Wednesday, March 14, 2007

Duncan Steps In

As I've been away for a week, the news on the league has not been up-dated. Fortunately Duncan Disorderly the local minority sports writer was on hand to fill the gap.

By the way, an astonishing development - if you look at the Comments on the questions for 6th March (link on right) you will see that our obscure scribblings in this tiny corner of Cheshire were picked up by a scholar in Idaho who gently corrects an answer!!


WHERE DID IT ALL START TO GO RIGHT?!

A report on recent earth-shattering events by Macclesfield Minority Sports reporter Duncan Disorderly

Just when I thought that I had finally extricated myself from the purgatory of reporting the utterly predictable defeats of the Waters Green Wonderers, all hell seems to have broken loose. Following the defeat by the Dolphin I insisted on an interview with my Editor, R Supwards, and insisted on being reassigned from the Macclesfield Quiz League. I told him that I had covered the Wonderers for half the season and my penance had been duly served, and that I never meant to prang his bloody car in the first place. The going had been tough and I had completely lost the will to live.

After gloating a bit he took pity on me and got me off the case. I couldn’t tell you how relieved I was. In the intervening two weeks I covered the quarter-finals of the Macclesfield one-hand freestyle crochet championships and the preliminary rounds at the Pott Shrigley Noughts and Crosses Festival, both of them much more exciting than listening to the Waters Green Team muttering that they were alright really….. keeping a stiff upper lip….the experience was good for them…even enjoying it in a funny kind of way….when all the time they were devastated and making their packets of crisps soggy with their loser’s tears. I say packets of crisps because that’s all that Tracey and Brian will provide for them until they buck their ideas up.

So you can imagine the torment when I was summoned back to the office from a particularly exciting heat of the Upton Priory Shove-halfpenny Fest. “Grab your pen”, cried my frantic Editor, “the Wonderers have turned the corner”. His enthusiasm turned out to be a little premature. It was true that the Wonderers had won – they had beaten the Bath in the Plate (or was it the plate in the bath). I knew the Bath team well – at least the only one of them that turned up. This team used to be the Beehive, one of the Wonderers favourite opposing teams – many a good night spent in combat and all that - but they were so under-strength on the night it wasn’t true. One of the team had only popped into the pub to ask directions to Buxton, and the other was a passing Pork-Scratching salesman. But heigh-ho, a win is a win, and the team left the venue with something I hadn’t seen before – the smiles of winners. I was not convinced that the team had at last turned the corner and I turned up the following week fearing the worst. To save time I had already written the report – how their Plate win had been a complete fluke and they had been crushed by the second best team in the whole League. And then the unthinkable happened. They won! At the end of the match, both teams were reduced to a stunned silence for very different reasons, I had to rip up my notebook, sandwiches and pork pies replaced the bags of crisps, and the look of hope shone in the eyes of the beleaguered Wonderers.

All this, of course, was a slap in the face to Billy Prattlefaggit, who is currently putting together a rival team. He suddenly became a little quieter, particularly about the clandestine offer he had made to Tommo to poach him from the Wonderers. He had offered our rising young star as many Twiglets as he could eat and a guaranteed Saturday Night audience at the Hurdsfield Darby and Joan Club whenever Tommo felt the urge to do his magic tricks. I have heard on the grapevine that the other Waters Green players got wind of this illegal approach and had a meeting with Tommo to discuss the situation. It was made clear to him that if he as much as thought of jumping ship, Wendy would break his pencil, Bob would break his legs, and Nick would show him a magic trick involving a large disappearing cucumber.


Come the next week though, all was well. They were thrashed by the best in the land. They have reverted to type and I am stuck with reporting their antics again.
Still, Mark Watson does a brilliant job of e-mailing fixtures and results, so I am saved the arse-ache of doing all that. Mind you, I still think he should be concentrating on the current crime wave. One of my mates in the Pig and Ball Bearing was telling me about these two youths who were terrorising his neighbourhood. One was drinking battery acid and the other was eating fireworks. The police charged one and let the other off.


Be brave and remember – if you think nobody cares about you, try missing a couple of mortgage payments.

Duncan Disorderley

No comments: