte waregem 2 novembre 2013 belgium jupiler leagueBut I don’t care what anyone in authority has to say – the fans are totally correct in their opinion of all-seater stadia. With so many standees in the ground, the atmosphere really was electric for the entire 90 minutes and the Mechelen fans must be the noisiest that I have ever heard at a modern football match.

The Powers That Be want everyone to be seated at a football match as in a theatre or a cinema, and give polite applause whenever someone does anything merit-worthy and to keep quiet the rest of the game. That is total nonsense and is what has ruined the game as a spectator sport. Football is all about noise and atmosphere, 90 minutes of bedlam on the terraces, and you can’t do that sitting down. And it’s not just about the merit-worthy actions either. When Zulte-Waregem’s n°3 went down rather too easily and for far too long right under the referee’s nose and on the “popular side” after a challenge early in the game, the Mechelen fans were on his back for the rest of the match with whistles, jeers and abuse to such an extent that his captain swapped him over to the other, more sedate side of the field.

THAT is what real football is about.

People might think that that is being grossly unfair to the footballers concerned. Four or five years ago I remember Craig Bellamy being quite upset about the abuse that he was receiving from the crowd. Firstly, I don’t ever recall him complaining or being upset when the fans of his team were dishing it out to an opposing footballer, and secondly, I will gladly go and stand out in the middle of a football pitch for a whole 90 minutes and let 30,000 people hurl as much abuse as they like about me and my family for only 25% of the money that he is on.

Argosstadionachterdekaserne kv mechelen zulte waregem 2 novembre 2013 belgium jupiler leagueAs for the football however, we had a torrential rainstorm and a 2-2 draw, the result being a fair reflection of the balance of the play. And the best player on the field was the Zulte-Waregem centre-forward who scored both his team’s goals. A different class of player than the others on the field.

I’d seen a Turkish Fritkot on my way into town and so I stopped off there and, sure enough, they conjured up a plate of falafel and fritjes. I enjoyed them too, especially as I felt that I had earned them. I’ll miss all of that when I leave. But I’ll have to come back ina couple of weeks though – there’s a book sale in the car park and I must add to my collection a copy of “Honkie and Ponkie On The Moon”.

I’m depressed though about how much Vlaams I’ve forgotten, I really am. I must do something about this.

-5

Sunday 27th October 2013 – SUNDAY IS A DAY OF REST

Especially when the clocks go back an hour. So it was really nice to get up, go for a gypsy’s, make myself a coffee and go back to bed to watch Carry On Follow That Camel, an excellent film totally ruined by Phil Silvers, and get up to find that it’s still only 10:30.

After breakfast I did rather less than usual, and marina chaeroff decapitated ixelles cemetery brusselsafter lunch went out for a wander. You may remember that a few weeks ago I went to the War Graves part of the local cemetery for a wander around. I went back for another look today and one of the graves there caught my eye.

It relates to a woman by the name of Marina Chaeroff – a Russian name but with a Belgian flag on her tombstone, and she is clearly shown as being decapitated by the Nazis. Like I said before, it’s quite easy to criticise people who were less-than-resilient when it came to dealing with the occupying powers when you don’t yourself run the same kind of risks that you would like them to run.

I went off to pay my respects to Marianne afterwards and, as a huge disappointment, the gravestone that I ordered hasn’t arrived. It’s a big job, I know, but it was promised for the end of the month and they need to get a wiggle on.

The familiar sound of a whistle from down the hill led me to the footy stadium where the Royal Sporting Club of Ixelles were entertaining their neighbours from Auderghem. €4:00 it cost me to get into the stadium so I was hoping to have my money’s worth.

royal sporting club ixelles football auderghemIxelles started quite brightly and were soon in front. And although they stayed in front for quite some time, we had a few astonishing developments. Ixelles were playing with a young lad on the right wing and he was streets better than anyone else on the field. He scored the opening goal with an excellent solo run and shot, but for some reason his colleagues seemed very reluctant to let him have the ball and he was isolated out on the wing for quite a while.

Ixelles’ tactics, to stand well off the defenders when the defenders were in possession, meant that they were being pushed farther and farther back and it was soon evident that despite being out in front and having the lion’s share of the game, Auderghem were gradually asserting themselves with all the time that they liked on the ball, and in the space of about 20 minutes, interrupted by half-time and one of the most astonishing cloudbursts that I have ever seen, Auderghem scored three goals, totally against the run of play.

