Last Updated: Saturday, 1 April 2006

Coveside 7 - 3 Lupo
Report Details:
Date: 11 Sep 2006
Reporter: TP
Location: Inter Rivers

The warm sunshine of a perfect early fall day greeted C-siders as we arrived at Inter River Park to start a new season of North Shore over 30’s soccer. The new season has seen some upheaval in the NSCL. It is now split into two divisions (Division one and Division not-as-good-as-division-one). Former league champs Peg and their manager CSI-Vancouver have moved on to try their luck in the West Coast over 35 league, so Coach Ward has been cautiously optimistic that his Coveside squad can mount a serious challenge for the title.

As we prepared for the kickoff, we thought nostalgically of the now dearly departed Ed and Craig. Ed has decided that the fast-moving business of growing plants required more of his time, and Craig has moved to somewhere near Spuzzum. We welcomed new signings P.K. and Fergie, who joined summer signings J.C. and Roddy in a strengthened squad that has an increasing number of players with names or nicknames that are either (a) composed of initials or (b) rhyme with budgie.

A number of C-siders returned from having a summer off, including Cam (kept trying to “come back too fast” from his wrist injury), Al (just finished singing backup on new Stones album), Randy A (busy writing his autobiography, entitled “Randy is Dandy”, and Randy J (busy writing his autobiography, entitled “Randy is Randy”).

The extensive pre-season preparation (two practices, one exhibition game, a bikini wax for Gino, and a bottle of rum for Harp) had us in fantastic shape for our opening game against Lupo. For those of us who had not yet played a game at Inter River, Bernie thoughtfully provided a map of the field from Google Earth, which was a big help if you were trying to find the park from 5,000 feet up.

Those who were earth-bound and made it to the game witnessed a starting lineup of Cloudy in goal, some guys on defense, some more guys in the middle, and a couple more up front (sorry, but even match reporters need a game or two to hit their stride). And although we struggled somewhat with the unusual long green substance that covered the field (someone told me it is called “grass”) we took the play to Lupo immediately.

A couple of good chances came our way before a Gino through ball freed JC, who tucked home the first goal of the season to put us up 1-0. We were dominating and more goals seemed on the cards, but the next marker came against the run of play: after Randy J pulled a groin muscle (we think it was his own) he lacked his usual blazing speed, and a Lupoman chugged past him and finished well past Cloudy (who cut down the angle well, unfortunately it was the angle to the far post). Lupo’s first shot of the game tied the scores at 1-1.

We quickly took the game back to Lupo and soon went ahead 2-1. Amar showed cat-like quickness (did you know the sloth was part of the cat family?) to pounce on a loose ball in the area and hammer the ball past the keeper. Shortly after that Gino played setup man again, this time putting a cross in to Fergie, who snuck in to open his Coveside account with a solid header. 3-1 Coveside. Fergie continued his strong offensive play shortly after with a clever back heeled flick to Cam (I think it was Cam—with so many goals it’s hard to remember who scored when), who put us up 4-1 with a tidy finish. The chances were now coming fast and furious. Brad was put clean through and opted for placement over power. This was a mistake as he has great power but no skill at placement. Gino was “unlucky” when a ball dropped to him 12 yards out and a strange, incredibly powerful gust of wind, gravitational shift, or magnetic field anomaly caused the ball to fly over the net.

Although the game was clearly not going to be a close contest, the tackles were flying in the middle of the park and things got heated at times. Brad had a fascinating bit of repartee with Lupo’s 280-pound offensive-lineman-looking defender. Roddie was his usual quiet self, speaking only when spoken too. For example, he very politely said “Excuse Me” when dispossessing a Lupoite who had temporarily placed himself between Rod and the ball. It is beyond me why opponents get angry at Rod: he’s such an erudite, well-mannered teammate.

With our dominance it was only a matter of time until more goals came, and when Mike found himself one-on-one with the keeper he calmly slotted home to make it 5-1. Bernie was concerned about the score getting out of hand, so he did the only thing he could think of to make us play a bit worse—he started coaching. The half-time whistle went as we fought to use the width of the field.

Bernie’s half-time talk was outstanding, in the sense that Covesiders who were standing out from the talk by several feet enjoyed it the most. Bernie called for restraint and trying to keep possession rather than going for more goals. Dave Speers restrained himself admirably, waiting nearly 30 seconds into the second half before he tried a long ball through to the forwards. Our defenders, however, were showing much more restraint. Al restrained himself from heading a through ball away a Lupo’s forward, Cloudy restrained himself from making a save, and it was back to 5-2.

And on the topic of restraint, one of Lupo’s forwards should have been put in restraints before he chose to kick Rod while Rod lay on the grass after a tackle. The Lupo player, who unbelievably only received a yellow card, made for a fascinating visual study: he had more furrows in his brow than the stars of “Quest for Fire.” Rod responded soon after in the best way possible: by having a quickie with his opponent’s wife then putting the ball in the back of the net. 6-2 Coveside.

With our forwards continuing to ignore Bernie’s advice to show restraint, we defenders felt obligated to redouble our efforts in that area. Perhaps we overdid it. We restrained ourselves from covering the Lupo forward who had scored the first two goals. He slid the ball past Cloudy (who was also restraining himself once again, apparently with the goal of maintaining his 0.000 save percentage on the day) to make the score 6-3.

Your scribe had a golden opportunity to open his account after a slick passing play with Rob P and Cam, but, remembering Bernie’s desire for restraint, I decided to shoot directly at the Lupo keeper from 2 yards away. My shot deflected directly to Gino who gleefully (and, may I say, showing very little restraint) tucked the ball into the net and took a lap of honor around the field, ending at his Miata where he admired his reflection in the freshly waxed fiberglass door panels. 7-3 was the final score as we got the season off to a winning start.

The beers and laughs in the sunshine were very much enjoyed by the Covesiders and their families (and my thanks to the lovely ladies of the Ward family for their outstanding babysitting. It was also good to see Karim out and we hope he's able to join us for training in the new year.

We’ve got a couple of weeks to go before our next game against Norvan (the Malones game next weekend is postponed) and the next two practices will give us opportunities to shed some rust, raise our fitness a notch or seven, and get our drinking skills back in order. See you all at Ambleside on Wednesday!