The glory days.
The best thing about the school summer holidays back in the day were not just the three months of no homework, but weeks and weeks of football-playing on the greens of parks up and down the country.
Without sounding about 74 years of age, computer games and the internet in general appear to be killing what was once the best laugh you could ever have.
So, to pay homage to glorious kickabouts in Irish parks, we look at 10 things that happened when you and your friends gathered for a game o’ ball.
The fella who was so good that you were convinced he’d make it as a pro
Ridiculously good technique, fast, strong, great finisher, brilliant passer and stylish… this guy was better than Ronaldo on his day.
Fast forward 15 years and he’s either not even playing football anymore or he’s lost that beautiful touch.
A wasted talent.
The guy who had the ball was always called in for dinner first
This happened every time. The suspect in question would do either one of two things:
- Take the ball home with him and come back out after dinner (pr*ck!)
- Leave it with you under the agreement that you’d kick it into his garden when the match was finished. Depending on how sound he was, you’d just kick it back in the general direction of his house (likely to go anywhere).
If you hit it wide, you got it. If you scored, the ‘keeper had to go running
Never mind shooting practice, this was the best way to improve your finishing accuracy.
This particular JOE’s park was on a hill, so if your team were shooting downwards you had better hope that you either had good aim, or that the ‘keeper wasn’t up to much.
The bigger lad who always picked unfair teams
He’d put himself with the class striker (that’s the guy who was supposed to make it), the box-to-box runner and the solid defender.
Meanwhile, you’re stuck with Johnny – who’s only playing because his mam wants him out of the house for a couple of hours – and Dave; the enthusiastic defender who’s known to mistime a tackle or two.
This is all only allowed because the captain of the other team is four years older than you, which translates to about 35 in adult years.
The guy who had all the new gear before anyone else
The new Adidas Predators, the fresh Fingertip gloves (remember them, those Shay Given bad boys?) and the £20 Premier League football.
Image via openthecity
This was often to same guy who got called in for dinner first. He was a sensitive sort.
An extremely intense game had to be stopped… because a car was coming
This was competitive. The tackling was tough and the shooting was sharp; it was like a cup final at Wembley. Then that feckin’ Ford Mondeo came driving by…
You all had to wait ’til it passed (which felt like an eternity), only for the process to be repeated every 3-5 minutes.
Didn’t these people know how important the game was?
One guy always got really upset
The game was just not going this fella’s way. He had missed a few easy one-on-ones (and he knew it) and his touch was off.
Eventually he cracked.
An opponent arrived in late (he’d spotted the vulnerability) and the victim cried off injured.
The two involved were usually good friends who then didn’t speak to each other for the rest of the day, because of the unsavoury incident.
Accidentally kicking it into the back garden of the angry neighbour
This feeling of dread was akin to conceding an injury-time goal that cost your side the match.
You’d sliced the ball and the moment foot met ball, you know that you were in trouble. It was like slow-motion, as you could hear the ball bounce, while not seeing where it went.
Tail between your legs, you knocked on the door. They always gave it back, but not without a disapproving glance. Consider yourself firmly warned…
The inter-park match
This was a massive, massive day out for the park.
The whole team (the half a dozen best players from where you lived) would pool together in the park colours (a mixture of United and Liverpool jerseys) and would make the mammoth excursion to the nearest estate, in an all-to-play-for encounter.
These were legendary match ups, sure to be talked about for generations to come.
Tactics were discussed en route, and the game caused such a stir that you’d even get a few people tagging along just to watch.
Score the winner in this match, and you were the hero for the rest of the summer and into the start of the school term.
Next goal wins…
Back to your home turf now, and an epic civil war of a game has been going on since 4pm.
It’s now 9.40pm and you should have been home 40 minutes ago. But, this game needs to be settled.
You’ve had fantastic goals, awful misses, a couple of changes and losses of footballs, several pairs of destroyed shoes, a rake of substitute appearances, and now your mam is demanding that you come in home, for heaven’s sake.
Then someone, with cruel authority, shouts out those three defining words… “Next. Goal. Wins.”
… may God have mercy on your soul.
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