We knew today was always going to be difficult. It didn’t help that we couldn’t get the basics right and consistently took the wrong option. Instead of keeping it simple and following instructions we seemed to go left when we should have gone right and right when we should have gone left. My co pilot and navigator was having a nightmare but eventually we managed to find the ground.

As the team began to arrive in dribs and drabs a few players appeared to be missing and the question was raised whether we had a quorate to administer our obligations. After a few seconds thought everyone just nodded with complete incomprehension. As we made our way to the pitch it suddenly dawned on us that one of our key squad members was missing. The hot dog lady. Frantic phone calling and texting proved fruitless. Rumours began to circulate around the ground that she lay at home, slumped in a chair, after an all night bender. Surely not. Not on the eve of such an important cup game. Fortunately all rumours proved unfounded (possibly) and hdl arrived a minute before kick off.

With Euxton riding high in third place of the South Division and Red Rose currently languishing second from bottom we thought we might sneak this one. League tables can be so misleading early on in the season. Euxton kicked off and dominated the first 23 seconds with some good work from Liam. 60 minutes later the ref blew the final whistle. Unfortunately it was not a case of our cup runneth over but more like our cup run was over.

Red Rose are a quality side and they must be applauded for their performance today. Their workrate and determination never fell short of 100% throughout the whole game. It is a shame that their high standard on the pitch was not matched off it with their coach finding it necessary to intimidate and undermine match officials throughout the game. This obviously rattled the ref in the second half with decisions going in favour of an already out of sight Red Rose.

It was a decent performance today against the onslaught of an inform Red Rose. We are back there in a couple of weeks so lets see if we can match their work rate and get a better result in the league.

Man of the Match     Kurt