Few things
are certain in life… The Sun being a monumental shit-rag, Boris’ cabinet being
full of zombie cockwombles, hangovers getting worse the older you get, middle
lane drivers & fans of Mrs Brown’s Boys all being nonces, death, taxes
& Farnborough being incapable of pulling off a comfortable 2-0 win.
None of
this will be news to any of you lot though, you’re only here for the in-depth,
cutting edge soccer analysis aren’t you. Well let’s face it, you’re in the
right place. Not meaning to blow our own trombone or anything but, with the old
‘rona winding itself up for a second crack through our glorious island, we’re now
operating at the precipice of spectator sporting greatness. Farnborough is back
where it belongs at the height of the nation’s beautiful game. I know this wasn’t what we all had in mind
whenever we’ve talked about hell freezing over, but it’s about as close as we’ll
ever get to End of Days so we’re just going to plough a path through the murky
waters and see where the hell we can get to before Dowden and his DCMS wrecking
ball of gammon lurches in to force us out of football grounds and back into
Wetherspoons to eat your Gran to death or whatever the feck their latest
catchphrase is.
Where were
we, oh yes… so with the Swindon Supermassive fuck holes well and truly in our
rear view mirrors, it was time to go and cash in those vouchers we’d won the week
prior at the funfair at Beachy hands. A Tuesday night dash up to St. Peter of
Chalfont? Yes please! Is there anything better in non-league than the FA cup?
If there is, I’m yet to see it. The history, the nostalgia, the pride, the
crippling disappointment. She’s a hard taskmaster of a mistress. Building you
up, enticing you into daring to dream, always toying with you for a few weeks
before making you watch ex-pros fondle her balls over and over again in front
of Jake Humphries before ultimately letting the same old overpaid big boys come
and spunk their load over her in front of millions watching in their homes up
and down the country so they can get on an open top bus and dream of going to places
like Zrinjski Mostar, Drita Gjilan & Buducnost Podgorica…. Slutsk.
So as we thrashed
off up the trusty M3, M25 corridor, conversation invariably moved on to tales of
years gone by. Well I say that, most of the car journey was actually spent on a
hypothetical narrative of if Spencer had the cojones to carry on his CJ up top
shenanigans just to prove the point to Connor Cullen that he really, REALLY was
not happy he went off to get a tan while the rest of us staggered half cut
through Lymington. We reckon CJ could notch double figures easy. Does what he
wants!
Teams were in! New striker Ollie Sims was still a no go, hopefully fast-tracking himself over a suspected case of the you know whats. Cullen was hoist out of the frying tan and into the fire. Tom Le-git was demoted to the bench for his defensive crimes at the supermariners, and was joined in the dugout by Fabs Solmio and Louie “McCain Micro Chips” Paget. Andrew “Beardo” Blakey, him of the Woking psf net bulger, was back off the naughty step too. On paper, ‘Arris, Cullen, Fitz and the Wilberforce sounded not too shabby.
After somehow navigating the minefield free for all of the car park, we evePASSed the shit out of the queueing system and navigated a handsfree pathway into the sanctity of this little piece of non-league mecca. Had it really been 4 years since we'd been here? Eddie "Gillette" Smith leading the line and Sam Shaban revelling in his fast developing super sub role. The meteoric rise to the egg cup promotion final. Halcyon Spencers.
KicK off.... we spent the first minute chuckling about the fact they seemingly had one of the harlem Globetrotters playing at 11. Then it started.... 0-1
Some quick interplay down the right and CSP tore into us like an angry badger, our backline taking turns to back off and flail around half arsed in an attempt to foil them. Final shot came in and seemed to either deflect past Liam or completely fucking bamboozle him. Either way he was completley rooted and we were looking uphill. Speaking of uphill, only a couple more minutes had ticked by and, with the CSP'ers running rings around our static caravan of an approach, a fast moving break down the left ultimately ended with him of the Globetrotters running unchallenged through the Messiah and Bradders and picking his spot past a helpless, disbelieving Beachy. 0-2
What the hell were we watching?! Spencer had not briefed us on this lot being the Barcelona of Buckinghamshire. Chalfont were delivering a lesson in dynamic attacking intent and sheer bloody desire. Seems a weird tactic, going 2 down before you start playing, but whatever floats your boat. So as the Boro faithful teetered over an existential crisis of "it's happening again" versus "this can't actually happen again", 'Boro began to try and fan some hot air into the dampening embers of a cup run disappearing faster than the average age of our squad. 'Arris was trying his best to spark something into life. In truth the defenders were shitting their pants when he got the ball as they hadn't quite mastered the whole doubling up thing. First time he was brought down pretty unapologetically by their somewhat erratic captain. He got up to take it and decided to thrash it high, wide and horrendously ugly. The ref, not really having a sodding clue what the hell he was doing, adopted the guise of a clinically depressed, recently divorced dad who'd just been lumbered with all the kids for the evening when he was supposed to be off paint balling with his work buddies. 'Arris was still drawing the treatment as he was brought down yet again. This time, in a similar situation to the first one, he went low, it deflected and, helped on by a couple of deflections, looped up on to the flying bonce of Cullen as he utilised his sunbed claim diving technique to snag himself a notch. 1-2
Tempers definitely started to fray as handbags galore erupted. A royal rumble exploded right in front of the dugouts as 'Arris was next brought down. Spencer was not a happy bunny and ran his mouth at, yes you guessed it, their bonkers captain from behind the safety of the linesman. Seemed to be accusations of a stamp, but we were too far away to call it. Took a few minutes to sort out as things went from the shit to the comically ridiculous. A lively half played out with plenty of bite and edge, but no real further goalmouth action.