The tactics of the Ixelles manager became even more bizarre. Instead of giving his players the old boot in the nether regions and telling them to move the ball out to the right wing, he withdrew the winger from the game, to the utter dismay and disbelief of everyone in the stadium.

royal sporting club ixelles football auderghemThe rest of the story you can write yourselves. Despite the heroics of the Ixelles goalkeeper, Auderghem went on the rampage and scored two further goals without too much effort and although Ixelles pulled one back right at the end, if the final scoreline had been 5-2 in favour of Ixelles, no-one would have been all that much surprised.

For Auderghem to have won this game 5-2 is one of those mysteries that will never ever be resolved – something on a par with what on earth was going on with the withdrawal of that right-winger on the hour mark, a decision that surely changed the whole aspect of this game.

-36

Saturday 26th October 2013 – I REMEMBER …

… back to 2004 when I was ill and thinking that I ought to develop a new interest, that the subject of footy first came up. Brussels is ideally situated for being a Northern European footy fan and I do remember thinking that as Belgium and France are rather boring in that respect, I ought to cast my net a little further afield.

Dutch football fans are well-known for their passion and ardour and as the town of Breda is easy to get to from here on public transport (change trains at Antwerpen), then NAC came onto the radar. However, times changed, and things changed, and I changed, and that was that. Nevertheless, it was always something that turned around in the back of my mind.

Dutch football has some very interestingly-named teams such as Willem III, Heracles and Top Oss, but pride of place has to go to the enigmatically-named Go Ahead Eagles. Any team with a name like that deserves to be supported. And so imagine my surprise this morning when, over a cup of coffee, I glanced at the footy fixtures and found that the Eagles were playing away this evening – at NAC Breda!

So early this afternoon after lunch I leapt into Caliburn and shot off up the motorway as far as Weerde (I really ought to live in a town with a name like that – second only to the town of Silly of course) when I realised that I didn’t have my passport (I seem to be making a habit of this).

Back on my way to Antwerpen I encountered a Carrefour at Mechelen so I was even able to do a pile of shopping, and after that, with Golden Earring playing on Caliburn’s music centre in honour of my Going Dutch, I eventually arrived at the ground.

stadion rat verlegh NAC Breda netherlands eredivisieNice and modern, which many purists (including Yours Truly) will think is a pity, but with plenty of space around it and plenty of parking too which makes a pleasant change.

Buying a ticket for an Eredivisie match is not easy. You need to have a Dutch FA clubcard to but a ticket for the match. if you don’t have one, which of course I don’t, you need to produce a national identity card, which I don’t have either, or else produce a passport, which I did have, so it was a good job that I remembered to go back and fetch it. But just €15 (that’s £12) for a ticket is an absolute bargain to watch a 1st-tier match in a keenly-fought domestic league.

Next stop was to buy some food. I left Caliburn (who has never been to the Netherlands before, by the way, so there’s a first) at the Stadion Rat Verlegh (a delightful name) and went on foot to the centre, and I’m glad that I did because I stumbled once more upon something quite exciting that I would otherwise have missed.

fokker 100 scrapyard breda netherlandsThis is a Fokker 100 of the late 1980s or early 1990s and what it is doing here as an advert for a scrapyard I really have no idea. This isn’t the first one that we have seen either, for those of you with very long memories will recall the Andover that sat on top of a scrapyard at Ettiley Heath, at the back of Sandbach, for a while. But anyway, here it is and here it sits, and here it will probably stay until the price of scrap aluminium rises again.

It did rather remind me of that delightful story about the old World War I pilot reliving one of his battles during a live television interview.
“There I was, at 8,000 feet, all on my own, and suddenly these five German Fokkers appeared out of a cloud, right in front of me”
“I should mention, for the benefit of our younger viewers” said the interviewer “that a Fokker is a type of German aeroplane”
“Thats right!” ejaculated our hero. “These Fokkers were Albatroses”

historic building medieval centre breda netherlandsSo I eventually made it into town, following my nose which was quite interested in the smell of chips that it was detecting.

This brought me to a little square just on the edge of the old medieval centre and here was a beautiful historic building. I’ve absolutely no idea what it might be although it looks like an ersatz town hall or school building of the late 19th Century when the Dutch ran out of inspiration. However, I could be completely wrong about this and nothing would surprise me.

Here I was distracted as two pizza delivery motorcyclists burst out of an alleyway and headed off in different directions. That gave me a clue and so I headed into the alleyway and found myself at the back of a takeaway pizza lace. My takeaway Vegetarian with my own vegan cheese (I always come prepared) was one of the best I’ve ever eaten.

public urinal Breda NetherlandsOn the way back to the stadium in the dark, wishing that I had come here much earlier to properly explore the town, I encountered this object, right outside the football ground as you,might expect one such object to be. Whatever its proper name might be, I was told that the locals refer to it as the p155 house, and for very good reason too as you can see.

