Lock, Stock & A Smoking Gun

Burton Khalsa   0   FC Sunnyhill   9

Midlands Regional Alliance – Division Two

“Could everyone please stop getting shot?”

A classic line from Guy Ritchie’s ‘Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels’, and while not a laughing matter or indeed something to take lightly, I just want to say….

“Could everyone please stop catching Covid?”

I know, it’s not that simple, and no, of course people don’t have a choice about whether they get shot or indeed catch Trumpy’s ‘China Virus’, but it hasn’t half proving to be bloody problematic!

It’s been a funny few days, clearly the problem is escalating by the day, the government is coming under increasing pressure and with leaked press reports that a national lockdown is imminent, I suspect football is about to grind to a sudden halt.

In terms of Saturday’s games, we had the usual plethora of Covid cancellations, then add in of course the fixture changes due to clubs being in Tier Three, and the spectator restrictions that go with that and you suddenly found the list shrinking.

Oh, and of course it decided to piss it down, so as the morning wore on we saw postponements hitting the airwaves.

I had a plan though, and it was simple enough. Burton Khalsa were due to be at home with a 2pm kick off, and with neither them or the away team putting anything out on social media I took the view to simply have a wander down and see what was happening. If it was off, then I had a 3pm kick off on plastic at Cannock United, which incidentally happened to be where Socially Distanced Steve headed to after initially arriving at a game in Mansfield only to find nothing doing.

Burton Khalsa are a new name in the Midlands Regional Alliance this season, but, my sources tell me that they are the club formerly known as Real Medina who were also in the MRA last time around.

When I say last time around, Medina played at Shobnall Sports & Social Club on Shobnall Road, a ground where I saw Stretton Eagles play a few years ago, but to be fair, I’d seen Medina play at both Eton Park Recreation Ground and Hillfield Playing Fields previously. So, I incorrectly assumed I’d seen football on every available piece of grass in Burton Upon Trent, but apparently not!

It seems there is a football pitch on St Luke’s Recreation Ground, in Horninglow, which is on the West side of the A38, and it’s at that venue where Khalsa have pitched up for the current campaign. Now to be fair, despite the fact that it was slinging it down, I was quietly confident the game would be on, only because SDS went earlier in the season on an equally wet day and said the pitch was superb in terms of drainage, but, the proof would be in the pudding!

As I drove down towards Little Eaton and on to Markeaton I did think to myself that the game would be off, the rain was torrential, monsoon like, lakes were forming on the road and herons were circling looking for fishes in the puddles. But, weirdly, as I got down towards the A50 it changed beyond recognition, we had blue skies and sunshine. Just as I was approaching the entrance to the car park, with the entrance on my left, I was forced to stop as a cavalcade of cars came the other way, it was the players of FC Sunnyhill in convoy. They hadn’t quite got a police escort, but nothing was stopping them getting the last few parking spaces, so I sat back and waved them in!

We had a game then, no need to head to Cannock!

The football pitch sits at the top end of the recreation ground, at the summit of a slight slope so you can see why it drains so well. It is quite a large space as well, while to the side of it is the De Ferrers Academy, which back in my day was probably called a school.

So, with two sets of players and a referee in place, we got on our way, with visiting FC Sunnyhill from Derby also a new side in the league this season, and for that matter a side that was doing better in the table after half a dozen games.

To be honest, the game was as one sided as you’ll see. Sunnyhill took an early lead after about a minute and I’ve got to be truthful, it was pretty much one way traffic for the rest of the game. They went in 5-0 up at the break, and by now the Khalsa players were falling out with each other at regular intervals.

We got to 9-0 with around ten minutes to go and I was confident we’d see double figures, but it wasn’t to be, despite two disallowed goals that would have made the difference. Sometimes the club linesman and his offside flag can be all you need to keep the goal difference down!

Sunnyhill to be fair looked a decent side and they’d got some good players, whereas Khalsa looked awful. That said though, they had won their previous two games so they were hardly the whipping boys of the league, but, having lost a game 8-1 as well this season you sense that when it goes wrong, it goes badly wrong.

Boris was due on telly later that night, and while he perhaps wasn’t going to go as far as to ask us all to stop catching Covid, he was highly likely to ask us to stop going out. Fair enough Boris, you’re probably right, but maybe just let us have a couple more games before we try to save Christmas?