Tag Archives: combronde

Sunday 7th October 2012 – WHAT HAPPENED TO …

… Sunday morning?

Well, to be honest, I worked through much of it, but from the wrong end.

03:34 when I finished what I was doing last night.

I was a little wrong with my estimate of what time it was when I woke up. I reckoned about 10:40 – it was in fact … errrr … 12:41.

I must have been really tired and even though this is what Sundays are for, I still felt bad about having missed the morning.

I was having a lovely dream though – I was driving a minibus through some forests on a main road through some mountains and explaining to the passengers that these were the Bluegrass areas of Kentucky (work that one out). We were being chased – not in a threatening way – by two cars, one of which was an old metallic mid-blue Peugeot 403 estate, and they overtook us on a sharp right-hand bend, crossing well over the solid white line in the centre of the road, which was divided into one lane for vehicles going my way, and the other way had two lanes coming towards me. This bit – the overtaking – I was watching from the air – maybe 500 feet up. Strangely, we were all driving on the left-hand side of the road as in the UK, so I dunno what all of that might be telling me.

After that, I had just enough time to grab something to eat and then off to Cellule, near Riom, to watch the football.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football as cellule puy de dome franceBut I shan’t be saying anything about the football in this column this evening.

As Ron Atkinson once said, “I never comment on referees and I’m not going to break the habit of a lifetime for that prat”.

Or as Jim Finks, manager of the New Orleans Saints once said, after a match against the St Louis Cardinals in 1986, “I’m not allowed to comment on the lousy officiating”.

We’ll just leave it at that.

But there’s a fruit stall at the side of the road just outside Combronde and I noticed that it was having a sale of apples. I’m getting low on them and so a 3kg bag of Red Gala apples for €2:50 seemed like a bargain, especially as the way fruit prices are at the moment.

So that’s Sunday dealt with. Monday is another day.

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Sunday 9th September 2012 – ONE THING …

chateaugay fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire michelin training track gerzat puy de dome france… about going to watch the footy with FC Pionsat St Hilaire is that you get to go to some really spectacular places.

The 2nd XI were playing at Chateaugay earlier this afternoon and the road up to the football ground has probably the best view that I have ever seen so far.

Way, way, way down there below us is the Michelin tyre testing ground and then over to the right is Gerzat where we record our programmes for Radio Arverne.

And if there had been less haze we could probably have seen right the way across to Roanne. It really was magnificent.
fc pionsat st hilaire fcpsh football chateaugay puy de dome franceAs for the football though, it was a disaster.

FC Pionsat St Hilaire started with just 9 players. A hasty telephone call brought along 3 more, somewhat late, and after 15 minutes there was something of a team out there.

With a smattering of new players this season it looked slightly-better organised.

But not for long.

fc pionsat st hilaire fcpsh football chateaugay puy de dome franceFabien, who seems to have found a little niche playing in the central defence, had to hobble off.

That meant a reorganisation with Xavier, who played up front for the 3rd XI last season, going up front and Bertrand dropping to midfield and Sébastien dropping to central defence.

When the new right-back was injured, Fabien came back on to replace him but was clearly struggling and it was clear that he was just a passenger in the side

fc pionsat st hilaire fcpsh football chateaugay puy de dome franceFabien was pushed up front, which is the correct thing to do with an injured defender and Xavier was put at right-back.

Xavier is a big, awkward, ungainly centre-forward – the type that causes a lower-league defence all kinds of problems in the opposition penalty area, but ball-control and tackling are not, unfortunately his strongpoints.

Shortly after this, someone in the Chateaugay side stood on François’ hand and so that was him off the field.

The willing and good-natured Xavier, who had done his best in goal a couple of times for the 3rd XI, valiantly took over there but the result was really a foregone conclusion.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football clermont la glaciere puy de dome franceAs for the FC Pionsat St Hilaire 1st XI, it’s clear just how much Jérôme animated the forward line of the team and how much they depended upon him for their results.

With him gone, Michael Bucaud suspended and Matthieu Sikorski injured, they had nothing to offer up front which is totally amazing for a FC Pionsat St Hilaire 1st XI side.

I can’t remember if Cedric, the star centre-forward, actually managed a shot on goal. The service he was receiving was non-existent.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football clermont la glaciere puy de dome franceTwo controversial decisions decided this match.

The referee overrruled a linesman in an offside decision and allowed play to continue.

So while the Pionsat defenders were waiting for the whistle in response to the flag, the Clermont la Glacière forward popped the ball in the net.

I know the referee (we had quite a chat in the interval) and he has a voice like a foghorn and I certainly didn’t hear him shout for play to continue – and neither did anyone else.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football clermont la glaciere puy de dome franceFive minutes later an FC Pionsat St Hilaire forward catches the ball brilliantly on his body and then volleys it beautifully from 25 yards right past the keeper into the net.

The other linesman signals for handball – and I was right level with play and if he has his hands there then I’m going back to school to re-learn all my anatomy – and the referee, miles from play, awards a free kick to Clermont la Glacière.

How the ref saw the incident when he was so far away and the player’s body in the way I just do not know, but I’m going to get myself a pair of eyes just like those just as soon as I possibly can.

Back on the way home, I stopped at the fruit stall at Combronde for some grapes and some melon and then I went round to Rosemary’s to drop off some stuff that I had bought for her in Montlucon.

puy de dome franceI had a little pause though because just on one of the bends there was a magnificent view right across the Gorge de la Sioule to St Gervais d’Auvergne perching proudly on its hilltop.

