Showdown

The win train was at the station again on Saturday, a happy 3-1 result for another late late away game. It was perhaps a tougher battle than we expected but we won out and that enough for us. The game had the feeling of a stumbling block in my mind, but we acquitted ourselves with confidence and battled it out. It puts our win streak at 4 and our 3 point gap at the top remains intact. That three point gap is going to be tested this weekend though.

In the backs of our collective minds there is an image of our season calender and as the weeks have worn on one weekend and one game has been highlighted, then circled, then underlined. That game is this weekend and it pits us against the closest challengers remaining to us, three points behind. The other teams have fallen by the wayside and two teams have churned out win after win. They are the last team we play before the change around and the only team with an unbeaten record. Whilst they've got that cherry of a stat on us we've got them beat in pretty much every other way. We've won more, drawn less, scored more, conceded less, and have a better goal difference (naturally). Come the showdown and the stats will be meaningless. It's a huge tie for us, our biggest of the season, the tingles are already setting in and it's only Tuesday, this is what we play for!

It's tough to say who is under the greater pressure in this situation, is it us as the hunted, seeking to pull away? Or is it the hunter who needs to catch us or starve? I don't know or care because I know we'll be coming to war either way and ready for a fight. There's a famous quote 'pressure is privilege', we have earnt the right to entertain this fixture and as far as our opponents achievements are concerned, well, they haven't played us yet...

I'll be making a fond return to centre forward on Saturday as well after cameoing at right half last Saturday. I'm not appalled at my performances in that position but to say that marking isn't my strong suit is something of a massive understatement. So I did find myself exposed at times due mostly to my knee-jerk ball pressure over-commitment (10 years of forward play gets into your bones) and I have to thank my team-mates for stepping in and helping me out of trouble. The fact that my man contributed nothing significant to the game and was hugely reluctant to shake my hand at the final whistle (marde arse) shows that I must have had some effect there. That said I think the fact he was a hugely greedy dribbler obsessed with showboating may have let himself down a lot too, so I can hardly claim to be defensively supreme. Anyway it matters not as I'll be repaying in kind all of the bail-outs I received last weekend with some goals this weekend.

This game represents the half-way point of our season and is hugely close match. For that reason I would ask and beg that you please turn out and support us, we will take any advantage we can get and having some support and cheering will certainly get us going. It's also a good chance for us to show you what we can do and give you guys a taste of the results of the hard work we've been doing. So come along, bring a friend! bring a flag! and get ready for the showdown, we've been ready and waiting for some time...