From what I can remember being said by players after last Thursday's match/training session, it appears that we only have 9 players available who can get there in time for a 7.00.p.m. kick-off, so I have therefore named those nine as the squad.
They are as follows:
Ozel Ozerman (GK)
Tem Adil
Jim Arrowsmith
Dean Assiamah
Alan Barnard
Lee King
Martin Loveday
Andy McGovern
Terry Moore
If any of those 9 cannot get there in time for the kick-off, please let me know asap.
Similarly, if anybody else can get there for 7.00.p.m., please let me know.

Our opponents are Middlesex United, who we drew 3-3 with earlier in the Summer. They are two points behind us in the table at the moment and their last two results have seen them lose 8-2 to XS and 4-1 to All Blacks. However, we have never beaten them, they beat us 10-3 last Summer, and they have had close games against all of the top three teams this Summer. (In some matches they field a load of Semi-Pro standard players and in others they don't !).

As for us having training on Thursday night in addition to our 7-a-side match, I will e-mail the SHC later this morning to try and bargain with them to let us train on the grass field between 8.00. & 9.00. p.m. for £40.00.
If that's o.k. with them, then we will have to charge £5.00 each for all players who attend for training but do not play 7-a-side, and then 'x amount' per player (up to Trev ?) for the others on top of the £5.00 they have already paid for playing 7-a-side.
That's because it looks like we will get no more than 8 there this Thursday coming along for training after 7-a-side. I am guessing that will be the following:
Rob Brown
Tony King
John Scoullar
‘David’ (a prospective new player who has texted me asking to join)
Lexton Harrison
Robin Pryke
& probably no more than two out of
Joe Ansell
Terry Brown
Jamie Martin
Danny Smith
Stuart Dorward
(I'm sure several of the above players said they were working late this Thursday or were away on holiday and wouldn't be there, but I can't remember exactly who).
There are loads of others who definitely won't be there, and I make that to be the following:
Steve Cokell (Plays 5-a-side for another team on Thursday nights and has done for years)
Conor McGovern (Still injured from end of last season)
Vernon 'Kizza' Nxumalo (Training with Horsham…Ryman League Club)
Daniel Daley (Working late shift for next 4 weeks)
Danny Hagan (On Holiday)
Simon Jackson (GK) (Don’t know why)
Scott Lewis (On Holiday)
Olie Tedder (On Holiday)
'Sean' (Danny Hagan's mate) (On Holiday)
Julian Carvey (No lift from Kizza…Doesn’t drive ?)
If any of the above players can make it for either the 7-a-side match at 7.00.p.m. or training at 8.00.p.m., then pleae let me know asap.

See you there at 7.

Will be there.

I am available, will check with Andy.

I have heard nothing from the Southgate Hockey Centre yet regarding us being able to use the field, but I am already getting a number of current players saying they are not coming anyway because they are either working late or because they are (perhaps not surprisingly ?) not prepared to pay £5.00 just for training.

I have had a couple of prospective new players phone up wanting to join us (in addition to John Scoullar) during the last couple of days, and they can come training this Thursday but I don't think we are going to have any current players in attendance other than the squad of 9 we already have for 7-a-side...unless we can train on the grass for free.
I don't think these new players will be happy about paying £5.00 for training either when other teams are doing their Pre-Season Training over a park for free !
If we are charged £40 or more for using the field though, then we will have to charge £5.00 each because the club has 'no money'...thanks to hardly anybody bothering to pay their Annual Subs yet !

Personally, I think we are going to have to forget about training at the Southgate Hockey Centre on Thursday evenings from now onwards and just make sure 'everybody' turns up to Pre-Season Training at Enfield Playing Fields on Sunday 1st August (10.30.a.m. start)...and if they are a prospective new player who none of us knows but they cannot make that session because of holidays or whatever, then we will not be able to take them on until the season has got underway (when midweek training sessions replace the 7-a-side League).
I don't think we can/should be throwing them in to 7-a-side matches or Pre-Season Friendlies unless one of us has seen them play first.

Something that our players do need to realise though, is that if we train somewhere in midweek during the season, then it will be floodlit and that costs money.
We will have to charge players for that, although hopefully not as much as £5.00 each.

Sorry Lau, disagree there, If we are going to spend our weeks playing 7-a-side and not train then these matches should be used for trialists in my opinion. I know we like to win, and that's the way it should be, but getting a decent squad together for the Waltham League is our bread and butter.

The problem is though, we have got too many players wanting to play 7-a-side at the moment and everybody knows that it is far better with a squad of 8 rather than 9 or 10.
If I put previously unseen trialists in ahead of regular players, then I am really going to get moaned at because:
a) The regulars are going to lose their fitness.
b) The trialists might not be up to scratch and we lose heavily, thereby damaging our morale. (This has happened before at 7-a-side Rob...before you joined the club).

As I have said before, I know the answer is to pull out of the 7-a-side League now and have training over Enfield Playing Fields every Thursday night in August until it gets dark/they start locking up the car park ! , but unfortunately we just can't do it.