HT 1-2
So as Spencer and co went into full on Phil Brown mode in the centre circle, we braved the more congested recesses of club house alley and made a beeline for the tea bar queue. Few casual exchanges with some amiable locals and, brews secured, we took our place ready for what was sure to be 45 minutes of absolute biblical level FA cup action. The couple of changes meant we'd reset into a flat back 4. More touchy-feely jiggery pokery ensued as the second half swung into action like Billy Ray Cyrus' testicles. Ceej, looking revitalised having had his target man status removed, was trying his hand at being a box to box midfielder. He ghosted into the box and was fed some scraps which culminated in our hero rising full pelt and attempting a deconstructed flying scissor job, which failed to trouble the host's stickman. The Chalfonters still took any opportunity to pour forward en mass. The Boro defence now slightly calmer in its efforts to contain, clearly the better for having been touched up more frequently than a brown paper bag at FIFA headquarters. That said, there was one heart in mouth moment when our GlobeTrotting friend found himself in the right place to connect his high altitude head with the ball, from a free kick, somehow managing to completely misjudge just how tall he was, resulting in him heading high and wide from 6 yards out. Tit.
Free kick after free kick, corner after corner, St Peter's disciples were riding their luck like a one legged jockey. 'Arris cut inside yet again and fluffed his daisy cutter flush off the near post. Next it was Connor's turn to blaze one so narrowly wide it full on pinged the stanchion. Le Git soon entered the arena in place of Wilberforce and we cranked up in the direction of the next gear. With 12 mins to go, we surged forward yet again, this time though it was a string of penalty shouts which would play out over approximately 14 seconds, the ref finally getting sick of it and awarding a pen after the third tug off. Penalty, Paget, only one place this was going..... 2-2
So we lurched with fervour into standard next goal wins territory. It seemed ridiculous that we'd be subjected to yet another penalty shootout. The hosts clearly weren't interested in the inevitable pens loss, at the big safe hands of Beachy, as they finally worked themselves into a position to call him into regular action. The big pink stood up big and erect and thwarted their advances though. The game was bubbling up to fever pitch as both sides continued to take pot shots at one another. Into the last minute and yet another mazy dribble from 'Arris brought up yet another free kick from decent range which he picked himself up to have a go at. Whether it was something he heard (from me) or just Spencer's "leveller pitch" comments coming back into his subconscious, but he finally drilled one ferociously into the bobbly corridor of uncertainty a couple of yards in front of the keeper. It was subsequently spilled right into the path of the onrushing Le Git who leathered it high and handsome in the direction of the underside of the cross bar, coming down in the direction of the goal line. The faithful went bonkers, but the ref wasn't sure so looked longingly in the direction of the Soviet linesman who didn't hesitate in giving the goal.
3-2 England! 
All that was left was for AJ to take himself on a mazy solo run down the left wing to kill some time, cutting past half the beleaguered congregation (no into the corners for that lad) before going halves on a bastard with a reverberating crossbar. As the ball was launched forward one final time and Beachy gathered it safely, we knew we were headed for that big old metaphorical hat and yet another chance at Spencer breaking his "2 rounds max" PB.
So what did we learn? Well we can't play like that for much longer otherwise we'll soon be propping up the league like a rusty old commode. We all know Spencer's trying to navigate his favourite "trickle down" approach, whilst simultaneously being very outspoken on the fact he doesn't seem keen to play and doesn't feel the season will last. Whilst he may well have a point, on the latter, the concern is that we'll get pushed into a position where we're floundering low down the PPG leaderboard if enough of the season does in fact get played out. Maybe we're overthinking it though, don't judge a manager until you're 10 games in, right? Not that anything would ever happen, we all know why that is, but here we are. Let's save that minefield for another day. Bottom line, at the Chalfont, was that despite a crappy start, we got ourselves out of a hole. That can only be applauded and warm the cockles that there is fight and potential there. Spencer cup wins are a rare breed and this season has now equalled his best return to date. Just the matter of Connie South strugglers, from last season anyways, Tonbridge Angels standing in the way of Spencer and that elusive 3rd cup win. Rumours appeared of confusion surrounding "elite" fans perhaps not being allowed into games with us step 3 riffraff. Hopefully this will evaporate into yet more DCMS horse dollops. God willing all will go ahead and we'll have a bumper load of ravenous Angels fans swelling the coffers. Good god don't let it be another Wealdstone.
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