How about this for a thought....

Perhaps less time spent in the tattoo parlour, and more practice catching a football?

Hopefully this will be a team effort.....

As much as we take great pleasure and joy from thoroughly researching our articles on Patgod, sometimes we really can't be arsed.  It's much easier to tag a few lame gags to images we've dragged off the ET website.

Or, as in this case, we are naturally assuming Paul Cooke will chip in with the relevant detail to enable the following paragraphs make some sort of sense.  Hopefully.

Let's talk penalties!

What a season it's been for efforts from 12-yards.  We started the season with Rhys taking on the mantle, scoring [Paul to insert number here] goals, but following a costly miss at Biggleswade, in rapid succession we ran through very moderate efforts from the spot from Rene, missing [Paul to insert number here] Aaron fluffing [Paul to insert number here] and Matt chipping in with [Paul to insert number here].  Each of them basically took penalties like complete drains.  Between all of them we managed to miss [Paul to insert number here] penalties which cost us [Paul to insert number here] points, and an extended FA Cup run. 

YAAAAAR!!!  GRRRRRR!!!

Strangely, even though our team was almost genetically incapable of scoring penalties, and Paul White never even goes the right way when facing spot-kicks, we somehow managed to win two penalty shoot outs this season.  Madness.

With opposition teams more than happy to keep giving us penalties, safe in the knowledge that Aaron would hit the goalie, or Rene would not reach the goal, we finally played our Ace in the form or Brett Solkhon.

The penalties kept coming.  Not all won by Rhys........and Brett managed simply hit the ball into the f*cking net, and scored no less than [Paul to insert number here] consecutive spot-kicks, giving him an amazing goal tally this season of [Paul to insert number here].  

During 2017-2018 we were awarded a record number of penalties - [Paul to insert number here].  In terms of total Poppies records, it was the fully [Paul to insert number here] more penalties than we have ever won in a season.  In fact, with [Paul to insert number here] penalties in total we have beaten the world record of [Paul to insert number here] penalties awarded in a season.  Scored by [Paul to insert number here] back in [Paul to insert number here].

Over to you Paul!

Slough of despond

It was, of course, disappointing and a hard way to end a long campaign - or "journey" as everything seems to be these days. On the night we made too many mistakes, and probably burned too much fuel in the first half trying to get back in the match. It was a bridge too far after an exhausting run of games. There’s not too much more to say about it.  By Monday night, another club will be rueing the freakish nature of this division, where nearly 100 points isn’t enough to guarantee promotion.  Ten years ago, exactly the same total as this season won us the league by 17!

It has been a weird season in so many ways. We’ve grown used to winning by wide margins, along the way discovering that Brett should have started taking penalties as soon as Craig Norman gave up the gig. While Brett was making a late run for the over 35s Golden Boot (golden slipper?), we ended up with a scarcely believable 122 in the league alone.  If this is some kind of record for a team that didn’t go up, it would be a typically Kettering kind of claim to fame, like finishing runners up in the Conference the most times (probably, it sort of feels true). So whilst it would have been good to take the season one game further, there’s a lot to look back on fondly – unless of course you prefer to air your views on social media, in which case the big question is – why hasn’t this dismal showing earned Law the sack?

It was also the season in which the curtain finally fell on Rockingham Road, and we all had to finally move on. Talk continues about a new site in the town.  All we need is for Kettering BC, who own the land, to make a grand community-minded gesture in return for some hard cash. Everyone hold your breath…

If they need any encouragement, they should have sent someone down to Slough to see yet another club benefitting from local council support.  For the umpteenth time since our departure from RR, we looked around an away ground and thought, yeah, we’d take this. I’ve even found myself thinking that at some right old sh*tholes but Slough’s Arbour Park definitely ticks the boxes. Plenty of seating, two covered ends, 4G pitch, outdoor bar and balcony!

And somehow, in the overcrowded south east in a town adjacent to the M4, a main railway line and Heathrow, the local worthies managed to find a site within walking distance of the town centre and resisted the urge to cram in a few two bedroom rabbit hutches or a new warehouse instead. Quite remarkable I think you’ll agree, and obviously an example of the kind of misplaced priorities that you could never accuse KBC of.

Three Positives from the Play-off Semi Final

Kings Lynn are likely to hammer the snot out of Slough in the final, meaning the newly formed "Midland Division" we'll be in next season will be eminently winnable.

The last time we lost to Slough in a play-off, we stormed to the title the following season.

Er....we're likely to have a nice Bank Holiday weather wise!

Which way to the beach?

John Betjeman's Red and Black Army

Poet Laureate John Betjeman was famous for two particular verses, both considered works of genius.  They are helpfully repeated below.  If for no other reason, tonight, let's do it for "Big John"

Slough - from the 1937 collection (Continual Dew)

Come friendly bombs and fall on Slough!
It isn't fit for humans now,
There isn't grass to graze a cow.
Swarm over, Death!

Come, bombs and blow to smithereens
Those air -conditioned, bright canteens,
Tinned fruit, tinned meat, tinned milk, tinned beans,
Tinned minds, tinned breath.

Mess up the mess they call a town-
A house for ninety-seven down

"Why don't you give me a KAAAAAY!...."

And once a week a half
 a crown for twenty years.

And get that man with double chin
Who'll always cheat and always win,
Who washes his repulsive skin
In women's tears:

And smash his desk of polished oak
And smash his hands so used to stroke
And stop his boring dirty joke
And make him yell.

But spare the bald young clerks who add
The profits of the stinking cad;
It's not their fault that they are mad,
They've tasted Hell.

It's not their fault they do not know
The birdsong from the radio,
It's not their fault they often go
To Maidenhead

And talk of sport and makes of cars
In various bogus-Tudor bars
And daren't look up and see the stars
But belch instead.

In labour-saving homes, with care
Their wives frizz out peroxide hair
And dry it in synthetic air
And paint their nails.

Come, friendly bombs and fall on Slough
To get it ready for the plough.
The cabbages are coming now;
The earth exhales.



Kettering Ambulance (full version) - after several pints with Kettering fans in the snug of "The Good Companions" in 1969.

You're gonna get your f**king heads kicked in!
You're gonna get your f**king heads kicked in!
You're gonna get your f**king heads kicked in!
You're gonna get your f**king heads kicked in!

You're going home in a Kettering Ambulance
You're going home in a Kettering Ambulance
You're going home in a Kettering Ambulance
You're going home in a Kettering Ambulance

Repeat, with specific hand-gestures