Match Report - Week 2 - Home versus Golden Cross 'A'

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WARNING

In the following report you may come across the expression “work commitments”. We at RacksPack towers do not condone this type of language, and would not seek to encourage its use, however in the context of a pathetic excuse for not turning up to a pool match, we believe its use it entirely justified.

We apologise for any offence caused, thank you.

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I don’t know, you miss the opening match due to work commitments and what happens? The blog goes to heck in a hand basket in the first week. Our glorious re-entry to this balmy summer’s sporting calendar was temporarily stalled as our Commander in Chief summed up our first weeks match with the expression “well nothing happened worth writing about”.

Nothing happened! Nothing happened!! I miss the match, and we give up two frames yet still manage to run out 10-2 winners and nothing happened?

Call it laziness, call it shoddy journalism, call it Mr Vain, call it Mr wrong, call it insane, I know what I want and I want it now,…wait a minute, who sung that?

Anyway after another week of “where’s the report”, “who’s doing the report” and “why aren’t you doing the report now” we decided that we owed it to our many fans around the globe to bring out something special this week.

Ladies and Gents, hold onto your chalk…

IT’S RACKSPACK TV !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Forget Pay-Per-View, 3D, HD and even VD, if you want to catch something really interesting then the only ticket this summer is the one that get you into RacksPack TV. Yes, that’s right – thank to the power of the interweb, a cheap web cam and a laptop your weekly dose of RacksPack flair will be coming to a living room (or in Andy and Rays case, a bedroom) near you. From now on (or until Kev and I get bored or fed up of wasting time on it), we will be recording the best and worst moments from the Monday night Pack-fest for your viewing pleasure and, assuming that we are not still under threat of libel action from the old Hitler video from last summer, we should be able to post up the fruits of our labours on You Tube.

Let’s not forget that we are going to be playing at North Maidenhead Cricket Club this season. Personally I’ve never been a fan of cricket. I can’t think of many things more tedious and boring than being sat down for hours on end watching a bunch of uncoordinated 30-somethings wildly swinging a piece of wood around trying to hit a few balls in between drinks.

Ahem.

Anyway onto this weeks match…

Week Two match report – home versus Golden Crooked Cross Billet “B”
(Filmed in glorious Rackspack-o-vision!)

Our first home match of the season, a roll-over in the Showboat (no one had taken it out in the opening match), a web-cam, a laptop, the best table in the league and no Brad in sight – yep, things were looking good as I made the half a mile trip from the entrance to North Maidenhead Cricket Club to the front door of North Maidenhead Cricket Club.

Kev had made the draw to see who would have first crack at the £12 Showboat jackpot, and organised the football card which was paid up by the teams and won by Dave the landlord! With John Shiel and Brad on holiday it was Kev, Keith, Neil, Rob, Pat and JY thrust into the thick of the action.

First into the action was Rob Walsh who went from looking in trouble to showing just why we have brought in this flair maestro with an outstanding double on the black all now captured by our web cam 1-0

Regrettably I’d forgotten to bring the battery pack for the laptop, so after capturing the glorious opening frame the laptop was on borrowed time. Pat was up second, and in all honesty this was the last bit of news it needed. In fairness to the laptop by the time his frame finished we were all drained ourselves as “The Fudge” ground out the win.

Some fudge yesterday

 At one point the lights kept dimming on and off as the laptop desperately tried to suck up as much electricity as it could to stay alive through the frame. Finally we hummed “Abide with me” and it died on the coffee table. 2-0



The seasonal debut of The Wonder Walls ended in victory before speeding off to get the charger, with Coach Southam pointing out that “apart from giving up two frames in week one due to the lack of Walls” we hadn’t lost a frame! 3-0


Wins for Coach Southam and Neil quickly followed, and our 100% record was intact at 5-0.

Step forward John Young who powered home the black a few balls too early and wiped that out in no time. 5-1 at the break, and cue the best clearance of the night as Neil took out the five sausages on his plate in double-quick time.