That had to be a moment to reach for the Nikon D5000 and the telephoto lens.

Hard to believe that St Gervais d’Auvergne is a good 15 kilometres further on from here, isn’t it? A good purchase, this lens.

Rosemary and I had quite a chat too – more of a gossip in fact. But that’s not important when you are amongst good friends.

But she had a laugh about me and my grapes – that I can sit and eat through a whole bag of grapes at one sitting.
“You’ll be wanting to go to the bathroom all the time” she said.
“Not me, Rosemary. Once a day, 07:30, every morning, regularly as clockwork!”
That’s very convenient and useful, Eric!”
“Not when I don’t wake up until 07:45, Rosemary, it isn’t.”

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Sunday 27th November 2011 – I WAS A BIT PUT OUT TODAY.

But before I tell you about that, let me first tell you the good news.

Although it was late when I went to bed, I managed to sleep for 6 hours or so. And after breakfast, I finished off the scripts for the radio programmes that we will be recording this week for Radio Anglais

I had to rush though as Pionsat St Hilaire’s 3rd XI were playing away at Combronde at 13:00 but just as I was stepping out of the door to go, Percy Penguin chose that moment to ring me.
“You fell on your head? It might knock some sense into you”.
It’s nice to have friends, isn’t it?

And so at Combronde, 5 minutes late and the place all deserted. There was no-one around at all. So what’s going on here?

col de ceyssat puy de dome franceAnyway, that was an hour and a half and 75 kilometres wasted. There was clearly no point in staying on here so I fuelled up and went off to Ceyssat for the 1st XI match instead.

That long drive took me round by the Puy de Dome – right past the foot of it, and it was remarkable to notice the change in the weather. From my humble abode to round about St Bonnet it was grey miserable and overcast.

But south of there we had glorious sunshine. The Puy de Dome (and you pass within about 200 metres of it) was especially nice. But once over the Col de Ceyssat I drove straight into a fog and that was that.

I met Bernard the club president. he said that the 3rd XI match was cancelled, and so I berated him for not sending me a text – after all, I told him last night that I would be going. It’s a couple of times now that they have done this on me and I’m becoming rather fed up.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football club de foot olby ceyssat puy de dome franceBut the actual match cheered me up considerably.

Olby-Ceyssay were a pretty poor side and FC Pionsat St Hilaire had no trouble whatever in demolishing them 4-0, hardly breaking sweat in doing so.

it’s a shame that they can’t play like that every week.

From there I went on round to Liz and Terry’s where we rehearsed our radio programmes – we’re recording next week.

Liz had baked potato pie and rice pudding for afters, and she even made up a doggy bag and a lump of fruitcake for me to take home. It’s that kind of thing that makes it worth-while having good friends, and helps me to forget all of the worries and disagreements.

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Sunday 15th November 2009 – I had a few surprises today.

car in ditch teilhet menatFirstly, on my way to the footy I came across a car stuck halfway down an embankment at the side of the road. And if there hadn’t have been a sapling in the way it would have been all the way down the embankment.

Now it’s true that where this incident took place is on a sharp bend, but the road between Teilhet and Menat is full of sharp bends and this one is no sharper than any of the others. So how come it was this particular bend at which it left the road?

Mind you, if it was going to leave the road, this is the best place to do it. The next sharp bend has a vertical drop of about 60 feet to the bottom.

I went down to look to make sure that there wasn’t anyone trapped in it – I mean, you never know. As it happened, it was empty but there was a lovely head-shaped impression on the windscreen just above the steering wheel. I bet someone has a headache today.

fcpsh football club de foot pionsat st hilaire combrondeSecondly. Pionsat’s third XI not only had 11 players including a real goalkeeper, they had 3 replacements and two others who didn’t make the team. Not only that, the two officials who had been sulking over something that was said to them in a moment of depression, they had patched up their differences with the others and so we also had a trainer and a linesman! Not that it did them any good though – they still lost!

Thirdly, I’ve bought myself a bass amp and speaker – a Carlsbro 45-watt combo. It’s not in particularly good nick – there’s a loose connection at the input leads, one of the speaker wires isn’t soldered properly and a couple of the potentiometers (volume and tone controls) need changing, but it’s only a fiver or so for the bits and half an hour’s work. It looks like it’s been left for years in the damp and then taken outside where the condensation has got at it. It still managed to rock the house though when I plugged the Gibbon into it.

It wasn’t cheap – €90 in fact, but it was the cheapest combo that I’ve seen in this area. And believe me, there isn’t a great deal of choice. I still have my stack (a 200-watt custom-built transistorised amp, a 200-watt Marshall valve amp and a 1×18 and a 2×12 cabinets) back in Brussels that I never thought I’d ever use again.

The other surprise is something that I found quite touching. As you know, I follow the local football team and take pics and write match reports of the games. Some of them are being used on a calendar for fund-raising purposes for the club but what is really nice is that they took a photo of me today as they want to put that on the calendar too. There’s also a chatroom on the internet for French local football and it seems that I am mentioned quite a bit with regard to the website. It’s nice to know that people appreciate so much what I’ve been doing. But now that I’ve finished my attic I need to bring the site up-to-date.

In other news, Liz, Terry and I had quite a chat about this digger. We’ve decided that discretion is the better part of valour and I’m going to write to this guy in Benin, thank him for his efforts, but tell him that we fixed ourselves up locally with a digger so we won’t ba able to complete the purchase.

And tomorrow, I’m back at work. My holiday is over.

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