Volunteer Arms Football Club

After having to deal with large volumes of jigger pokery trying to tie down a fixture against Wester Hailes Baptist Church FC I assumed that having finally sorted a date that would be the end of any shenanigans. I was sorrowfully wrong. Firstly was the bother getting a pitch, apparently Fisherrow is booked up all month. I think this may be false and the guy at the Brunton was just utterly incompetent, but one can only speculate. Secondly was the farce that was booking at Meadowmill Sports Centre, a booking was made fine enough, but to secure the floodlights I could only book 2 days in advance, so I phoned on Saturday to sort this but was then told the floodlit pitch isn’t available for hire at al just now. This turned out not to be a problem as it stayed light well into the evening. That sadly, is not the end of the jiggery pokery.

With a horrendous mess made of sorting out a squad I was left at 5pm asking anybody with two feet to come and play for us. In the end we eventually managed to get together 10 players (no expeprienced goalkeeper) and ended up borrowing one of the Baptist mob. I had to ask for kick off to be delayed 5 minuted due to Owen’s train being a bit slow, to which the referee replied “According to my SFA rulebook you have more than 8 players here so the game can go ahead”. SFA rulebook, JESUS. It was a friendly between two non-SFA affiliated teams. Thankfully the ref did back down and decided 5 minutes wouldn’t make that much difference for his bus back to Harthill. Eventually Owen arrived and we were able to line up as follows. Greig Johnstone AKA Sach in goals (despite the fact hes a centre-half by trade), in defence (left to right) J.Dick (captain), Marcin Nowak, Louie (a punter of Staggs), and Ray (a striker from up north we borrowed from the Baptists). In midfield were (l-r) Yorkie (who saved our collective asses by coming in last minute), Clarky, Ryan “Georgie Best” McKenna, and Andy Mckinlay. Up front were the prolific partnership of Owen Kinsella and Val. No subs, which would later become a challenge considering the Baptists turned up with almost 20 players.

The match eventually got under way when the ref made sure the ground was to SFA standards, that all forms were filled in in triplicate, all players were registered, Sepp Blatter had been fully fallated, and that the 6th official was in place to ensure each blade of grass had been well trimmed with a pair of nail scissors. The match started well with fluid motion and pressure from both sides and it was clear there were several goals to come when the Baptist striker chipped a shot over Sach and it bounced hilariously over the bar. However it would be Wester Hailes that would capitulate first with a staggs attack from Owen rushing forward down the middle and Yorkie picking the ball up in the middle of the park, jinking past a couple green and white shirts to slot cooly home and open the account for the Volleys. Soon after the FIFA panel of 8th officials had scrutinised video evidence and deemed the goal as passable the match was ready to kick off again. 1-0 Staggs. Not long after the game was under way again a Baptist attack that was absorbed by the very much makeshift Volleys defence resulted in a swooping counter attack from Owen down the right feeding the ball to Val to power home and sublimely double the advantage to 2-0 with an excellent shot to the top corner. After experiencing the sting of a VAFC team held together by the footballing equivalent of papier mache it was time for the Baptists to rally or die. And rally they did with a couple impressive attacks making use of my poor fitness from the months break and came close when they missed another shameful open goal. The pressure remained even from both sides and a goal was certain to come. The baptists did manage to open their account before half time in a totally unexpected way. After making one of many quality saves sach went to kick the ball up the park and ended up belting it off a Wester Hailes shin and the ball went ballooning into the net. In direct response to this the Volleys had to restore their two goal lead before half time and did so in the smoothest way possible typical of their style. With a cutting run through the middle Clarky played a brilliantly precise ball towards the penalty spot for Andy McKinlay to put away with a diving header that showed true finesse and class.

Going into the break it was fairly evident what we had to do. Despite the team’s piecemeal nature we were holding out and playing together with some strong linkup play from the wings and we just had to focus on keeping the defence tight and further our advantage without making any mistakes. Obviously no changes were made as we had no substitutes to mention and we had put in a good performance in the first half. Wester Hailes rung in the changes bringing on numerous fresh legs. Keen to regain some control of the match Wester Hailes got the match underway with intense vigour making full use of fresh legs with dashing runs left right and centre looking to break apart our makeshift defence. With long balls coming over the top everytime the match looked to have gained a rather Scottish feel to it, with Wester Hailes purveying a brand of football particularly popular with those of a maroon or royal blue persuasion. However they managed to gain a foothold on the game after a superb shot ghosted in across goal and went just out of Sach’s reach to make it 3-2. With weary legs and half an hour remaining it was time to opt for a christmas tree approach with Yorkie pulling back to play in defence to make it a 5-3-2. The most dreadful moment of my entire life was soon around the corner. Another speculative hoist up the park from Wester Hailes keeper left the Volleys tired defence for dead and a striker charged through onto the ball. I managed to catch up with him and nick the ball. I gave it das boot to put it out for a corner and it landed sweetly in the bottom left corner of our net. Absolute dismay. It had all gone very much Billy Gallas. There had been a major collision between the brown stuf and the fan. The buns had been sold. I had equalised for Wester Hailes. I wanted the ground to open up and disentegrate me. From this point on it was gung ho, throwing everything at the goal to make up for my dreadful error. Another fresh pair of legs were brought on for the Baptists, a fairly short wee lad with piles of pace who I reckon was one of their best out there. With Staggs piling forward a goal seemed very likely to come from some brilliant attacks and a couple of near miss free kicks. However upset was yet to come when a Wester Hailes striker added insult to injury with a spectacular shot that ghosted across goal and slotted in sublimely to the top left corner of the goal. 4-3 to the Baptists, with time against us it was serious gung ho time with Sach coming up from the goal for everything but sadly it was not to be and with the final whistle came the overwhelming feeling that I had ruined things.

Very much a positive performance from VAFC and I think the only person who can’t walk away from this one with their head held high is me. I can’t begin to apologise enough because we truly deserved to win that game, having had a goal chalked off and dealing with a referee with a very poor sense of geography and the rules of football as he chucked about the yellow cards like nobodys business, to all and sundry in green and purple. Definite positives to take though. Andy put in a solid shift on the right wing and was deservedly rewarded with a brilliant goal. Owen and Val worked superbly together up front with Val being unlucky to see a goal chalked off and Owen being very unlucky not to add to his already impressive tally. Clarky and Ry worked tremendously in the centre of midfield and provided excellent service for the lads up front in their usual industrious manner with Clarky setting up Andy’s goal with a characteristicly great ball. Yorkie was ever industrious and made a great call to drop back into defence and put in a quality shift. Ray the lad we borrowed was good as well despite being a forward and if he didn’t live up north we’d snap him up. Louie and Marcin were solid at centre half and did well particularly covering for me at times. I was dreadful. Totally inept and completely unfit, I really feel worse for wear for the month we had off due to not being able to get a game together. However, man of the match has to go to Sach for bravely stepping in between the sticks and putting in a brilliant performance that certainly merited a pair of gloves from Sports Soccer, despite shipping 4 goals he did exceptionally well to cope with a makeshift defence and made some tremendous saves.

As for the man in the middle all I can say is that Harthill are welcome to keep him.

Keep the faith

JD