Cueists of the world rejoice! For as Jesus raised Lazarus from the dead in the Gospel of John, so let the Gospel of Budg show that Mr Walls is well and truly back.
Captains Report
Keith Walls
"At 6.45pm the captains ulcer started playing up again - Neil "the newcomer" rang to say he wasn't going to make it unless we were absolutely positively desperate. Swanny had already called in sick, so with two men down I was beginning to regret my masterstroke of telling JY not to bother coming as "we had 6 players and it would make team selection easy"!
In the end Brads tactful phone call to JY telling him to "get his arse down here now" meant that we did scrape together the necessary six players. So off we trooped to see what the Farmers Boy had for us.
The captain showed his high altitude [should that be 'attitude' - slugger] training in Northern Ireland had paid off by leading out a nice Fleetwood Mac clearance in the opening frame. ("Fleetwood Mac" - one where the player takes the most complicated and bizarre route to finish a basic clearance, normally accompanied by the rest of the team singing the Fleetwood Mac hit "You can go your own way").
Treddy went on second and grabbed the opportunity with both hands, subsequently dropped it, found it again, but ultimately forgot where he left it and it was 1-1. He was not helped by the 10 minutes it took to work out who was on what colour. Some drunken monkey stuck his oar in when it was not wanted or needed and confused everybody. He wasn't even playing, just passing painfully through like an accidentally swallowed marble.
Brad shrugged off the humiliating pastings he had taken from "the duke of fluke" and "the slugger" during practice at Racks to clinch the third and things were back on track 2-1. With The Slugger putting down his marker for the Pointless Flair shot of the week award during his victory, things were looking good at 3-1.
But 3-1 became 3-2 when Lee (who was back from a three week break) took some time out from his frame to cook up a giant flange and present it to all of us on the table!
JY justified his inclusion by taking frame six and then justified his reputation by losing frame seven - 4-3!!!
It was time for the gas to be stepped on and Brad had a date with Destiny. In fact she was waiting for him in the Honey Pot and he knew that only a quick victory would do as he had to clear up and get his cue into JYs car before he drove off to save him carrying it into the bar. The crockery was out and the dish was lovely - 5-3.
Kev managed to get his double when his opponent played one of the worst tactical frames in history. With the black hovering over the middle he cleverly maneuvered his yellow right on top of it. Then, heeding no warnings from that shot he did the unthinkable and put yet another one of his yellows on top of that. The whole lot was balancing delicately like a trifle on a boiled egg and all that remained was for him to complete his own suicide. In one of those car crash moments, when you know you should look away but you just have to see what happens, and with no regard for his own safety or that of his reputation, he ignored the three remaining yellows and buried the black in a three ball plant attempting to clear up the mess he had left previously. 6-3.
Lee redeemed himself with a confident finish in the next and Treddy followed suit with another fine clearance. It was left to the captain, the Duke of Fluke himself, to put this puppy to sleep and Tony Gibbons was the victim of the coup de grace.
At one point it was 4-3, the next it was 9-3 and job done. The pressure is back on the Thatched Cottage at the top of the table! Handshakes exchanged, cards signed and now it was off to Racks to right the world.
A five minute walk back into town turned into the longest five minutes of the captains life as he was abused all the way home by Brad and the slugger whinging about his team selection. Apparently I should have played Treddy last so he would have to stay to the end and could have given us a lift back to town so they could get to the HP quicker!
A quick one in Racks and after heavy persuasion the captain got his first taste of the yellow building, accompanied by Maidenheads answer to Crockett and Tubbs. Ironically one of the pool committee was in there so that saved me getting my cards stamped - which is more that can be said for the other two!
Next week - home to the Bell!
THE CAPTAINS POINTLESS FLAIR SHOT OF THE WEEK
Runaway winner this week - Kevin 'the slugger' Southam. With the match finally balanced at 2-2 a fluked snooker gives him two shots with one yellow and the black left. After sinking the yellow he is faced with the black on its spot and the white about 12 inches up towards the middle of the table. He couldn't take the black into the bottom left because a red covered the pocket; the shot was to double into the vicinity of top left and then use the second shot to finish it off.
Or, you could just slam the double straight in, as hard as possible, and to hell with the second shot."
Once again thanks for the report Keith. Next weeks match is at home versus the Bell. We have reached the halfway stage now, and once all results are known we'll have a better idea of where we stand in relation to teams in other divisions. Keep it here for the results and tables later this week.Until then this is your cue correspondent signing off.
No comments:
Post a Comment