Where to begin?
I suppose we start with the fact that the ACT region, along with just about everywhere else, has been experiencing heavy rain storms. The fact that the game went ahead is amazing and probably in no small measure to the generousity of spirit of Canberra FC, whose home ground, the very fine Deakin Stadium, was made available for the game. Any other time in these conditions, no one would have played on this surface and nor should they. The playing surface looked green from the stands, but the grass just hid a whopping big puddle. But it was game on!
From this point on, it will become clear to the NPL reader that a force greater than Football itself was at work this day. What is bigger than Football? I have no idea, but after today I'm prepared to concede it is just possible. I was similiarly unaware that Coach Junna was so well connected with the "forces of nature" and beyond, but again, this too must be acknowledged.
Poor bloody Adeliade United, they had no chance. Deakin Stadium was this afternoon the ACT Football's equivalent of the Bermuda Triangle.
This is how it went.
Before the game the clouds cleared and we were all getting very tropical, as the sun made it first serious appearence in a while. It got hot and steamy and people were scratching around trying to find suntan lotion. Hard to beleive but true. Quite a few spectators elected to sit in the uncovered stands on the far side of the ground. Brave souls, but they thought it best to have the sun at their back. Yes, the sun really was out in full at Deakin for the first half. The first sign!
Coach Junna had a cunning plan! A deft combination of get as many goals as possible, then call in the rain, flood the pitch and have the game called off, but not before you do enough to get the points. He seems very well connected. I don;t know why they call him "Reggie", from now on, he's "God".
The game got underway and Canberra United mounted some fast right sided attack, along the only part of the field that look solid, and four minutes and five seconds into the first half we get a goal. It was a very heavy surface for both teams, with sections of the field better than others likely to support playing the ball. The players adapted quickly. Adelaide sat back on halfway giving Canberra lots of time and they obliged with three more goals. A dream start. The score could have been anything and we "experts" in the stands started to talk about building our "for and against" courtesy of a hapless Adelaide. Adelaide changed up in the last 15 minutes of the first half and got further forward in defence, so the goals stopped flowing, but we still looked a good thing to do more damage. Half time and almost summer. Second sign!
The first phase of Coach Junna's plan complete. Now it was on to the finale.
The sky got a little darker at half time, but no sign of rain looking out from the covered stands. Some on the far side in the uncovered stand, started to drift back to the other side - they could see some serious black clouds and a storm front heading our way. The game seemed to resume where it left off and we didn't seem to be under any real threat. Then it got really dark. That Bermuda Triangle thing! The heavens opened up, you had trouble seeing the other side of the ground, players were crashing and falling all over the place, passes were stopping weel short of their target and submerging in an ever increasing expanse of water. It's been a long time since I have seen anything like this and you could say it changed the character of the game. Third sign.
There was one magic Football moment for a young Canberra United and Woden Valley player, Grace Field. Field got a spot on the bench and looked a good thing to make her debut in the W League. Well that moment happened early in the second half, with the rain tumbling down. I'll bet she didn't notice. Good call Coach Junna. Then, as if by magic, that little Canberra United jack in the box with the orange hair, layed off a beautiful ball to Field, only to see it stop dead in the water two meters short of Field, as Field ran on to where it would normally have been, ready, one on one with the keeper and a good thing to score. Then the moment was gone. The game disappeared into the rain on another part of the field. But waht a moment that would have been.
Coach Junna's plan was almost complete. Now for the orchestra!
It got darker, the lights were put on and the odd flash of lightning on display in the vicinity. The players were lost to most of us, appearing in and out of our vision, the occassonal whistle blast, yells from the players, a shot at goal, a passage of play to our front, to disappear to another rain swept part of the pitch. They fell over eah other, slipped, collided, miss kicked, got stuck in groups madly flayling at the ball to get it moving out of the water and still played hard as they could. Unbelievable. There was definately a game going on but it was hard to say what was going on from where I sat. Organised chaos and getting a bit risky.
At this point, the Ref stopped the game for safety reason and good thing too. It was gloomy as a Harry Potter movie. I looked across the filed and noticed the person filming the game on top of a crane of some sort. Wet and likely to get the first jolt of electricity where the sun doesn't shine I thought to myself. But they continued filiming. Coach Junna's crafty plan was now close to competion. Fourth sign.
The players went into the sheds and we punters huddled in the stands, the covered ones. The poor buggers who stayed on uncovered side of the field had by this time retreated, looking like drowned rats, to the covered area. So much for having the sun behind your back in the first half, ha ha! No point in leaving the ground, it was pelting down. At the same time, their began some very animated discussion where I was about whether Canberra United would get the points, as the game had been abandoned. Canberra United scoring four goals, strange weather, game stopped and an arguement about the rules - gotta love football, something in it for everyone today. I thought to myself, I'll bet this has got the officials scrambling around looking for a bloody competition rule book. I'd have liked to have seen that. Not Coach Junna though, I reckon he knew all the time! Fifth sign.
As we sat in the stands, for there was no point in leaving yet unless you were a good swimmer, the strangest thing I have seen in many, many years on a Football pitch occurred to our front. The Lady and Men in Black (match officials / Ref) marched out of the sheds, straight down the halfway line out onto the pitch in the teaming rain. They got to the centre of the ground and marched very smartly back into the sheds, as wet as they had been when they called a halt to play. Now this incident coincided with the announcer (who I might add owes much to Fawlty Towers), declared in his best "Basil Fawlty", some garbled message about the Second Cricket Test in Adelaide. Well that was it for me, this just had to be that Bermuda Triangle stuff again. "What do they think they are doing, doing a pitch inspection" I heard one wag say, watching the officials hot foot back into the sheds with as much dignity as they could muster. He was nearer the truth the he knew. Their could be only one conclusion and a quick look out the door would have confirmed two things - it was still raining cats and dogs, and that pitch had continued to disappear under water. Sixth sign.
At this point the players took matters into their own hands. Again, as a garbled message wafted out of the PA system, sounding a bit like a message in a scene from Mash, Basil or was it Radar now, said something, the only word of which that caught the ear was "Abandoned". Game Abandoned we said to each other. Abandon is not a good word, like abon ship or something. Then the cavalry arrived. The Canberra United players had as I mentioned re-enterred the playing area, signaled to the crowad that it was over, they seemd happy, so we figured we hand the points - and then the whole team ran off into the middle of the pitch and like a buch of not so synchronied swimmers, did a whole bunch of whopping big water slides. Fanatstic! Not to be outdone, Adelaide players stepped up and launched themselves into the water. Players sliding everywhere, laughing, hugging each other, talking, the rain still bucketing down and generally feeling pretty good. Just fantastic.
Don't know how you did it Coach Junna! Talk about the perfect storm!
If they ran this game again tomorrow, I'd be there in a heartbeat! A great afternoon of Football. Different, but great. It washed away all the unhappiness I have felt for days over the loss of $26 million to AFL (and nothign to Football) and an unsuccessful World Cup bid.
Thank you Canberra United (and Adelaide UNited) for a most entertaining football match.