Skip to main content

Tales of a Teenage Terrace Tearaway



The cricket season may be getting into full swing and England may have a new captain, coach and whatever it is that Rob Key is called but there's no escaping the fact that football violence is hogging the headlines and the back pages. 

These are dark days for the people's game.

Unfortunately for OSCC there is an overlap.

Because one of our own is both capable of terrorising opposition batsmen (when he actually manages to land the ball on the strip at any rate) and causing carnage, confusion and chaos among opposition football fans.

That elderly youth is of course none other than Jamie Cummins. 

The link below illustrates just what devastation Cummins is capable of when the red mist descends.

Offley & Stopsley Cricket Club (@OSCricketClub) / Twitter

On the cricket field Jamie Lad is a force of nature, chugging into the crease like an enthusiastic young librarian pushing a heavy trolley of books to spray the ball optimistically towards the batsman's stumps. 

Or, occasionally, a hapless fielder at second slip.

Yet when it comes to football, Jamie is simply "The General", an unchained animal capable of spraying opposition fans with invective and police officers with disdain and disrespect. 

Jamie has been all over the country following his team.

While other fans group together to sing their battle cries and war chants, Jamie is a one-man army who goes his own way.

It's common knowledge among football fans across the land that whenever Jamie is involved it's a case of No Cummins, No Goings.

When Luton Town visited Cardiff this season, most Hatters fans contented themselves with watching the match, burning the odd dragon flag and making sheep noises at the home crowd.

Not Jamie.

He passed up the football and stormed Cardiff Castle, joining a guided tour of the castle before planting his Luton flag atop the battlements and claiming it in the name of the Queen and Mick Harford.

Bloodshed and violence and perhaps even war between England and Wales was only averted when 72-year old castle tour guide Bronwyn Thomas threatened to phone the General's mum and forced him to retreat.

There are other examples of Jamie unleashing havoc.

No away fan will visit Kenilworth Road without the safety of a police escort for fear they might be ambushed in the passes and ravines of Bury Park by Cummins' commando tactics. 

The fields of Culloden, Bosworth and Hastings have seen plenty of men fall and blood spilled but few have seen as much destruction and desolation as Beech Path after a Cummins assault. 

It's rumoured the football club have to employ a couple of extra workers the day after every home match to sweep away the blood and bones.

At Blackpool he threatened to seize the tower and turn off the illuminations before he was appeased by frantic officials with the offer of ice cream and a donkey ride on the beach. 

At Fulham he joined the flotilla of supporters sailing down the Thames, echoing the Royal Marines' mantra of being the first to land and the last to leave. 

Jamie was indeed the last Luton fan to leave Craven Cottage that night but only because he'd launched a reckless one-man infiltration and gone undercover in the Fulham end and couldn't make his way to the exit while the Fulham fans celebrated.

At Huddersfield he was all set to lead the pitch invasion at the end of the game when Luton had secured their place at Wembley.

Unfortunately not only did the result go against the Hatters but the General also sustained an ankle injury as he warmed up for the invasion by practicing climbing over chairs, an injury that has caused him to miss the trip to Pinner on Saturday leaving OSCC to go with ten.

MIG down, as it were.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The People's Champions

"We fight for lost causes because we know that our defeat and dismay may be the preface to our successors' victory." A day out that was confidently expected to end around lunchtime eventually drew to a close in the early evening as heavy underdogs, Offley & Stopsley C.C., otherwise known as the People's Champions, took their leave of Knebworth Park having reached the club's first final since 2008. Unquestionably no one was more surprised at making it through to the final than the team themselves, the semi-final victory prompting a flurry of hastily rearranged plans. Ultimately they were not victorious on the pitch - not exactly a shock as they were up against a side six divisions above them in the Saracens League, a gap that will be confirmed as eight divisions once the tables are finalised on Saturday night. Yet at the end of a torrid season where the club flag has been subjected to shot and shell, it was heartening to know it still fluttered defiantly in the...

iBat; iBowl; iPad

  OSCC, 71 all out, got about halfway against Leverstock Green, 155 all out iPad At the captain's request (for a direct line please dial 0-9 for Wardy) I'm not allowed to mention what effect Saturday's result has had on our survival prospects. However, I think I am free to point out this challenging mathematical poser, namely what would happen if you took the points we have accumulated in the Bedfordshire league (depleted by 10 after Sunday's concession) and added them to those we have accumulated in the Saracens League? Answer: we'd still be pretty severely fucked.... Things did not begin well on Saturday.  Richie Barker missed out with a nasty toe injury (laughably sustained attempting to bowl seam in the nets) and Danny O'Brien was forced to withdraw on the morning of the match after a tough week at work. Roger Piepenstock, a man who lives within a stone's throw of the ground, although perhaps not if that stone is being thrown by an Offley fielder, subseq...

The Triangle of Triumph

OSCC, 116-6, beat Shillington, 115-9, by four wickets OSCC, 174-6, beat Harpenden, 166 all out, by eight runs OSCC, 245-6, beat Hexton, 152 all out, by 93 runs Having started the season by losing six out of six - and conceding a seventh to boot - Offley kicked the season into life with a three-game sweep of assorted opponents. The week that began with the unfortunate Bus Wanka saga ended with the victory beers overflowing. Captain Roger Piepenstock secured the first win of the season against Shillington, having been elected to the position on the grounds of his patrician bearing and the fact he was the only one with a coin (a golden guinea presumably) to toss up. Manouvering his fielders with a combination of frantic arm-waving and polite requests one that conjured images of a pissed up usher at a garden party, Captain Piepenstock ensured Shillington were restricted to 115-9.  Mark Kirkman and Shane Jones were the pick of the bowlers with three wickets apiece but there were also tw...