In fact I made very good use of it. I must stop drinking all of this flavoured water while I’m driving. It’s doing me no good at all, I tell you that. I’m not sure how I would have coped had I not found this artefact. It’s certainly a novel way to spend 1.2 centimes.

Mind you, it’s a bit disconcerting having to resort to something like this in front of a crowd of about 17,000 people trying to get into the Stadion Rat Verlegh. I mean, I didn’t want to give them all an inferiority complex.

stadion rat verlegh nac breda go ahead eagles deventer netherlands eredivisie 26 october 2013But that’s enough of me talking rubbish. Let’s concentrate on the football.

Tyhe quality was rather … errr … less than I was expecting for an Eredivisie match. NAC were, well, about average I suppose but Go Ahead Eagles were thoroughly awful and how they were in one place higher than the home side before the kick-off I really do not know. They had a central defence pairing of Lord Lucan and Martin Bormann and for the second quarter of the game they were quite simply torn to shreds. Its no exaggeration to say that 4-0 at half-time, all the goals coming in that 20-odd minute spell, was something of an understatement.

stadion rat verlegh nac breda go ahead eagles deventer netherlands eredivisie 26 october 2013It will also come as no surprise to anyone reading this that the second half was a totally different game. Naive followers of the sport would expect the second half to begin with the Eagles having their heads buried in their boots and a bouyant bunch of Breda boyos bouncing out to run up a cricket score (mind you, 4-0 IS a cricket score when England are batting).

But no, Breda had gone right off the boil and were content to play exhibition football for a while, passing the ball around amongst themselves instead of going for the jugular.

This of course gave the Eagles some kind of respite and a couple of times they snatched the ball away and went racing off down the ptch to give the Breda defence some VERY ANXIOUS moments indeed. I remember thinking that if the Eagles scored twice (which they could so easily have done), there would have been an almighty panic in the Breda side and anything could happen.

stadion rat verlegh nac breda go ahead eagles deventer netherlands eredivisie 26 october 2013However the Breda defence stood firm and with just two or three minutes to go, they managed to pot a fifth goal to calm what was clearly becoming a jittery Breda performance. I don’t think that I’ve ever seen a side winning 4-0 look so nervous.

But I really don’t know why teams like this do this kind of thing. 4-0 up and looking good, and then going on the defensive for 45 minutes. They should have carried on with the allout attack, been 6-0 up after the hour, and then gone on to bury this team, instead of giving them a few easy chances to get back into the game. Really bad planning, this, and I would have kicked the players all around the stadium. A tight mid-table finish means that goal difference is all important when it comes to doling out the prize money at the end of the season and whenever you are given the opportunity, which doesn’t arrive very often for clubs like this, you should be going for the throat;

And on that note, I went home. Another one of my … errr … goals in life accomplished.

-10

Saturday 19th October 2013 – THERE HAVE BEEN A LOT …

… of changes around here – it’s amazing what cam happen when you’ve been away for as long as I have.

new road junction montaigut quarry puy de dome franceSteaming down the hill past the quarry at Montaigut on my way to the shops at St Eloy this afternoon and I came shuddering to a halt. That’s because a new road, and of course, a new road junction seem, to have miraculously appeared.

I’ve heard a great deal about this proposed new road – it’s something that’s been proposed for quite a while. For years, heavy lorries from the quarry have struggled through the medieval streets of Montaigut, snarling up the traffic and rattling the houses, and all of the local inhabitants are thoroughly fed up of it.

new road junction montaigut quarry puy de dome franceBut not any more. While I was away, a new road has been consrtructed that by-passes the village and goes off to the N144 on the outskirts.

There, the traffic is not obliged to enter into the village at all and that will please everyone.

It will please me greatly too. I often need to take the N144 and then turn off for Montmarault and in order to do that I have to go down some quite narrow windy roads with, more often than not, the sun full in my face at the most inopportune of moments. Now I can just steam on down to here and then hang a left on the new road, and I’m there in no time.

new road junction montaigut quarry puy de dome franceThere’s another part of the road that is in the throes of being built. That part will take you onto the road that leads to Pionsat, and that’s another piece of road that should have been built centuries ago to by-pass the village.

All the traffic on there, if it isn’t going to the village itself (which is highly unlikely as there is nothing in Montaigut tha Pionsat doesn’t have) is going to the motorway at Montmarault and so is being channelled through the village and as anyone will tell you, traffic in Montaigut can sometimes be impossible.

No, when they finish this, it should be a good thing.

