Saturday 6th September: The Cooper Cup at Hamilton
The Motherwell Dossers hosted The Cooper Cup and invited our good selves to take part in what Mister Campbell though was a sixes event but turned out to be a sevens tournament. The fact that Mr C had been at the previous year's sevens only goes to show that old age doesn't come alone !
Unfortunately it wouldn't have mattered whether it was sixes or sevens as we only turned up with five !
A couple of late call offs meant that Mr C, Jazza, Roddy, Arthur and Big Tam were our lucky team and, as none of them even looked like a keeper (or had probably slept with one, although you never know), things didn't look promising.
Nine teams were split into groups of three and our first game was against The Dossers with a young local lad, Graham, being drafted in make us up to six. the Dossers, however, still fielded seven, a very sporting thing to do !
This game was also being played for The Crooked Cup, we had won the previous two encounters on penalties, and at least we didn't have to carry that big trophy home as we lost 3-0 despite Tam having a header cleared off the line and Arthur being in goals.
Next up was Jack Daniels B who were a abetter side than The Dossers and put five past us with nothing to report at their end of the pitch.
Jazza took a turn in goal and made one save with the ball being hit straight at his not incosiderable belly.
Two defeats put us into the next group stage along with the bottom two teams from the other groups (hope you're all keeping up !) as we played off for the Wooden Spoon.
A very young team calling themselves Ayr, and wearing an assortment of tops, played us first with Arthur again "volunteering" to go in goals.
We were two down (two shots on target) before BIG TAM headed the ball in at the back post to give us our first goal of the day and a ray of hope.
Just as we thought we were back in the game, and after Roddy had somehow shot wide with only the keeper to beat, the referee, the pernickety Mr Jaffa (Motherwell) awarded a penalty against Tam for a clear foul on an opponent.
Funnily enough Arthur didn't save the effort and we lost two more to lose 5-1.
Thankfully we only had one more game to go and it was against the world renowned Boaby Dookits, international playboys from South Lanarkshire.
After borrowing a couple of Dossers and getting nowhere we decided to change tack and hired a couple of Ayr players including their keeper Mincey.
Naturally Mincey was the busiest man on the pitch but managed to keeper the Dookits at bay, despite all their efforts whilst ARTHUR, released from standing about with gloves on, shot into the bottom corner to give us a 1-0 win.
Despite our win we still finished last but at least we'd managed a consolation victory.
Back to the Jack Daniels pub in Motherwell for the presentations, not that we got a Wooden Spoon as they'd forgotten to bring it, a buffet and a quiz before watching Scotland gub the Faroes.
Naturally the team performed better off the pitch although amazingly Jazza, who was hopeless throughout the football claiming he'd toothache, managed to get a nomination for Player of the Tournament, probably from the guy with the Labrador on the harness.
The team eventually made their way home with Campbell (Mr) and Stormonth being the last to leave, the worse for wear as usual.
Mind you, at least they found their way home unlike Big T who ended up on the wrong train and had to pay �7 in a taxi to get home to Shawlands via Cardonald. No way in the book !
Naturally it was good day out and thanks to Jaffa and The Dossers for organising the tourney and for their hospitality afterwards.
Hopefully next year someone will find out beforehand how many players are required !