Thinkers overthink opponents

Londrina 5 PFFC 2

Will, 24 February 2013

 

Is this a joke? Had someone changed the clocks? Dozens of grinning faces (or so it seemed) greeted me as I walked into the South Park changing room. My diktat about latecomers was starting to seem a bad idea. Once again sat upon Michele's shoulders (he seems to have his own struggles with punctuality), I battled with the hateful net and allowed myself to ponder on this week's opponents.

Before this match, rumours had circulated from other teams who had faced Londrina that they were by far the best team in the league. Supposedly skilful and quick, technically brilliant. Maybe the fact that Londrina is a team made up of ex-pat Brazilians helped fuel these rumours, and maybe there was some truth in them, but we had to put rumours out of our minds and face the fact of whatever turned up to South Park on a cold February morning.

And what actually showed up turned out to be a predictable mix of rumour and reality. Yes, Londrina were good technically; however, they also allowed us plenty of space and time in turn and, to our credit, I think we made use of this space and played some attractive football which our finishing, unfortunately, couldn’t match.

This was to prove the difference between the two teams. Londrina were clinical and seemed to put away every chance afforded to them. There are not many games after which I walk of the pitch and feel I should have had at least a hat-trick, but today was one of those games. Londrina scored 5 to our 2, which came from Matt and Colm, the latter adding a touch of respectability and reality to the scoreline.

Good performances throughout the team, particularly Dylan, who roamed touchline to touchline and box to box.

 

PFFC (3-4-2-1): Kadeem; Michele, Ally, ???Rob C??? (Ewan 45); Will, Omer (James 45), Kieran, Simon; Matt 1 (Omer 70), Dylan; Colm 1, James