However I am getting ahead of myself. This morning I was intending to go to Montlucon but I’d seen some interesting stuff that would do for the radio programme, so I wrote a couple of thousand words on the tax changes that took place in July.

After shopping, I went round to Marianne’s to catch up on all of the latest news, and then to Cecile’s to unload Caliburn of the stuff that Cecile had chosen from the other Marianne.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire nord combrailles puy de dome franceWe had footy this evening too. Pionsat’s 2nd XI were relegated to the fourth Division at the end of last season and are doing fairly well here. Tonight they were playing the Miners of St Eloy but they would only muster a team of 10 and which was not a particularly strong team either, with several faces missing from the squad.

They started off brightly, with the Pionsat n°9 ( a guy called Fred, a new signing) playing a total blinder up front and looking as if he could take on the entire Nord Combraille side on his own.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire nord combrailles puy de dome franceIt didn’t however work out like that as Pionsat couldn’t keep going, being short-handed like that.

The Miners gradually came back into the game and eventually the goal that they had been threatening to score for quite some time went into the back of the net, despite the best efforts of Christophe who seems to have taken over the goalkeeping jersey on a permanent basis, given the illness, injury and retirement of everyone else around the club. There have been quite a few changes over the last two seasons.

Nord Combrailles scored a second goal late in the game to put the issue beyond doubt.
fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire nord combrailles puy de dome franceBut that wasn’t quite the end of the story, because this guy Fred, who had quite impressed me throughout all of the match, was still going at the final whistle.

Here he is bursting through the Miners’ defence right on the final whistle, shrugging off a few strong tackles, and putting a shot across the face of the goal beating the keeper easily. But it hits the post and bounces to safety – about the third or fourth time that he had hit the woodwork. He would have been my man-of-the-match on any day of the week in any team, that’s for sure.

Even more astonishing was the weather. We were all standing on the terraces in shirt sleeves. This was one of the nicest October nights that I can remember.

-9

Sunday 4th August 2013 – YOU’VE BEEN SPARED …

… another discussion and more photos of the parking around here – not because of the fact that there was nothing to report (there was in fact even more than in the last few days) but because I’ve had other things to do.

I told you last night that I would go and visit Marianne today and give her a progress report, which I duly did. Her grave has been restored from the last time I was there, and it’s grown a basket of flowers – obviously someone else has been to visit her.

Her headstone hasn’t arrived yet though, but then again what I have ordered for her will not be the work of 5 minutes.

On my way to her grave I pass by the military section of the cemetery, where soldiers who died during the defence of the city in August 1914 and May 1940 are buried.

There’s also a section that deals with the civilian victims of the two World Wars and I went for a wander around that part of the cemetery today.

Many people, mostly British and Americans, tend to criticise, sometimes vehemently, the citizens of many occupied countries for what they see as their collaboration with the occupying powers during the wars.

They also criticise those in Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan who are standing their ground and fighting the occupying powers, but that is by the way of course.

But these British and American critics of the civilians in these occupied countries are being extremely naive. They simply have no conception of what was going on and what it must have been like to live in these countries.

Nazi execution victims Ixelles cemetery Brussels belgium august aout 2013Here are a handful of the hundreds of graves in this part of the cemetery – people who died after falling into the hands of the occupying powers.

If you enlarge the photo you will notice the legends thereupon – “FUSILLE” (shot), “EXECUTE” (executed), “DECAPITE” (decapitated) and all of the hundreds of graves here, of both men and women, bear similar legends.

And none of these legends tells you anything about the sufferings that they must have undergone at the hands of the Gestapo before the Gestapo tired of amusing itself with them and sent them on their way.

Yes, it’s easy to criticise people for collaborating with the enemy when there’s a whole ocean or a sea between you and the enemy. The British and Americans would think twice then.

I don’t seem to recall the British inhabitants of the Channel Islands putting up too much of a fight when they were occupied by the Nazis – in fact they even sat on their hands for 10 months, slowly starving to death, after the war had passed them by.

They couldn’t even seize the initiative then when the Germans no longer had anything to fight for.

civilian victims world war 1 Ixelles cemetery Brussels belgium august aout 2013There’s also a section for civilian casualties of the Germans in World War I.

Back then in those days the Germans made no secret whatsoever of their policy of “frighfulness” towards the civilian population. All kinds of atrocities were committed upon the civilian population.

All kinds of people were caught up in the dragnet during World War I and in this photo you’ll see graves of a couple of British civilians and a couple of French civilians, as well as some Belgian civilian graves.

The flat at Boulevard Reyers where I lived for a few years, that backed onto the Tir National – the National Firing Range – and that was where people who were singled out for “special attention” by the German occupying forces were executed, and subsequently buried.

