A Dream Job:Coaching Waterhouses Modern

Last night I was trying to do two things at the same time: follow the Crawley Town v Derby County FA Cup-tie on the PC and create another post for Ushaw Moor memories. I was very pleased to get the post sorted and in doing so felt smug and clever to have linked John Lennon to Alf Rothwell. The trouble was elsewhere: Derby had lost to a last minute goal. Being affected by that result I then began to think that Alf might not see the funny side of my linkage of him to to Hey Jude.

It all got a bit to much for my inexplicable brain during the period of darkness. Weird neurons began to fire strange impulses. I found myself coach of the Waterhouses Modern football team during their short journey to a match at Ushaw Moor. The coach - oh yes a coach - began to run out of petrol on the outskirts of Ushaw Moor so I instructed the driver to use the petrol garage located on the left hand side of the road, about  two hundred yards before St. Lukes. Yes I know there is no such garage.

With three minutes to kick off I had to instruct the team regarding formation and went for 2-3-5 with the intention of switching to 4-2-4 if we hit trouble [we?}. I also had to write Waterhouses Modern on the left breast and right breast of each team shirt. I found that difficult to do in the time available before kick off,  but managed it by writing Waterhouses  and then going below to put M just below the r and h of Waterhouses.

I think we drew the game 0-0 but only after a desperate switch to 4-3-3. I saw no sign of Harry Barlow when the final whistle went,  perhaps that was just as well.

I woke up at two minutes to three in the morning with a headache and  in the knowledge that I had been a traitor to my Ushaw Moor County colleagues. Oh and the sudden remembering that my Derby County had been humiliated. Again.

The combination of the Rams defeat to a good non league side, the silliness of my Lennon/Rothwell article, and too much coffee during the previous evening, had got too much for me.

WB