With the match all but in the bag attention now turned to the £18 Showboat, and trying to look good on RacksPack TV. JY had a half chance to bag the contents of Justina, the Showboat piggy bank, but managed to claim Pointless Flair Shot of the Week with a textbook double on the black. It was clearly no consolation though as he ambled over to the table, head down, shoulders sagging, a tear in his eye. We were witnessing the onset of an unfortunate and terrifying new medical condition…PSD – Post Showboat Depression. The symptoms are easy to spot. First you blow your chance at the pot and know that you don’t have any more tries until next week. Second, you sit for 5 minutes watching the next frame willing the opposing player on to stop the next person from getting it. Finally you take your cue and clear off home because you cant be bothered to watch any more pool now that your showboat hopes are dashed for another week. PSD – its sweeping through our team like wildfire. JY was out the door in a shot having potted two blacks and only one win. 6-1

Our interest was rekindled when “Magic” Cameron stepped up with what looked like a real “hope of the boat”.  We had debated whether breaking is really the best way to win it as you only get one visit to grab the cash. Is it better to have your opponent break, take a few out and leave you with a clearer table? This was certainly the case as Tony Baxter broke, potted a few and then left Neil with the big chance that he craved…..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yimosvV0AOM

We won the last few frames and Rob managed to double yet another black for two wins on the night and two doubles to go with it. If I was smart enough I would think of a clever phrase for doing just that but its 3.15 in the morning so I can’t.

So the match was wrapped up at 11-1 and the only frames we have lost in two weeks are two forfeits and JY's unfortunate black. I’m telling you this is our year!!!

Next Monday we are away to the Anchor, and it could be a tricky week for the Showboat on that table but no doubt Brad will be there by 4.30 in the afternoon sneaking in as much practise as possible. The Most Hated Man in Pool makes his seasonal debut (along with John “Hokey Cokey” Shiel) and everything’s primed for one his horrible moments. The Anchor’s only round the corner from the Honeypot so expect John Shiel to be there by Sunday night.

We’ll leave you in the capable hands of RacksPack TV as we present our shots of the week..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ySk9wILoVHM

Season Preview - Episode Five - The Empire Strikes Pack

When Reality Bites !!

I was at a family wedding in Northern Ireland recently. As Mrs Wonder and I sauntered into the reception to begin a 10 hour session of singing and binge drinking I caught up with a few relatives and friends that I hadn’t seen for a while. At the back of the bar was a pool table and after I was caught glancing at it my cousin piped up with “are you still playing”.  

“Yep, when I can.”

“Do you still have that summer team with the dopey blog?”

“Yes and it’s still going strong!”

“Cool, do you remember I was over when you were writing the first one, I think I was about 5 months pregnant?”

“Yeah, how is the kid by the way?”

“Doing great, just finished the first year at school.”

“SCHOOL??”

And then it hit me like hammer – WE’VE BEEN DOING THIS GUFF FOR FIVE YEARS AND WE STILL HAVENT WON IT!!!!!!

RACKSPACK V – The Empire Strikes Pack

This time it’s personal, and we’re starting to need Roman numerals to count it up!

Brief recap - yet another glorious failure last year saw us plummet new depths with a 7-6 loss in the semi final to the eventual winners Heinz 57. What followed was our first youtube entry with the Hitler parody, followed by me receiving an email threatening a lawsuit over the video and some other copyright infringements and the banning of the said video. At the end of four months of Showboats, piss taking and slating our own players (plus most of the opposition) we had zip, nada, zilch. We had even lost our home as The Bear closed down not long afterwards. Trophy-less and homeless, the men of Rackspack were entering some dark times as Winter drew in.

It was a time for men to be men, and women to be men (more on that later) so we regrouped (again), did a bit of counselling (mostly in Smokey’s) and vowed that, by God we will win this damn tin pot league even if it takes us the rest of our lives to do it!

