On a lighter note.....

Way back at the very beginning of my time in the Transkei I landed at the airport and was picked up by a driver from the hospital called Mabena. His English, while better than my Xhosa, was not great but we managed to pass the time during the journey with a conversation based largely on the words Liverpool, Steven Gerrard, FA cup and Premiership. I boasted of my time as a goalkeeper for my college while he told me that he was captain of his team and promised to give me a try out. Ever since then I have been known to Mabena as 'my goalkeeper' and he has been known to me a 'my captain' although despite my constant nagging the try out has yet to happen.

Luckily for me the hospital has recently formed a team and as the tallest guy around and quite frankly the only one who showed any interest I was a shoe-in for the number 1 shirt. Practices have largely consisted of 5-a-side games on a tennis court with no goalkeepers so I was a complete unknown when we had our first game recently.

The day of the game started with few surprises. Firstly, our captain had his first beer will before the scheduled meeting time of 10am. Secondly, the actual meeting time turned out to be about 12 o'clock and after driving half an hour to the pitch I was told that the opposition had not yet set off and were 2 hours away. So no great surprise then that the game kicked off about 4 hours late. What was more surprising was that each team had a full set of clean kit, the goals had nets, there was a ref with a whistle and two linesmen complete with football socks tied around stick for their flags.

The game itself was a scrappy affair on a dusty and uneven surface and as full-time approached with the score was locked at 2-2. The full-time whistle blew and no-one was satisfied so it was decided to play extra-time. By this stage the opposition were passing beer bottles between them as they played so I felt we had a chance. It was deep in the second period when a looping shot came in and with half an eye on bowling it out for one last counter-attack it slipped through my hands and trickled over the line. Gutted wasn't the word. I sheepishly returned the ball to the centre circle but the final whistle blew shortly after. I apologised to my team mates as we sauntered off but within five minutes it seemed to have all been forgotten. The focus turned almost immediately to the pub and how we were going to beat them in the pool competition later anyway. It's comforting to know that whether in Africa or Anfield some things never change.