Pre-season friendly
Barnet 0(0)
Watford 3(2)
Starting line-up: Day, Cox, Perpetuini, Page, Ward, Robinson, Palmer, Easton, Helguson, Smith, Mooney
Substitutes: Foley, Gibbs, Chamberlain, Ngonge, Miller, Norbert (triallist)
Scorers: Helguson 2, Mooney
 
Lovely to have them back
By Martin Blanc

Wish someone at WFC would post the Cornwall training regime on the Net - could've done with some of it myself, hauling my carcass into a seat in the main stand rather than stand for ninety minutes in the baking sun the other side of Underhill. The boys all looked rather good...even Charlie Miller, though he kept his sweater on, and his shirt loose, just in case it wasn't a muscle six-pack he was keeping under there.

We started sharply - 1-0 up and it was still 3.00pm by the ground clock. Then trotted around for a bit, confident and superior, till a move you could have predicted would lead to another goal did just that. Day-Milo-Heidar-Tommy M. Nice. The rest of the time we went through our paces, which were as ever, slow and mostly composed at the back, busybusy in midfield, Tommy Smith as smooth on his frictionless forward runs as that drop of Castrol GTX that used to slide down the side of the can. And Heidar Helguson absolutely everywhere. What a man.

Second half, well, we were all looking at this Norbert geezer thinking, what's the boy got? What's he got to do to win a contract? Get the ball, would have been a good start. But he couldn't, didn't, and then did and laid it off nowhere, much as the second half drifted smiliarly. Ngonge was back, Roadrunning into nowhere. Clint Easton was off at half-time, thus assisting me greatly in my first New Season's Resolution: Be nice to Clint Easton. Barnet had upped themselves a gear, led at least vaguely forwards - downhill, certainly - by old Ken Charlery. It was blah, very just okay, until Norbert disappeared into the far corner as we were all getting up to go. "Go on, then, get yourself a contract," we muttered. And, well, he shimmied around and between two Bees, pulled it back for Gibbs to get a nice ball across and Heidar polished it off. Smart move. The sort of thing all of us wished Charlie Miller had done instead. Charlie included, probably. Poor guy.

So, off we go on our travels. Lovely to have them back. Except when Ceefax welcome you home with news of "reports linking Heidar Helguson with..." anywhere but Vicarage Road, the shine sort of comes off it a bit. Even with the long-running promise of Baardsen (old story, so what's GT in a flap about?) and now Neilsen too, in the wings.

Too much time for talk. Can't wait for some action.