Overtouchers Corporation

With the joy of Christmas before us now, the Toucher's can look back on a solid start to the season. Victory last night in the last game of 2014 was built upon a solid defence. There was almost a full cast on the windy night at Narrabeen with only BBB and Dicko absent from the playing roster. It was in stark contrast to the previous week with just the bare bones left to take the field and achieve that hard fought victory. The Toucher's were never really in any danger of losing and went into the half time break for oranges up 4-1 on the Pepsi Jumbotron. Supercoach delivered a positive speech on the defensive structure that his colleagues should deliver in the second half. As usual nobody was listening, some things don't change. The VC sat so far away I doubt he could hear anyway. But I was close enough to the speedster to hear him mumble to himself "let the b@stards through, I'll chase em down" . All played well in the fixture. With 5 reserves, the bo...

This time last week I was preparing in my head a story around overcoming in the face of adversity and accepting the challenge when all is against you. Seven days ago the Touchers were not happy. Despite Dicko's urging across the park, the fire wasn't there, the interest in Touching wasn't there, the simple fact of wanting to be on the park wasn't there. I chose not to write that story last week for many reasons. Well last night once again the Toucher's had a wall to climb, a river to cross. With a heavy schedule at this time of the year and an expanding injury roster the Toucher's that could turn up and those who wanted to turn up looked at each other in the face and asked each other the question. At 710pm Tuesday the 9th of December 2014 the player status was as follows: Chairman - OUT Milt - OUT The Sponsor - OUT Jonty - OUT Bulldog - OUT Kiwi - OUT Lockmith - OUT Harro HOF - Retired to Stud Left standing were VC, Supercoach Bill, Rookie, ...

As the the weather formed into a drizzly night up in the Hills of Terrey, the mountain men descended from the escarpment down onto the tundra like fields of the eastern shoreline last night for the latest round of Touch Football. With teams re-gathering after a week off thanks to a two mile handicap horse race south of the border won by a German intruder, the legs were fresh and the arm muscles glistened in the lowering Spring sunset. Well they were in the other teams anyway !!! The call went out early in the morn of Monday to seek out those Touchers who were available to TOUCH. There was a resounding YES from all club members until they were advised that the notification was in regards to playing touch football. With that confirmation the player numbers dropped faster than inhibitions on a steamy hot summers night. Chairman OUT, Milt OUT, Jonty OUT, The Sponsor OUT but the biggest shock to the corporation was VC OUT. The VC had been ordered...

As I trawled through the morning media today  looking for results and match reports of the Narrabeen Touch Football C Grade competition, I was dumbfounded by what I was bombarded with in place of the information I was looking for. You my fellow Touchers, may have not have been aware, I was sanctioned by my media employers post the Grand Final of last season. The sanction was built around a litany of intrigue, innuendo, my in ability to see out a Grand Final 3 years running due to inappropriate play and instances of over the back fence voyeurism instances taking place by the executive group. Whilst it made for good content, it was not seen as appropriate activity in the eyes of my media employers. So rather than reading prose about ISIL's takeover of land in Syria and northern Iraq and the spread of Ebola across western Africa and how they are using plasma transfusions to cure the nurse in Dallas and the storms that have lashed across NSW closing rail lines, ai...

In the last 4 years I have enjoyed writing prose about the fortunes and sometimes failures of a dozen or so guys from Terrey Hills and surrounding suburbs. Describing their ability to play the game known in heaven as Touch Football has been a fun hobby. In the last 24 hours I debated whether or not to close out the season with the Grand Final edition. In my ever honest nature writing, with a good example of my description of players skills and / or lack thereof on occasion from some, I must admit that I had chosen not to write this story. After losing 6-5 in our second worst game of the season to a very good team in last nights Grand Final, I didn't feel there would be any good reasons to write this story. However, my smartphone made that known buzz of a text message at 6.23pm Australian Easter Summer Time this very night.  It was the VC reminding me of my contractual arrangement that includes amongst other things a post game rant on the description of the game just finished....

Toucher's win 7-5 The Toucher's have always enjoyed Finals series games and last night was no different. The Toucher's were the Minor Premiers which had them matched with the team placed 4th in a sudden death play off for the Grand Final. Despite beating the same team, in name only, last week 10-1, the Minor Premiers knew it would not be an easy 40 minutes of Touching. Their opponents went to the well looking for talent and youth. They found both and fielded a very different team last night.  With the VC out with educational duties and the Locksmith practicing to save the lives of many, the Toucher's topped up their ranks with the return of B1 [Chopsy] and the Bulldog.  B2 missed his return flight from Sochi where he was competing in the Giant Slalom. Gees he looked good in that lycra on Channel 10 !!!! Milt called in to advise he was stuck in transit. Something to do with an open bar at the Hilton in Hong Kong. Well you can't say he ain't committed ...

Let me open with an apology and the delay in presenting the post game report. After what I felt was a sub standard performance Tuesday night in relevance to the standard of the opposition, I locked myself in the video room and went looking for answers to the many questions that I, the corporation and the fans have been asking. All is not okay and I need to find out why or the next two weeks may be the darkest in club history. But in watching these tapes I saw wonderous things in the 10-1 victory to the Toucher's.  The opening blast from the Locksmith was a showing of pure power, raw power and elusiveness [yes its a word...and would score high in scrabble] .  Running in two tries before most of us had even got a sweat up, the Locksmith ensured that the opponents had a lot to fear Tuesday night. Let me just back track for a moment. On Monday the Locksmith invited the VC, the Rookie and 'Louie the 15th' on bike ride in the Blue Mountains. At first I was a little ...

On everyday, in every form of life people lose in some way or another. Whether we like it or not losing is like death and taxes, its a bugger of a thing and you can do nothing to escape any of these. Muhammad Ali lost 5 times. Once to the late great Joe Frazier. He even lost to the journeyman, cocaine addict Trevor Berbick who later was hammered by Mike Tyson. But he was judged and measured on his greatness and his beliefs. In Michael Jordan's basketball career he played 1,072 basketball games and lost 366 regular season games but he was not measured on this 34% losing record. Jordan was judged and measured on his 6 championships, not the 366 times he was a loser. His coach Phil Jackson used Zen like quotes through his coaching career and described a season in this way  "its not about the destination, its about the journey". Today in the cities all over the world business people are losing out on business deals and tenders they felt sure they would win. These peop...

The Toucher's have kicked straight back into gear after the Christmas holiday break with a commanding 10-3 victory on a balmy summers night. The Touchers opponents just under a month ago were unwrapping presents on Christmas morning and thanking Santa for their new skateboard or new surfboard. I am sure that the were not thinking about their round 12 match up with the undefeated Toucher's. However, the old men from high up on the Terrey Hills escarpment were putting together strategy, aligning game plans from the very first day after the last match in 2013. That's what make the difference between champions and second place. With the playing roster cut by retirements, work responsibilities, having better things to do [Locksmith !!!] and the attacks of the  Dasyatis thetidis on a key Toucher in the group, the playing roster was at 6 at the start of the game. Within 30 seconds the team was cut to just 5 players when the Chairman was shot by a sniper and fell to the gro...