The Complete McAuslan by George MacDonald Fraser Page B

an exulting ‘Aw-haw-hey!’ from below the box.
    Two minutes later Campbell had the ball in the net again, but was ruled offside. Then he headed against the cross-bar, and we forced three corners in a row. But you could feel it slackening; the Fleet were as steady as ever, and presently they came away, swinging long passes through the open spaces, using their extra length of leg, keeping the ball up where their height counted. They were good; in their way they were a better team. In their way. And for a moment, as they broke through on the left and centred and their inside right chose his spot in the net and banged in the equaliser, they were imposing that way.
    There was worse to come. The Fleet went ahead with a penalty, when the corporal, in a momentary lapse into close-mouth warfare, obeyed our supporters’ behest to ‘Ca’ the feet fae ‘im,’ and brought down a Navy forward close to goal. It was a critical point: when we kicked off again the Navy, one goal up, came storming through. Their centre got away and side-footed the ball past the advancing goalkeeper. It was rolling home, but the corporal came from nowhere and stopped it on the line. And then he did the ridiculous, unspeakable thing. I can still see him, the stocky yellow figure with his foot on top of the ball, watching three blue jerseys tearing down on him; alone, in his own goal. Bobby Moore himself would have belted it away for touch and been thankful. But not our boy. He shifted his hips, beat the first Navy forward on a sixpence, showed the ball to the other two, feinted amidst agonised yells of ‘Get rid of it!’ stepped over a scything foot, looked about him, and patted the ball into the hands of the goalkeeper, who was so stricken with anxiety that he nearly dropped it.
    It was perhaps the cheekiest piece of ball-juggling that I’ve ever seen; it shook the Fleet momentarily for it seemed to indicate a careless contempt. It said, more clearly than words could have done, that there was no sense of panic in this defence. The Admiral roared with laughter, and I hoped again.
    We scored again, just before the interval, a goal against the run of play headed in from a long, free kick, and the teams came off and the Marine band marched up and down playing ‘Iolanthe’. I stayed where I was, listening to the Governor chattering Good game, good game, my goodness, and the Admiral’s bass rumble, and staring out at the sunlight on the great crowd lining the saucer of the arena. There was no point in my going down to the dressing-room; we were doing well, and nothing I could say could make it better.
    The second half began disastrously. A high ball went into our goal-mouth, the centre-half and the Fleet centre went up for it; the sailor came down on his feet and our man on his back. He lay still, and my heart turned over. I watched them lifting him, crowding around, but his head hung forward, and presently they took him behind the goal. ‘Dirty, dirty!’ came the cry from down front, drowned in the answering roar of ‘Wheel ‘im off!’ from the Navy. The referee bounced the ball to restart the game, and as the injured man was supported towards the dressing-room I was bounding down the stairs.
    He was slightly concussed, the doctor said; he wanted to go back on, but the doctor said it was out of the question. I watched while they bandaged his head, and told him – what I honestly felt – that it didn’t matter a damn about the game. His face took on that look of whining rage that the Glaswegian wears in times of stress, and he said, ‘We had them bate. We’d’ve sorted them this half.’
    Maybe we would, I thought; with ten men it was certain that we wouldn’t now. The doctor broke in to say that he ought to go to bed, and as they took him away I went back to the stand. Dimly I had been aware of the distant roar swelling and dying; when I climbed into my seat we were kicking off again. We were down 4 – 2.
    The Fleet were out for blood now.