Barely in 5-goal Thriller!

Barely Athletic 0 AXA 5

Unfortunately Barely's role was that of straight man continuously slapped around the face by his 'hilarious' master. And frankly it could have been worse. With crowd favourites Tom Pinnell, Andy Lillford and Rich 'the metronome' Jackson all absent, it was always going to be a tough game against a big and composed AXA side. Barely began like this:

Goal: Steve

Defence: Chris, Danny, Phil, Rich B

Midfield: Mike, Jim, Richie, NIck

Attack: Mani, Sam

Subs: Gareth and Eustace.

It was a warm and curiously dry day, though the pitch was heavy with dew after the first cold night of the impending autumn. How Barely must have wished the dawn had never came. But for an hour they were in the game. They began, like almost every match report in the Barely archives surely echoes, on the back foot. AXA had a degree of passing and movement that tactician Richie can only dream of, if indeed he has nothing better to dream about, and they put the Barely defence to work from the word go. However, in the early stages they generally found them impassable on the ground, and turned instead to hitting in crosses at great speed, with mixed successes. Steve was occasionally beaten, but these efforts weren't hitting the target.

Instead the goal came rather freakishly when Rich Batten hit a goal-kick straight at the opposing attacker, who belted the ball in off the underside of Steve's body. It says much about Rich 'The Body' Batten's character that he shrugged off this gaffe and turned another man-of-the-match performance, narrowly seeing off Richie in the voting.

Meanwhile though Barely shoe-horned their way into the game with the odd swift - for them - counter-attack. Jim, put in by The Body, saw a shot smothered by the defence. Sam hit an effort from the edge of the box just past the right-hand post. Richie went narrowly wide of the left-hand. And the break came with Barely 1-0 down and well in the game, if they could keep the AXA attack at arm's length.

Gareth and Eustace both put in busy appearances in the second-half, as did Nick who took up position between the sticks. But between his fine saves AXA hit a second around the hour, and the Barely house of cards collapsed. Man-for-man a few years older than their blue-beshirted counterparts, Barely were going backwards through the gears as time took it's toll and AXA took advantage, breaking again and again as Barely looked for a consolation at the other end. It wasn't to be. Everything was in place - the crisp weather, the tingly sensation of a opening season, the delightful 'thwack' noise a ball makes when you strike it just right - but for Barely, it was merely the silver lining to a very dark cloud.

Credit must go to both teams for playing the game in the right spirit - the fire in Barely's bellies is of the cosy hearth variety and they don't tend to throw tantrums when they lose. But that's now history. Somehow they must shake off this defeat and return in two week's time - nobody appears to be taking next week's cup game as anything more than a convoluted friendly - with a clean slate. Otherwise their long tradition of occupation in the highest Casuals division could be in danger of coming to a dramatic close.