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1st XI v FC BROMONT LAMOTHE 12th DECEMBER 2009
While we were waiting for the match against Bromont to start I was musing to myself that I hadn't seen Christophe Larue since the Cebazat match a few weeks ago. He's quite a speedy forward with some good ball control and a quick eye for goal, and we spent a pleasant couple of hours together in the summer outside the DIV in Riom trying to register our respective vehicles. And who should trot out for the match wearing one of the substitutes' track suits but Christophe himself. That was weird. "Injured" he told me when I enquired.
Early in the game the match is quite nicely poised although Pionsat have had the better share of the play. There hasn't been much noteworthy action yet but I've been keeping my eye on the Bromont goalkeeper. I've noticed that he seems afraid to catch the ball and his response when a ball comes towards him in the air is to punch.
Each to his own at this level of football and it doesn't matter how you keep them out as long as you keep them out, but this is a recipe for disaster if he keeps it up on a cold night like this. I'd be tempted to swamp him with tall attackers at dead-ball situations and see what happens to his punches then.
One of the early pieces of action was a horrible collision of heads between Thomas and one of the Bromont defenders. It's a dreadful moment and they are both badly hurt. Thomas struggles to his feet and manages to walk four or five paces - and collapses again. This doesn't look very good and I'll be surprised if Thomas continues.
It reminds me of the one and only Jim Lambie - a legend in his own lifetime and for quite a while manager of those giants of Scottish football ... errrr ... Partick Thistle. One of his players was badly concussed in a collision and the sponge man was helping him to the sidelines - in the days before substitutions were allowed.
"Why are you taking him off?" roared our Jim
"He's concussed" replied the sponge man. "He doesn't know who he is".
"Well tell him he's Pele and get him back on!"
And we have another bit of excitement as one of the Pionsat players, in what would be Bromont's inside right position (so we aren't so far outside the Pionsat penalty area), slips and loses the ball. One of the Bromont forwards picks up the ball and bursts through the Pionsat defence and fires across the goal towards the far corner of the net.
François puts in a despairing dive and manages to get a fingertip to the ball and push it out for a corner. Pionsat breathed a sigh of relief there, I can tell you.
And then Pionsat concede a goal. They all stand around waiting for the offside flag that never came and the Bromont attacker duly runs on goal and blasts in at short range. François manages to get something to the shot and block it but he's totally helpless for the rebound which falls nicely to the Bromont player.
This leads to all kinds of disputes and some of the Pionsat players give ironic applause to the Linesman. I can't say anything about the decision as I'm up the other end of the field but I will say something about the incident in general and regular readers of my pages will have read it on many many occasions.
And that is that playing the offside trap at this level of football is fraught with danger. You are relying on
1...perfect timing and coordination of your defence
2...an attack being somewhat slower than your defence
3...a linesman up with play
4...a linesman who fully understands the offside rule
5...a linesman who is absolutely and totally uninterested in the outcome of the match
6...an eagle-eyed referee
And the chances of getting all of that at the same time in the same match at this level is about zero.
From what I've seen in matches since I've become an avid follower of French village football it's the offside rule that is the most contentious and having studied in depth the offside rule (I wish I had something better to do) I'm not surprised. Players should really learn from these countless failures of the offide trap, pack in the dependence upon it and concentrate on proper defending.
There's another unusual incident in this match. The Bromont bench has been notably voiciferous all throughout the match and the referee has been over there on a couple of occasions to tell them to belt up. But now he's clearly had enough and he's gone over to them and it seems that he has sent a couple of the benchers to the stands.
I went up to the referee to ask him about this afterwards. Apparently only those people named on the team sheet (players, substitutes and named officials) have the right to sit on the bench. They had about 20 people in the technical area, so he simply cleared out all of the extraneous people, with the threat that the next time he had cause to speak to the bench everyone else would follow.
There's a really bad incident right by the stand just now. Two players go for a 50-50 ball that is about waist-high. The Pionsat defender jumps for it while the Bromont player swings a leg. The Bromont player is a microsecond late and misses the ball, and instead he scythes down the Pionsat defender with something of a crunch.
It looks pretty horrible from here but I'm sure that there was no malicious intent on the Bromont player's part. It was in my opinion an "overenthusiastic tackle". But the Pionsat player is carried from the field none-the-less.
The referee calls the Bromont player over to him - for a little chat I thought at first, but instead reaches for a card, which I think is probably a little severe.
And much to my surprise, and probably the other neutral supporters it's a red one. The referee is clearly of the opinion that it isn't "dangerous play" but "violent conduct" (according to the Disciplinary Committee publications a week later it is "serious foul play") and sends the Bromont player to the dressing room.
I'm not the only one who is surprised by that and some of the Bromont players go up to the referee and express their discontent in extravagant tones. Not that it will of course and I don't know why players think they will be able to do anything about it.
And for no reason at all we have something of a general scuffle breaking out. There is really no need for any of this. They ought to put something in tha half-time cuppa to calm everyone down and we can get on with the game.
So eventually the game restarts and Pionsat go onto the attack. And they need to. They are one goal down and playing against 10 men, they can't let an opportunity like this slip by.
One of the Pionsat players bursts into the penalty area with the ball and gets into a good shooting position but while everyone (including me) expects the shot he tries for perfection and wants the extra touch. Of course he loses the ball and Bromont clear upfield.
At this level of football you will be lucky to find a Dago Madonna and the order of the day has to be first-time shots especially when you have some shaky goalkeepers.
And now it's Cedric's turn to be shown a card, but this time its a yellow one. -It's for a foul on the Bromont no5 just inside the left-hand corner of the penalty area.
It was a foul, no question about that, and the referee was quite right to award it. But the defender made a dreadful meal of it. If I had been refereeing, then forget the yellow card - I would have awarded the defender an Oscar. He did everything except cry for his mummy. It really was quite shameful.
It's not long before Pionsat make their one-man advantage count (although you never can be sure with Pionsat) and they equalise at long last. There can't be many minutes remaining in the game.
It stems from a nice move down the inside-left position. Cedric and one of the other players combine really well with some nice play to get the ball into the area, and finally Cedric gets in a shot that curls round the defenders and heads for the far corner of the net with "goal" written all over it.
The keeper launches himself across the goal in quite a spectacular dive and just about manages to get a hand to the ball.
But he can only just push it onto the post and the Pionsat no7 is the quickest to react. He slides in on the greasy turf, stretches out a toe to to the loose ball and pokes it home.
This was excellent play and proves my point about following up in the attack and putting pressure on the defenders.
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