37 Years to the day Terry Waite was kidnapped, we saw the release of Nick “Big Dog'' Cave to the BHHHC 5’s (it’s been nearly the same amount of time since Nick last played), we also welcomed Larry the midfield Lion back to the team.

After a long and chilly wait for the 1’s to muster feisty draw the mighty 5’s took to the field. Bicester came with a good mixture and youth, and bought more subs than when we played them at home. As the game got underway there were an even amount of attacks from both sides and the first half was well fought. The defence with Pete in goal, Alex, Ian and Drew at the back saw little get past them. The starting midfield with Neil, Andy P, Big Dog and James linked up nicely. Whilst Brian, Dubie and John led the line well.

With 15 on the team and a cold sideline, rolling subs needed to work well, unfortunately with the second 5’s legend in 2 weeks (Dave last week and John this week )pulled up early, we needed to change the front line. For those concerned, John did not come off with a nose bleed being so far up the pitch but had a muscle strain. On came Larry, Jamie, Andy T and Paul. The strong defence and midfield rotation kept the momentum of our attack working well, a great aerial from Drew, which stayed inside the fence and on the pitch, went amiss but with some great driving runs opened up space for Dubie to slot in the opener, we went in at half time 1-0 up.

The intensity in the second half was much greater, our rotations much slicker than the week before. As we rotated positions we saw El Capitano featuring on the right wing where he turned and remembering his footballing days rolled 3 times claiming foul, (some said that’s just how he gets up these days). We pressed on in the second half with an assist as I quote “on a platter” from Nick “Big dog” Cave for Andy T to faff around with before scoring with his reverse stick for 2-0.

Bicester fought back hard with a well worked goal and were denied by a great Pete save to draw level, which stopped the game from turning like the away fixture did. Bicester pressed but the defence held strong before Larry broke loose and slipped to Paul for goal 3. The reliable poacher Dubie was on hand to slot goal 4 in at the post.

Huge huge effort from all, especially the midfield and the best result in the men’s section this week . Well done everyone! Great thanks to Jo and 1st time umpire Issy for a flowing game. Get well soon Dave and John- see you all next week, and Yes Paul we are sharing lifts for the home game.