If I had known back in April that people were suddenly going to be interested in training on Thursday nights in August, then I wouldn't have entered us in the 7-a-side League, but after that non-fulfilment against Enfield Royals we only seemed to have about 8 regular players left ! (Enough for a 7-a-side squad, but not enough for training).

I agree with Rob - so long as you have a core of experienced players there at 7-a-side (say 6), you can throw in a couple of trialists to make it up to 8. That way, if they are both not up to standard, you only need to have one of them on at any time.

I'd say that a match situation (even if it is a small sided game) is possibly a better indication of how a player will get on for us on Sundays than training would be. I don't think any of the 'regulars' will mind missing the odd game. I can't play next week, and possibly the week after for starters.

Cheers
Barney

O.K.
I will put John Scoullar and Wosen (the player who phoned me today and who put a message on here) that they are in the squad for the 7-a-side match against Wood Green Old Boys on the 5th August.
That will be a good test for them and give us a more realistic view of how good they are rather than having them play in a much easier game next Thursday.
If they are good enough against Wood Green Old Boys, then they will be good enough to sign up.

I can't put them in the squad for this Thursday now as it's too much pissing about and I am very busy.

Next Thursday against Locomotive Southgate (a 9.00.p.m. kick-off), the squad will probably be something like: Jacko (GK), Robin, Rob, Smithy, Hagan, Scott, Lexton, Tony King & if anyone drops out, the other new player who phoned up wanting to come training ('David').

I am going to have no choice but to change the squad every week to give people a game if 'nobody' is prepared to pay £5.00 to train on the grass field.

I agree with Barney's idea of 6 regulars and 2 trialists for 7 a side.

If Southgate agree to £40 I still think we should try to do the training. No-one has actually said that they are not prepared to pay £5 and we may not need £5 to break even depending on the numbers. If the 8 man squad from 7 a side pay an extra £2 that will be £16. £3 each for another 8 players makes £24 which will cover the cost of the £40.

Er...yes they have (to me by text and e-mail)...but I'm not going to name and shame them on here.
I think I had better start turning over a new leaf, as I have already upset at least one of our players this week.

By the way, the weather forecast for Thursday night is thunderstorms. That'll put a few people off !

Hi

I wont be able to make training this thursday,As i'm training with wormley because we have a friendly next tuesday , I'll be available the following Thursday.

Cheers

Tel

Hi Tel!

Hi Rob,

How's things mate you keeping well? How's the family these days?

I am planning on being there this Thursday at 8 for the training ("in the thunderstorm", well done Lol). However if this is not going to happen or we have received no confirmations, can you make a decision by Thursday afternoon?

Thanks Terry for explaining why you are unavailable, particularly as it is a good reason.

It makes a change from the 'unavailable' message posted by some players which leads to negative speculation about the reasons.

Lads

I can't post on the Forum as it appears to have been hacked.
The last thing I did on there was click on John Scoullar's e-mail link so that I could contact him and ask him to replace Andy McGovern in the squad for tomorrow night.
My Anti-Virus software (AVG) now blocks all attempted posts on the Forum (either new, quoting or replying) and says it is infected with a phishing virus named JS/Redir. It probably won't affect anybody else unless you click on that e-mail link. (Barney please advise !?)

Wosen Girma Rike (a prospective new player) keeps phoning me, so I have told him to turn up and play 7-a-side tomorrow.

The rest of the squad is as per the Forum. I assume Oz is available to go in goal ? He said he would last week.
Everybody else has confirmed their availability.

Don't forget it's a 7.00.p.m. kick-off.
We will definitely not be having training afterwards. We will not have enough players there for that.

The following Thursday is a possibility for training at 8.00.p.m. depending on how much the Southgate Hockey Centre charge us. I have still not heard from them. We will then train on Sunday 1st August as well.

See you tomorrow (if you are in the squad).

Cheers,

Laurence Hughes

AVG have patched the virus in this morning's update, so I can post again now !

The only thing I have to add to the message Trev posted for me last night is...
Can Lee, Dean & Oz all please bring a proper passport-size photo with them tonight so that I can get them registered for 11-a-side this season ?

I want to get that sorted out before the kick-off so that I can go straight home and get on with re-designing the Rovers website and editing matches from the end of last season.
Obviously if players drop out and I have to play tonight then I will, but otherwise can somebody (e.g. Trev, Terry Moore or Barney) please drop the kit, etc. off back to my house on the way home afterwards ?
I badly need to get on with some work.
Cheers.

By the way, the JS/Redir virus was nothing intentional from John Scouller. The JS stands for JavaScript (according to Google Search). It looks like a Bravenet problem and it was just a coincidence that it activated by clicking on an e-mail link from somebody with the initials JS !
John phoned me last night to see if training was on.
I will be putting him in the squad for 7-a-side next week.

As I predicted, it has just got very dark and there are loud rumbles of thunder around !

Also, Loveday has just dropped out. He is on a training course and can't get away.
We still have 8 as long as everybody else turns up.