Preditah

In a week when puffed up pompous popinjay Boris Johnson called London Mayor Sadiq Khan a "puffed up pompous popinjay". It appears nothing is out of bounds in terms of verbiage or dignity. Flipping newspaper pages I naively scrounge for good news and chance upon a story about the Cityscape Complex in Croydon. The freehold owned by a family trust set up by multi-millionaire property mogul Vincent Tchenguiz. Proxima GR Properties insists that the 93 leaseholders should cough up £ 31'300 to remove the dangerous cladding identical to that found at Grenfell. Cladding he or his minions installed or agreed to install I believe. To reassure petrified pensioners and residents, Fire Wardens regularly patrol the area to the tune of £ 4000. This further cost presented to actual leaseholders this week.

I turn the page quickly. Ah what's this - ex Manchester United player (Not promising) Richard Eckersley has set up a "zero waste" store in Devon. Nice! Mr Eckersley has apparently helped other globally conscious folk as far off as Wales, Bristol and Birmingham. How so? By the avoidance of plastic use and hi-lighting this global issue to make it become a local issue. Now that's a community of the spirit!

Moving on, Cyrille Regis sadly passed to the other side and I am sure anyone who enjoyed watching him play would have appreciated his courageousness in light of the difficult times in which he no doubt endured. The vast majority of good decent folk who would have routed for Norwich earlier this week, would have witnessed the impact Cyrille's loss had on Dion Dublin.

A rare thing in Football or even television punditry these days, we witness Dublin struggle to contain genuine emotion when explaining the understandable influence that Cyrille represented. Awkwardly Linekar squirmed in his chair whilst Shearer did his best to subtly comfort Dublin. A visibly aged Gianfranco Zola on the other hand looked jaded and bamboozled and seemingly had no means of a response when the camera eventually managed to get him in shot. Initially Zola was said to be grateful that the BBC had got rid of the large coffee table that he himself struggled to see over. Now however under the studio spotlight and perched upon an Umpire's Chair seemingly lifted from Wimbledon Lawn Tennis Club, Zola found himself terribly terribly exposed.

Exposed is how we all felt today. Sleet and snow bit into pores as we stood together, more a collective colony of penguins than an ardent winning machine hell bent on doing well. So at home at Kingsfield against AFC Ewell the under 13 boys took out the carving knives to get stuck into a mud pie.

Encouraging early stages found the Knights displaying decent passing football and no real sign of complacency. The new strike partnership of Ben & Seb harangued and harassed as the midfield set about setting the early pace. Needless to say despite relative dominance it was AFC Ewell who finished the half 1 up as we just simply could not defend a relatively straightforward ball into the 6rd box.

Resilience is an asset that has been honed into this delightful set of boys. Freezing and slightly down, the team were not in the mood to be denied to easily. It took some considerable minutes but when Ben Roohan whacked one in the momentum was with us. The midfield quarter slugged away as best as possible in the conditions and continued to frustrate the physical lads of Ewell. If Arvin didn’t win it, it was invariable that Owen did. Both distributed well all things considered. The defence were kept occupied, more by the conditions than anything else however Michael in particular shone out with his steady eye and even better distribution.

We continued to use the ball well, if not always wisely! Football was attempted to be played more in the middle and that was increasingly become impossible. Eventually the deadlock was broken after Max Adams chased the ball down and cement a narrow home victory against an upstanding team.

Notable mention to Joel Cumberbatch who I thought had an excellent game in testy conditions! Big Hands for a largely unnoticed but crucial one handed save during the 2nd half.

Goals: Ben Roohan 1 & Max Adams 1

MOTM: Michael Burton – truly excellent decision making at left back.

Song: Jorja Smith X Preditah - On My Mind from 2017 enjoy!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA5uuBCtZ5k