Edith Cavell was shot there, and many famous people from World War I and II, and many SOE operatives who were running escape lines across occupied Europe and who fell into the hands of the Gestapo are buried in there.

Even more poignant are the graves of the “unknown” – no-one knows who they were and why they attracted the special attention of the Gestapo. From the one or two survivors of this kind of treatment, the suffering was appalling and death was often a merciful release.

Leaving Marianne’s grave, I heard a familiar sound in the distance – yes, a referee’s whistle. The football season has restarted here in Belgium and it seems that there’s a football club here in Ixelles – the Royal Ixelles Sporting Club.

They play at the sports ground down the hill from the cemetery and today, they were at home to La Hulpe in Division 3b of the Provincial League of Brabant, so I was informed.

Royal Ixelles Sporting Club de football La Hulpe belgium august aout 2013And so I went for a nosey around, like you do … "like SOME of you do" – ed …

The standard was pretty dire, I have to say. FC Pionsat St Hilaire could have defeated both these teams without drawing too much breath, but at least it was football and so that cheered me up considerably.

I was wondering what I was going to do for my weekly football fix while I’m living here, and now I know. It’s played on artificial turf, but I don’t suppose you can have everything.

Reminds me of that gridiron player asked by a television reporter if he preferred grass or astroturf, replying “hey man, I ain’t ever smoked astroturf”

local authority social housing Ixelles Brussels belgium august aout 2013But never mind the stadium itself. That’s quite a modern edifice, but it’s surrounded by Council Houses and Council Flats and not just any old council houses either.

If you’ve seen my page onthe houses built by the Peabody Trust in London, you might recognise the influence.

Brussels was also a slum-ridden city at the turn of the 20th Century and a great deal of effort was put into rehousing some of the inhabitants of the worst areas.

The earliest social housing was in the centre of the city but by the 1920s the city was building out in the suburbs and I reckon that this might be one of those

So there you are – 4 photographs and 1002 words. You really ARE having your money’s worth today, and on my day of rest too.

Still, back to work tomorrow.

-5

Sunday 9th December 2012 – I am glad …

… that I bought the new wood stove last year.

Not only have I been nice and warm for most of the day, I had another lovely tea tonight. Pizza of course, but in the absence of any bread (what with the boulangère forgetting me yesterday) I had baked potatoes with garlic butter, all cooked in the little oven thingy.

Not only that, I boiled a couple of kettles on the top, and made a big pot of coffee, half of which I drank and the other half I put in a thermos flask. I’ll be intrigued to see what that will be like in the morning. I could be on to something here.

Strange as it may seem, I was up and about at 08:30 this morning, so an early breakfast and a film followed by a couple of hours work on the radio script. But coming downstairs at mid-morning I encountered the black feral cat that roams around here. Normally it totally ignores me but today it maiowed at me, came to me when I called it, let me stroke it and even let me pick it up. All that I can think of is that there’s no wild food around in this weather. Being a vegan, I’m not able to help it out and it turned its nose up at the soya milk. If this weather keeps up, I’ll have to splash out on a box of munchies. In the meantime, I’ll leave the door open to the verandah and the lean-to. There’s a mouse running around somewhere in there and a hungry cat is a useful ally.

I also found a footy match this afternoon – Terjat’s 2nd Xi against the 3rd XI of Quinssaines. Terjat had about 70% of the play but somehow managed to lose 4-1. Twice they were hit on the break, a third time a lucky deflection in the penalty area found an unmarked attacker, and the fourth time a tired defence was caught stationary. But it was an astonishing match all the same. We all froze to death and there was, tragically, no coffee.

So tomorrow I really must get cracking. I’m in danger of falling behind.

-1

Saturday 17th November 2012 – AFTER AN EARLY …

… early start this morning, I dashed off a complete Radio Anglais programme – the rock music programme for January.

I can do things like that at one sitting when I’m in the mood and I wish I were in the mood more often. When I’m feeling like that I can move the world and that’s a phenomenon that I would like to maintain.

I had a quick whizz around the shops at St Eloy-les-Mines where I bought nothing of any importance, and then round to Marianne’s for a chat and a coffee. She gave me a couple of prezzies too, which was nice.

This evening it was out to Marcillat-en Combraille for the football.

This match tonight could best be described as a “warming” match – very entertaining, and all for the wrong reasons too, with AS Marcillat winning 2-1 in the end.

Tomorrow I’m having a lie-in, I hope and then I have more work to do. I can’t even arrange to have a day off these days.

Ohh how times have changed 🙁

-4