March 15, 2015
I decided to wait for the three-quarter mark of the season to update the story this time. I'm discovering that finding the right combination of playing the game and writing about it will be important, so I don't tire of either activity. As long as Zoe is having as much fun as she is right now, that shouldn't be a problem.
The new year began with some very good news for Simon Ross's future. The board, viewing my job status as Untouchable, offered to extend my contract for another year. Zoe and I decided to accept the offer, and we're signed with Little Common through June 2016.
Several of our current players will be, too. Over the past two months, the media have been calling to our attention the fact that different players' contracts would be expiring. We took that to mean they might be interested in staying, so if we decided we'd like that to happen, we brought them in for contract talks. Eight Commoners--all the regular starters except Joe Mellings, Jack Ross, and Liam Cockerill--are on board for another season, with pay raises that will kick in when this season ends. I'm thinking we'll re-sign the three other guys, too. Breaking up a side that's playing so well doesn't seem like a wise decision to me.
We are noticing teams starting to play differently against us now. St. Leonard's, for example, opened with two defensive midfielders in front of their back four. No wonder we had 61% of the ball, as they basically let us pass it around, looking for openings. Okay Oniah, in particular, found them. He completed his brace by finishing off a beautiful team move begun by our goalkeeper...debutant Aron Boardman!
Joe Mellings was ready to come back into the side for the trip to Saltdean, and now we have Aaron Dunn, whose potential almost demands he be given opportunities to develop. So the moments of glory for Aron Boardman may be fewer and farther between from now on. Whatever happens, though, he'll still have that January night against St. Leonard's, when he walked off the field with a clean sheet in hand, hearing the crowd sing his name.
The Saltdean match was exhilirating and frustrating in turns. Michael Hassini, who is lethal on set pieces, scored his fourth goal of the season. With a 2-1 advantage and with Saltdean going a man down, we thought we had three points safely in hand...but we tossed two of them away when we let them score off a corner in stoppage time.
We lost more than two points that day. Troy Ferguson pulled a hamstring, leaving a big hole in the middle of our formation. Troy's injury gave us a chance to appease the one player in the team who has been complaining about his playing time.
Dean Frett is a backup. He knows he is a backup. Alone among the lads we brought in to provide depth, he has pouted when he didn't get to start matches. Maybe he believes that since he is the club's vice captain, he should play more. At any rate, Dean got a run of four games in the first team, and that's calmed him down a bit.
He played well in our victory over a tough Oakwood side, which featured Aaron Lacy's first goal in a Little Common shirt. He lashed a Jack Ross cross across the face of goal like a boss. Wick went down next, after two early scores drew the life out of a big crowd at Crabtree Park who were howling for our scalps. Now we'd gone seven matches without a loss, and widened our lead to seven points over a resurgent Steyning Town.
Still, the Commoners find ways to frustrate us, even as they sit top of the league. The Westfield game provided ample proof of this.
Dean Frett responded to his opportunity to start the match by picking up two yellow cards and a dismissal within a six-minute span, late in the first half. Following his example, Dean's teammates accumulated five more bookings, reestablishing their reputation as the league's bad boys. (Our 37 yellow cards are seven more than any other team in the league, and half the clubs have fewer than half that many through 23 matches).
For a while, it looked like the slight advantage we'd gained with an early goal might hold up. But when three of a team's defenders are on yellow cards and the team is already a man short, they can't tackle boldly when opponents bear down on their goal. That's a big reason why Westfield were able to equalize in the 82nd minute.
Left back Nat Hubert, the one back liner without a yellow card, vowed he would not let something like that happen again. He went in hard against a Westfield forward...inside the penalty area...and the referee pointed to the spot.
Michael Hassini, furious, would not stop running his mouth. The referee showed him another yellow card, a routine with which Michael is all too familiar. Naturally, Westfield converted the penalty.
Simon Ross laid into the team after the game. Zoe weighed in, too. "Who is the referee? He's a putz," she declared with the absolute certainty of a child.
It turns out the ref was Mr. Irvine Woodward. A perusal of the referee stats revealed that Mr. Woodward had taken the whistle for four Division Two matches this season, in which he produced a total of 22 yellow cards--more than any other official has shown, in about half as many games as our usual refs have called. I will, from now on, check to make sure Mr. Woodward has been assigned to our matches and, if so, I will instruct the Commoners to refrain from tackling with such gusto.
Our winless skein now snapped, we returned to the pitch a week later for the Rustington match, which I'll describe in a post all its own.
The last two matches we've played are primarily interesting in that our victories gave us a bit of revenge against sides who either beat us (Storrington) or drew with us (AFC Uckfield) the first time we faced them.
We are nine points clear now, with seven games remaining. Let's close it out, lads!
Up the Common!