Week 7 Captain's Report - Away versus Grenfell Arms

The Risks Associated With Pulling A “Dave Brubeck” (or the night we decided to ‘Take Five’ and finally got our comeuppance)

In case the Brubeck reference has passed you by and jazz isn’t exactly your forte then try this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DDOgYw5-pNs

In fact I would advise running this in the background while you read this weeks mind numbing dribble. You never know, with any luck the music might take your attention away from this weeks blog entry.

On Monday I decide to take a new approach. I wasn't going to text anyone, mail anybody or make any last minute phone calls. I would just assume we weren’t going to have six players and live with it. I got home from work on time for a change, jumped on my bike (which badly needs maintenance or dumping in a canal, whichever is easiest) and cycled to Slough Station. The train arrived as soon as I got on the platform, what a nice way to start to the evening. I arrived at Racks for 6:20pm and it was empty. More importantly the Murphy’s was back on. What’s more, the main table wasn't reserved – could it get any better??

Dom Taylor’s monthly direct debit to Racks must have got caught up in the banking system or maybe he’s cut back after the recent stock exchange crashes. Either way I jumped on it in a flash and even managed to get Vic’s balls as well. Things were going a little too well but it did put me in a joyful frame of mind - certainly joyful enough to shrug off the usual “I cant make it, working” SMS from Brad. Leo was nowhere to be seen either, he has obviously learnt his lesson the hard way and I doubt he will ever be in Racks before 8 o’clock while the summer league rolls on. Everyone else had made it and I’m tired of chasing up players so to hell with it - we would just “Dave Brubeck”.

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As a side note (and this one is for any committee members that are reading), any chance you can put the rules up for the summer league onto the front of the website? You managed to get the scores and tables done last week so thanks for that part. However a few people have asked me how the knockout stages will work and I don't honestly know. Any chance you can put up how the last eight are selected including how you will sort out a tiebreak between teams if its needed. It would be good for the players to know how its going to work and it also means everyone should know where they stand going into the last few matches. I think it will save you a lot of hassle in a months time when the sections finish. If you get any complaints just give them the “it was clearly stated on the website” and that will cover it – it’ll certainly avoid any accusations of corruption if people know in advance what the criteria are. Something nice and simple would do – “winners go through plus the ……..” “ they will be decided by….. yah da yah da yah da…”

If that's not possible then mail it to us on rackspack@hotmail.com and we will shove it on here as we would be interested to know as well.
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Of course, we shouldn't be in any danger of worrying about the runners up spots. After all we may have just five players but it’s only away to the Grenfell Arms for goodness sake, what can possibly go wrong?? We pop in, have a drink, rattle off the frames by nine thirty and its back to Racks for some beers, some pointless flair and a chinwag.

Fast forward to 9:32pm…..

JY: “ what’s the score now then?”

“We’re 6-3 down John”

“F*****g hell, how the f**k did that happen yah cheeky f****n’ c**t?”

…How indeed – rewind to 8:01PM…

It may be drawing to the end of the summer but the evenings are still bright until about 9’ish – unless of course you are in the Grenfell. It’s like the Black Hole Of Calcutta [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Hole_of_Calcutta - ED]. You open the front door and its bright sunshine outside. But you move two metres inside the door and you are bumping into tables and stools. Your eyes are squinted like a Vietnamese weight lifter during the clean and jerk.

We managed to arrive in one car at 8:01pm. By the time we walked in and managed to find each other again it was quarter past. Any other teams that go to play there - I would suggest some sort of ‘buddy’ system between you. There were three light sockets above the table but only two of them worked so one half of the table was all shadows. The only lights were coming off the fruit machine and the TV, but the barman turned them off so it wouldn't distract us!

Mark Hedges walked over and said “We are missing a bulb”. I showed him our card which, in Brad’s absence, had only five names on it, and replied “So are we!”. [You set ‘em up , and I’ll knock ‘em down…Ed]

The table is one of the slowest I have played on. It feels like you are playing on a shag-pile rug. You have to wallop just about everything and trying to bounce a white off a cushion and down the table is an impossible task. However it's the same for everyone so not to worry, and besides if you don't have a table you don't have a team so there’s something to be said for it.

I kicked it off with a win and Kevin followed up for an early 2-0 lead. JY then lost a shocker before disappearing into the night in the direction of the ‘Tri Towers’ card game on the amusement machine. Lee put us 3-1 up and it was looking good.

Back in our first meeting with the Grenfell, you may remember our guest appearance from Will Graham ending in a disaster. He landed Richard Meadows in the front and back six and Richard had brought out the Family Sized Bucket O’Fudge specially for him. Well, this time he worked his magic on ‘Magic’ and beat Neil. 3-2.

Throw in the two frames we had to give up and we found ourselves 4-3 behind at the turn. To make matters worse Richard then doubled up on the night and beat Lee. You can’t fudge with budge. 5-3.

With luck, at that point the sandwiches came out. Seizing the moment I managed to grab one of them and lay a small trail of breadcrumbs from the games machine to the table, enabling JY find his way back to the baize for frame 9. Fifteen minutes later I was wishing that I had left him to the ghosts and ghouls of the gloom as he brought out the flange stick, waved it around, hit himself full in the face with it and lost. 6-3.

“What’s the score now then?”

“We’re 6-3 down John”

“F*****g hell, how the f**k did that happen yah cheeky f****n’ c**t?”

You may well ask, Double Doughnut boy!! (0-0)

Hopefully, one thing that will stand us in good stead for the remainder of the season is our ability to win crucial frames. Goodness knows we have had plenty of practice so far with not having enough players. Sure enough we took the last three to snatch the draw. Neil nailed a tough black from under the cushion for 4-6. Kevin cracked in another to hold onto a slender lead at the top of averages, and it was left to me to complete the comeback 6-6.

Talking of averages, here are the standings in the Racks Packs “I am the greatest and now I have a trophy to prove it and I will be larging it over all of you ‘til next season” Trophy.

Kev 80% (8 from 10)
Keith 79% (11 from 14)
Neil 79% (11 from 14)
JY 71% (10 from 14)
Lee 66% (4 from 6)

At the end of the match we all shook hands, until Neil demonstrated the benefit of eating lots of carrots and pointed out that in the darkness we were actually shaking hands with each other and not the opposition. So JY lit up a flare he found by the fire extinguisher and we spotted Richard and co on the other side of the bar. We ran over, signed the cards, thanked everyone for a good night and jumped into the car and sped off into the relative light of Maidenhead at 11PM.

No game next week as it’s bank holiday so have no doubt that Brad has probably arranged time off in order to make it.

Note from the editor:

No game next week - it's a bank holiday, so a two week gap until our home game against NMCC gives us time to regroup for our final assault on the league title.

If we needed any more encouragement, our glorous "leader" Captain "Coach" Walls will not be available for selection as he is on a scouting trip to Switzerland. So for the first time this season vice-under-chairman-captain-uber-lord Southam will take charge of the team. I'd like to say I've learned a lot about how to be a team captain from Coach Walls. It would be a complete lie however, so all I'll say is I have already put the word on the street that we are looking for a couple of quality players to fill the gap left by Coach Walls (I wonder if Anne-Marie is still available) and I hope to schedule a press conference in due course.