With the Bear closed down we needed a new home. The tender process had began in late January with many of Maidenhead‘s finest establishments fighting for the right to have the Rackspack call their venue “home”. After much deliberation North Maidenhead Cricket Club (NMCC) won the juicy contract and we recently signed on the dotted line. The clincher was the fact that they have the best pool table in the league and, as you all know, we have the best players in the league, so it’s surely a marriage made in heaven. The Showboat challenge is back and we expect the records to tumble this season on a table where even the Wonder Walls would be hard-pressed to come up dry on the break.

Last week was the Rackspack AGM. Messrs Walls & Southam were locked in talks for five gruelling hours in front of the Rackspack shareholders and board, but at the end of it had managed to come up with a foolproof plan on how we are going to win this thing.

The strategy of previous years has varied from the incompetent to the non-existent. First up we played in Racks, feeling that the practise tables would put us in better shape than most teams – we failed. Next we hand-picked eight players that were the best in the league – plus John Shiel – but we failed again. Season three saw us going into the season with the bare minimum of six and scrape help when we needed it. This meant that the six were guaranteed to play two frames in the knockout stages and wouldn’t have the incredible burden on their backs of playing for their place – we failed.

So what is our strategy this time around? It’s controversial, but I think you’ll like it. Basically we’ve signed up anyone we can find who can hold a cue because at least that stops them playing elsewhere.

So into the maelstrom of Rackspack pool talent comes Rob “White” Walsh and Pat “The Fudger” Phelan. These two players are the finest of additions, both having honed and toned their cue actions over years of hard graft over the green baize. Add these two to the existing Rackspack roster of Keith “The Wonder” Walls, Kevin “Slugger” Southam, Brad “The Bear” Robinson, John “Houdini” Young, Neil “Magic” Cameron and Maltese John Shiel, and for the first time in five years we have squad capable of winning this damn thing. By the beard of Zeus, how can we possibly blow it this summer?

Common Sense

Hats off to the Maidenhead League committee who continue, in my estimation, to exercise a common sense not often seen in a pool organisation. Having delayed the summer league because of the World Cup they have shortened it to six groups of four. This leaves us with only 6 matches to try and qualify, with the six group winners plus best two runners up making the quarter final line up. I like this very much, It’s a sprint and you can’t afford to mess up and I think it will give ‘lesser’ teams a real chance of an upset.

Mailbox

As Kev and I opened the doors to Rackspack towers this week there was 8 months of mail on the doormat. It was all firebombs, lawsuits, Anthrax envelopes and copies of readers digest, but in amongst the manure a few flowers had grown.

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Dear Rackspack…

So here we are again, five years on and we’re still waiting. As a Rackspack fan I want to see you win the title! Every year my hopes are raised and every year they are dashed. You guys are like my brothers 1978 Ford Capri. The group stages are like the test drive – it ran smoothly with just a few blips here and there but it looked so good. The guy selling it mentioned that there could be a problem but my bro didn’t care – this Capri seemed to be perfection and it looked beautiful. But every season the knockout stages are like when the deal is done and we drove it home. We would end up broke down on the hard shoulder with a wheel rolling off into the distance across the motorway into oncoming traffic and making us both realise one horrible thing – we’ve been suckered. Suckered by lots of blinky flashing lights and sex appeal that blinded us from the whopping problems that really were there all the time.

What can you say to assure me and the thousands like me that this isn’t going to happen this year?

Dai Hard, Rackspack Fan Club, Welsh Division.
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Dear Rackspack…

Have you noticed that in four years of pool you have only ever played in two venues and both of them closed down? Racks – liquidated, The Bear – sold. Are North Maidenhead Cricket Club aware of this ?

Anon.

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Dear Rackspack…

I read back over your old blog entries and found the one about the Tranny bar. I was on a stag-do last week and we ended up in the exact same bar! After telling the rest of the stag posse that “The Racks boys have been here” me and my mate Ray drunkenly stumbled in for a laugh. For future reference if any of your legion of fans end up there too, can you advise them not to say any of the following :

“Bottoms Up”

“Toss you for the next round”

“Excuse me , can I push your stool in”

Is dat u no.

Andy Brant.
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So it’s the first league game this week, and we’re away to the Rose – we are ready but are they?