Dear Footballaires Supreme,

And yet another week passes us by at the speed of gary and history has finally been made. The Mighty Lions have famously pulled off the caper of the century by going out to DOIT's home pitch and carrying off 3 points in a dramatic 5-4 victory over one of the traditionally strongest clubs in the league. The DOIT boys are feeling a bit confused and befuddled as this is the worst start in the history of their club. But even so, I believe in those lads and, like Manchester United does on a regular basis, I can see them pulling back to within Championship pointage (and yet another new word that I am introducing to the English language) later on in the season. Rumors are already going around that anybody who wins the JIFL Manager of the Year award curses his club the following season. Mike Wildblood got the award last season and the Wanderers could not defend their title. Mick McTeir got it this year and DOIT are already in the relegation zone just one month into the season. I did mention though that them Lions were gonna be troublemakers this season, didn't I? Well, congratulations to the Mighties. They have suffered long and hard and tenaciously built their club into something to take pride in.

To the rescue

Well, we do have a few results this week as well including a fantastic showing from BuGils FC the other night against the Wanderers. I have never seen such a dramatic turnaround in a just a few weeks from any club in this league. BuGils jumped out of the block immediately from the kickoff when Neil Donovan took the ball off of Eli Lalbar and started the Ronaldo stepovers beating at least four Wanderers on route directly to the goal. Everybody recognized that something was up and only two minutes later they forced a penalty kick off of a cross which ended as a handball in the box. Eli steps up and cracks the penalty in. Then for nearly 70 minutes they hold the lead and it looks as if the Wanderers home field win-streak which has lasted for over three years is finally over. But, unfortunately for them, Tommy Ambon came to the rescue. Then The President sealed a victory with only a few minutes left after a shot going wide gets deflected into their own goal just past the outstretched diving goalie. It was extremely hard to choose a Man of the Match since everybody in the side (including Ray Googlie-Googlies) played an outstanding game of football. I stand by my support of BuGils this season. Keep up the hard work and the great standard of football Bugils. You, too, like the Mighty Lions, will one day earn your place in the sun.

Real grass rather than plastic grass

Finally, another team who is making a mark on the horizon is FC D's Place. Last night they battled against the Jakarta X-Pats in Kuningan and walked away with a 5-0 victory. Well done to D's who are steadily climbing the points ladder one by one. And just a friendly word for the Jakarta X-Pats: Hang in there, lads. Keep your heads up. And maintain your enthusiam. All good things come to those who are patient and whom wait. Just look at BuGils and the Lions. They are perfect examples of such complete turnarounds.

One big question that keeps gnawing away at me is whether current JIFL champions JIS are ever going to play on their home pitch again...? They have only had one single match so far and I purposely wait until Thursday to do the newsletter so that I will have a chance to write about them. But yet again they have had to postpone their match for some reason or other and unfortunately neither the Vikings nor JIS bothered to inform the League Coordinator. So he embarrassingly sent the referees there last night only to have them waste their night as well. It would be nice if JIS actually had somebody who was responsible for writing up match reports, informing the league and others about any changes, and general such stuff that would make that fortress just slightly more hospitable then the state that it is currently in. (I do know that they have a lovely grass field downstairs that is available if they really wanted to play on it. When Mark Gray was here, he was able to secure it if a team demanded to play on real grass rather than plastic grass in the stadium. I miss Mark).

Retraction:

Interestingly enough, I got a lots of compliments and a few complaints about last week's newsletter. In fact, that one particular lad quit the league on me and I had to promise a retraction in order to make him stay (I think that he might have been manipulating me but even so...). Let It Be Known Worldwide And For All To Hear: That fellow (aka The Shadow) who was marking Manny last week did play to the best of his ability and did indeed accomplish the mission that had he set out to do which was to keep Manny from scoring. So he did, indeed, play good solid defense. Well done, Geoff.

And just for your perusal.... here is a copy of one of the letters of complaint.

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Letter of Complaint

Hi All Vikings,

I just wanna share some thoughts I had after reading the last newsletter this week. I was not surprised that there has been violent incidents in this years JIFL,(both the Japs ('Japanese'; -ed.) and Do It tried to start fights with members of our team this year) but I was disgusted by the way they were reported. Especially by Do It and Wanderes. I think its completely out of order that Dale uses the newsletter as a forum to slag of (sic.'off' -ed.) a single player, which obviously is done only to defend Manny. I heard that Manny hit the other guy, who ducked and took a punch on the neck/throat. How come thats not in his report? Didnt Manny grab Ruben by the throat last year? Didnt he take a swing at Gustavo? Dale/Wanderes should realize that this is not their league, not their newsletter!

Our game against Do It, we played a little hard, we took our yellow cards without a word! They swore, threatened, intimidated and tried to start fights twice, where is that in their match report?

Peter Nielsen (No 7)

Marvin, Please forward this to Dale.

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Response to Letter of Complaint

No Problem Peter...

I admit that I do use the newsletter as a forum. I use it to better the league. If you think that the Wanderers are getting
too much attention then that is understandable. I used incidents from their particular league matches for two reasons: 1.) I am an eyewitness to the events. Wanderer's players cannot do anything about whatever I say about them good or bad. They just have to take it. 2.) The events were fresh and topical. I mean I could have delved into the history of the league and brought up that match last season against the Vikings where you single handedly ruined the game for both teams with some of the overall and worst behaviour ever witnessed in this league. But I didn't. I didn't because you have shown the most improvement attitude-wise of all the players that I have witnessed. You have gone from 'Crazy Pete' to 'JIFL All-Star Pete' just by concentrating on your own football game. