Some weeks the voting for Lemon has us scratching around with things like the skipper setting a ridiculously early arrival time in Peterborough and then being the last to rock up, or Will becoming the latest M3s player to partake in the mystifyingly popular parlour game Is My Head More Solid Than...?, as previously played by Neil when demonstrating that his bonce was not more solid than a hockey stick. Details on what caused Will’s wooziness remain sketchy, but fingers crossed for a speedy recovery.

Thin gruel indeed. However there was something more substantial on offer in the opening half of this game, as Rob positioned himself on the Peterborough goal line to neatly boot away Simon’s goalbound shot. And then there was Joe’s contribution, failing to distinguish the theme of the day by competently putting the ball into the net twice. One vote.

A good start for sure, but the ante was upped substantially after the break. Dan made the first telling contribution. Having already been spoken to by the umps for stick tackling, when Dan committed another he was clearly expecting trouble. And lo, there he was trooping round the outside of the pitch towards the sin-bin chair, explaining to teammates that he had been green carded. This came as news to most, who hadn’t seen a card come out. But it was accepted as true as no-one would voluntarily absent themselves from the game. Would they?

Dan sat there for a few minutes, certainly longer than two, which prompted the following exchange.

South to the Umps: “When can our green carded player come back on?”

Umps to South: “No-one has been carded”

South to sheepish left-back: “You dingbat*!”

Six votes.

* - I paraphrase.

Unchallengeable you say? Not at all. Soon after we were back to eleven, Simon went on a scintillating run. He beat the last two defenders in turn and then lifted a neat reverse stick flick past the onrushing keeper. This was flying nicely high into the net in what would have been a contender for our goal-of-the-season…until Jason decided to ‘make sure’. This involved volleying the ball from about 20cm out, getting a top edge and seeing it lob up over the bar and drop on the roof of the net! Once again we were mentally thumbing Roger’s Profanisaurus for suitable epithets. Four votes.

There was one more entry to this high class competition in the game’s dying stages, after the hosts’ keeper saved the ball directly to Ash. Ash was a yard out from an unguarded corner of the net, the ball on his stick and certain to score…until Rob tackled him! By the time the two South players had worked out who was going to do the honours of knocking the thing home, the keeper had got across his line and closed the gap off. A good effort, but only worth two votes in the face of the other strong contenders.

Oh yeah, and somewhere amongst all the clownishness, we also scored five. Joe got the first when a save by the keeper from his initial shot came straight back to him; the second go messed cleverly with the keeper’s timing (i.e. it was scuffed straight down the middle and the stopper swung too early and missed!). Joe also added the second a couple of minutes later, finishing off at the back post after Ollie had driven to the byline and centred via a couple of small deflections from attacking sticks.

The third was all Jason’s own work, collecting a loose ball in the circle, working space for a reverse stick drive and neatly picking out the exposed near corner of the net. Number four was the best of the day, a sweeping move that began with sweeper Dave inside our own twenty-three, went up the right flank via Jan, Ash and Simon and ended with Ollie’s clean shot having too much power for the goalie. The last was also neatly done, Rob deflecting home a ball played in from the left channel.

Oh, and a shout-out to keeper Matt, who made two or three key saves when Peterborough had a spell of pressure whilst the score was still nil-nil. If any of those had gone in, it would have been a very different game.

Victory put us five points clear of the chasing pack at Christmas. We have the most wins in Division 5NW with nine (eight earned on the field, but even discounting the walkover it’s still ahead of the next best of seven) and our forty goals scored is also the most prolific. The two defeats we have suffered is the joint fewest, as is the eleven conceded, both marks shared with Kettering.

Possibly the best news is the way the goals have been spread around the midfielders and forwards. Simon remains the top scorer (despite the efforts of his turncoat strike partners in this match), with twelve other players having chipped in with league strikes:-

Simon – 10
Rob – 6
Dave – 3
Ed – 3
Joe – 3
Jason – 2
Will – 2
Alex – 1
Jonny – 1
Ollie – 1
Paul – 1
Raj – 1
Tom – 1
(and Awarded – 5, for any pedants noting the above doesn't add up to forty!)