… the most one-sided football match that I have ever seen in my life.
US Granville were totally clueless today. They had just two shots on goal, one of which was collected easily by the keeper and the second went over the bar.
What didn’t help matters was that US Granville had a player sent off after 30 minutes. And it was probably the most ridiculous sending-off I have ever seen. A foul in front of me on the left winger by the Granville right-back, who is booked. The Granville left-winger shouted something from right across the field at the referee, who went over and booked him. So, immediately, the left-winger said something else that was probably equally uncomplimentary.
The remainder of the match was spent camped in the US Granville half with the FC Lorient goalkeeper playing centre-half. And he could easily have played centre-forward too and it wouldn’t have made any difference.
And so we had relentless attacking pressure on the US Granville defence, all of which led to nothing whatever because FC Lorient’s attackers couldn’t hit the nether regions of a ruminant animal with a stringed musical instrument.
The Granville keeper made two or three excellent saves, but for the rest of the match he was a virtual spectator.
But he could have been the saviour of the hour too, if only he had thought quicker. On two occasions late in the game he made good clean catches in his own area. But with the opposition keeper standing in the centre-circle, I would have gone for a good Route One clearance right down the centre of the pitch over the keeper’s head and who knows? One of them might have found the back of the FC Lorient net.
Instead, the match petered out surprisingly to a 0-0 draw and I reckon that the teams could still be playing there for a whole week and the score would still be the same.
Last night was an interesting night. I was tossing and turning all night and hardly recall having any sleep at all. But there was plenty of time to go on a few voyages, and did I voyage!
Last night I was in a Tax Office somewhere where there was a young guy examining some tax returns while I was looking through a drawer full of weeded-out files held in green envelopes. This guy asked if he should e completing a tax return, which I thought was rather strange seeing as where he was working, but then I noticed a huge file for the Duke of Somewhere, with a note that “no returns to be issued to this person”, and I was wondering whether this young guy had inherited the title. But even so, he should be making tax returns so I decided to send him a few and if it was inappropriate, he could always put them in the waste bin.
At some other point I’d been living in an apartment with several other people, mainly girls. I decided that I had to get up and get ready for work, even though it was only about 00:30 and most people hadn’t even gone to bed. Going to get washed was quite an adventure because it meant a walk of several miles down some old cobbled street rather like the Via Appia Antiqua in Rome. On the way down there I met Terry who was on his way to work on some church that was down there. He asked me if I would like to help him, which interested me not because of the work but the chance to get to see inside the church that was normally kept closed.
I was living in a house near to the sea and the tide was quite high and there had been floods. And at the next high tide I went out to see what was happening. It was clear that the waves were coming over the top of the sea wall – not very many at first but we still had a few inches of flood water. Nerina was there insisting that I come inside otherwise I would end up in a tragedy.
Finally, and last but not least, I was in school, going around with a girl who was much younger than me. But we couldn’t have some time together alone because people kept on interrupting us, riding bicyles around us, talking loudly, misbehaving, all of that, so in the end we walked back to school and I dropped her off at ther class. I walked on up several flights of stairs and the higher up I went, the more out-of-breath and ill I became. so that by the time I was almost at the top, all of my friends kept on rising out of their seats asking me if I was OK and did I need any help. I arrived at the top eventually and to go down for a drink, which I badly needed, it was quite a jump – three and a half storeys I reckoned, and I told the boy who was with me that I didn’t fancy the idea of jumping down there at all.
At 06:30 I was out of bed, and I had an early breakfast too. A shower and a shave and a good clean-up saw me hit the streets and the shops.
There was the usual round – LIDL, NOZ and LeClerc – and I bought nothing at all of any interest and forgot my pears to boot. There was another dark-blue sheet in NOz on special offer, so I added that to the collection.
Back here, I didn’t have the strength to unpack. Instead I sat on the chair and crashed out for a while. I’m still not getting better. I had to wait until after lunch before I could manage it. And after that, I didn’t do anything – just gathered my strength ready for the walk up to the football.
Tea when I came back was out of a tin. And now I’m heading off for an early night. Sunday is a lie-in and I reckon that I need it.
