Carnival Review 2015
Last year I looked forward to the eventuality of organizing and playing in the QLD Regional Carnival but then I’m the type of bloke that walks under a flock of birds and is surprised when he ends up with shit on his face.
Some may have been concerned that with less than 48 hours to go before kick off, “hey you want to play on the weekend?”was being asked of every able bodied 35+ year old. But not us. Thankfully Norman’s decision to get married brought some old Stratford boys back to the fold and we fielded a TEAM for Friday's game. Then we got flogged 4-0. But never mind we’ll do better tomorrow. We have to right?
Saturday came and we counted 1,2,3…..10 people. Huh. Now I’m not necessarily being critical of our salt of the earth Wednesday Moodies but when the team of 10 we put out on the pitch consisted of players sore from the night before, a bloke who had jetted in the arvo before laying carpet all night and a guy who drove the equivalent distance of Belgium to Poland to get to the carnival you can probably see why not being able to get there from places like Redlynch may not be met with a ton of sympathy. We start the game with 10. We then go 1-0 up. Then Matty the goalkeeper put his bar mans apron away, put the keepers gloves on and Spiros became our new left mid. We have 11 on the pitch. Nope Rantucci tears a nut and limps off and we’re back to 10. Team Manager Davy runs off to find someone. Anyone. He comes back says he’s sorted it. He’s got another bar man to play. Simultaneously confused about exactly who the fuck is now running the bar and being too puffed to give a shit we keep playing. We win 1-0. I consider putting a suicide alert on Renegades after losing to our turgid shit show. We come off looking like the walking dead I am given a whistle and told to ref the next game. I am then introduced to a nice lady who wants a team photo and interview for a promotional piece for the FNQ Games. At this point I’m just confused. Deeply confused. I put forward Spiros and Rantucci (who’s still adjusting his nuts) as they aren't sweating like meth heads, have white teeth and of course - salon quality hair.
Last year I looked forward to the eventuality of organizing and playing in the QLD Regional Carnival but then I’m the type of bloke that walks under a flock of birds and is surprised when he ends up with shit on his face.
Some may have been concerned that with less than 48 hours to go before kick off, “hey you want to play on the weekend?”was being asked of every able bodied 35+ year old. But not us. Thankfully Norman’s decision to get married brought some old Stratford boys back to the fold and we fielded a TEAM for Friday's game. Then we got flogged 4-0. But never mind we’ll do better tomorrow. We have to right?
Saturday came and we counted 1,2,3…..10 people. Huh. Now I’m not necessarily being critical of our salt of the earth Wednesday Moodies but when the team of 10 we put out on the pitch consisted of players sore from the night before, a bloke who had jetted in the arvo before laying carpet all night and a guy who drove the equivalent distance of Belgium to Poland to get to the carnival you can probably see why not being able to get there from places like Redlynch may not be met with a ton of sympathy. We start the game with 10. We then go 1-0 up. Then Matty the goalkeeper put his bar mans apron away, put the keepers gloves on and Spiros became our new left mid. We have 11 on the pitch. Nope Rantucci tears a nut and limps off and we’re back to 10. Team Manager Davy runs off to find someone. Anyone. He comes back says he’s sorted it. He’s got another bar man to play. Simultaneously confused about exactly who the fuck is now running the bar and being too puffed to give a shit we keep playing. We win 1-0. I consider putting a suicide alert on Renegades after losing to our turgid shit show. We come off looking like the walking dead I am given a whistle and told to ref the next game. I am then introduced to a nice lady who wants a team photo and interview for a promotional piece for the FNQ Games. At this point I’m just confused. Deeply confused. I put forward Spiros and Rantucci (who’s still adjusting his nuts) as they aren't sweating like meth heads, have white teeth and of course - salon quality hair.
Yushki from the J-Team turns up and put the Moodies jersey on. We then play Mareeba with the commitment to play more like the Moody fucking Blues. We do its just not the hung over football playing feral cats version we were expecting and more the ‘let's give them a 2-0 head start’ inside of 5 mins variety. We try harder and go 4-0 down by half time. We go to the sheds for half time and Toddy gets hold of he talking stick and decides to give one of his half time motivational specials. Prior to this game Paddy was the bookies favorite for going back to back with the annual ‘Sookie Lala’award especially with his early carnival form, calls for balls to feet and other Tourette's like muttering and swearing. 2 minutes later SportsBet closed all betting lines for the trophy. Toddy starts his speech, Renzo gets the shits, yelling, swearing and arguing starts, things start to calm down, Renzo takes off the boots and walks off (and with him our only sub),Toddy decides to go straight into one to one couples counseling and yells out to Renzo, “don’t come back”, which then starts a tirade between the two at a distance of 30 meters. Yoshki- the politest man to ever wear a Moodies Jersey looks on in abject fucking horror. Welcome to the Moodies Yoshki. We calm things down. One of the bar man comes back and puts a jersey on. I’m starting to think the Stratford bar staff team have more subs then we do. We start the second half which we win 2-0 despite a doggy off side call and Andy’s Thurston-would- be- jealous-of-that-conversion penalty miss. I’m starting to think we are the only team that needs to take a team photo before AND after a game. Go us.
A photo of Renzo in more gentle times......
When is a 45’s team not a 45’s team. Apparently when Townsville Has Beens gives the Mareeba 45’s an absolute arseholing and tells them they’re a 35’s team. There had been a mix up and the draw changes. As an amendment we play a good 45’s team. It's not a problem. We just received an influx of some great 35’s players for the first time in the carnival. We have three subs. We now have speed. We’ll be great. Nope we suck. We score a home goal and lose 2-0. Matty also get swollen nuts. Lord let it end.
All the games are counted up and we tie fifth and go out on goal difference…to the team we beat 1-0. Not the best carnival. But we’ll be great for the October Carnival. After all we’re at home. What could possible go wrong? Go us.