Arriving at Beddington Park on Halloween is sometimes not the most welcome of propositions, especially when you know that within 20 minutes you are also going to be looking at a half naked Ryan Polley trying to get changed slow enough to avoid putting the goals at. However, Old Owens could not have been more pleased to be finally heading over the River Wandle and up to the clubhouse at 3 o’clock, 45 minutes after the scheduled kick off time. The reason for the late arrival was due to the main road though Sutton being closed on a Saturday – the busiest day of the week in Sutton. Genius. There was some debate whether the road was closed due to road-works or due to a shooting. As it was in Sutton the consensus seemed to be it was likely to be a shooting because of road-works.

However, Owens weren’t the only team to face tribulations before the game. Andreas Carey-Bailey managed to demonstrate the fitness of the 2’s by getting injured in the warm-up. Luckily Ross Sinclair was at hand to step in, finding an old Purple kit that made him look remarkably like Barney when he trotted out to join the team. Once Owens arrived at the ground, Cars didn’t show any sympathy and started the game at a very high tempo, which produced to very good chances early on. The Owens keeper gave a sign of things to come, getting down to the feet of both Polley and Shane Bowes to prevent an almost certain goal both times. Dan “Mr Carshalton” Lawler seemed to be making things tick for Cars in the middle of the park, despite two dodgy Achilles tendons making him less mobile then Paul Mason, the 70 stone man from Ipswich. Unsurprisingly, it took Owens a little while to get into their stride, and they didn’t create an opportunity until about 20 minutes in, with a long ball allowing the right midfielder in behind to round Sinclair. Luckily some superb covering by Chris Tilley meant Owens had to settle for a corner, which was dealt with comfortably. Soon after Cars opened the scoring in a somewhat fortuitous manner. After picking the ball up half way inside the Owens half, Polley managed to carry the ball to the edge of the area before falling over for no reason (it has been rumoured that the 1’s felt an earthquake in Crouch End at around the same time). With the keeper coming to claim the ball comfortably, the Owens centre half inexplicably decided to try and clear the ball instead, hitting it straight into Badgie’s face, with the keeper helpless as the ball rebounded into the net. The centre half was the most liked man in Carshalton at this point, as not only had he gifted Cars a goal, he had also straightened Badgie’s nose. The rest of the half continued in an end to end manner, with both keepers making a couple of good saves and Polley continuing his Bobby Zamora like goal drought by putting a one-on-one wide.

 As Cars came in for the half time team talk there was shock all round, as Charlie Sinclair decided that a little bit of praise was necessary. Ok, the 2’s had performed well but hearing praise from Charlie is like hearing a tolerant view on immigration from Nick Griffin. He didn’t even swear! The second half continued in much the same vein, with play going from end to end and both keepers making good saves. Another one-on-one save from the Owens keeper was followed by a superb full stretched save from Sinclair. Cars then doubled their lead when Bowes broke in behind, who after another great save by the Owens keeper managed to slot the rebound home. There were reports of another tremor in Crouch End when Dave Booth tried a speculative over head kick and put the ball into the playground behind the goal. After over-loading the Owens box, Badgie copied Bowes and scored his second by slotting home a rebound from the Owens keeper. Badgie has claimed that having Lawler doing the holding role in the team is allowing him to get forward and score more, but the more logical reasoning is since become a “mature” student, he is just eating more and un-able to get back in to defend. Owens got a consolation when a long throw was flicked on and scrambled in at the back post. As dusk fell the full time whistle was blown and Cars took a deserved win.

Despite deserving the victory, Old Owens deserve credit for their part in an enjoyable game. Both teams played decent football and if it wasn’t for some great goal-keeping at both ends the score could have been more. With this win the 2’s have pushed themselves up to 3^rd in the league and with 1^st and 2^nd place coming up in the next to league games it is a good start to a vital point in the season. If Cars can come out of these two games with wins they will be well on there way to being the heaviest title winning side in SAL history.

Team: R Sinclair, D Fenton, T Lawler, C Tilley, B Wood, F Addo, D Lawler, Badgie, D Booth, S Bowes, R Polley, M Boyman, M Harrison

Boothy