The Berkeley Bandits have stolen a two nil victory against the Kincumber Crooks in a dour struggle between the O/45 competition bad-boys. Both teams went into the match as confirmed cheats after failing to challenge rulings from Central Coast Football that each had played player/s contrary to the very poorly written CCF player qualification rules.
The opening 20 minutes of the match, played on the postage stamp like Kurraba Field, was owned by the Crooks with the Bandits at sixes and sevens in defence as the Crooks’ midfield and front line attacked the Bandits’ goal at will. During this period the Crooks had numerous chances to score and should have converted at least two goals. Team speedster ‘Baby Face Nelson’
continually found space, and when the ball fell comfortably to his right foot he
looked very dangerous. Several times Baby Face found himself one on one with the keeper but, seemingly lacking the killer instinct for which he is famous, failed to finish. The Crooks best chance in the first half came when Baby Face pushed a shot just wide of the right hand post. The miss was bad enough but the spindly ‘Jesse James’, who was parked on the right post, could not complete the simple tap-in for a goal. Jesse James has never missed such an easy target!
Shortly after the near miss the Bandits went ahead 1-0 after some deft headwork from ‘Hannibal Lector’ which saw him squirt the ball past ‘Fat Tony' for an own goal. Lector, always looking for the positives, reminded those that play up front that goals can be scored from the head! He then added if they had a problem with it he would eat them.
The Bandits were up 1-0 but not out of gaol. The Crooks continued to press hard for a death blow. Midfield sensation ‘Billy the Kid’ was combining well in attack with coach ‘Manson’ and
new eyes ‘Al Capone’ to continually put Baby Face, Jesse James and Jack the Ripper in strong attacking positions. The Crooks went to the half time break down 1-0 but deeply in the contest. One over-sized Bandit was lucky to survive alive after an altercation with Manson.
The second half saw the Crooks continue to push for the equalizer. Jack the Ripper swooped onto a great ball from Captain ‘Kelly’ down the
left flank to snap a super shot on goal. The shot looked in for all money! It missed. Later Jack was to hit the crossbar with another sensational strike.
The Crooks defence, as usual, looked impregnable (unless we score against ourselves). ‘Dr Evil’ had another strong match. The bald evil doers ability to turn with the ball on a two cent piece, obviously a hangover from his hockey days, quickly turned defence into attack.
His combination with Lector and his fellow backs the drunk Russian ‘Rasputin’, the angry ‘Ted Bundy’, the cunning ‘Lee Harvey Oswald’ and the legendary ‘Robin Hood’ withstood just about anything the Bandits tried in attack. Robin Hood, the Beckham of his time, was inspirational at full-back. (Note Robin Hood played by Errol Flynn!)
The Bandits’ second goal came from no where! An aging gray Bandit, thinking he was Billy the Kid, struck a goal from 30m out. The ball went like a bullet to the top left of the goal just wide of the outstretched Fat Tony.
All in all, for a bunch of crooks, the team played reasonably well. As mentioned earlier the game was played on an oval the size of a postage stamp and was, for the most part, a ‘shotathon’. The Crooks will relish the opportunity to get back onto a larger field next week against
The Cavemen and the Superstars.
According to the sidelined Crook ‘Sitting Bull’ the players to stand out were Jack the Ripper, Ned Kelly, Dr Evil, Fat Tony and Hannibal Lector.
Robin Hood
