Big thanks to everybody who took part in the charity football match and donated money and raffle/auction prizes for The Grace Dear Trust. Claygate Casuals, who had great success last year making it to three cup finals, winning two of them and getting a promotion, were playing against a fierce and highly competitive The Grace Dear All Stars.
Manager of Claygate Paul Bird had to really get his game in order and get his squad fit and ready for this amazing Charity Event. Once Graham (Player Manager of The Grace Dear All Stars) left the pub and got his team together Paul knew it was going to be a tough game.
Five minutes into the game, and there were already chances at both ends, the game went from end-to-end and just before half-time Claygate snatched the first goal. An absolute screamer from Lewis Hill, The Grace Dear All Stars keeper Jon Lewis (not the shop owner) didn’t stand a chance.
Half-time came and Claygate’s keeper JD (short for Jack Daniels) came in with a clean sheet, the score remained 1-0 to Claygate. After some clever tactical shuffling around from Graham, The Grace Dear All Stars came out fighting, to counteract this and face the speed and power of Daniel Haines, P.B had to bring on his new signing and left-back Jack “The Hack” Cowdy, in no time at all he showed his presence by wiping our Harry Bird (we have this on tape if anyone wishes to see it).
Soon after this, Sam scored a screamer, The Grace Dear All Stars got their equalizer 1-1 half an hour to go…
Then, The All Stars got a penalty. The Manager Graham, after giving it some careful consideration thought there was only one player that was capable of taking this… So, he made a game-changing substitution and bought HIMSELF on.
After giving Claygate’s new goalkeeper ‘the evils’ and making him feel very uneasy, Graham placed the ball on the spot, took four steps back and with a burst of pace sprinted up placing the ball in the right-hand corner…. and missed!!!
From kick-off, Claygate centre back and captain Andy Shev scored to put Claygate 2-1 up.
Straight after that The Grace Dear All Stars scored to make it 2-2.
But that was it for The Grace Dear team – they were running out of steam fast and gave away a penalty. Big Shev demanded that the penalty was to be taken by him, no one was going to argue because he is BIG.
Grace Dear Team had one last attack in them, but failed to score and from that chance Claygate on the counter attack made it 3-2 Game Over.
…and then the fourth one followed quickly.
Final Score 4-2 Great game, enjoyed by all.
The Grace Dear All Stars heads didn’t drop – everybody went off the pitch shaking hands and looking forward to the next match.
Great performance by everybody, some huge amounts of money raised individually, as well as collectively.
The day continued with everyone making their way to the Griffin Pub for the raffle, auction and quiz organised for the event.
Once again, a big thank you to everybody who helped and participated to make this a success. Our goal of raising £3000 was smashed and we ended up raising £8200 for the charity.
Paul & Harry Bird
Claygate Casuals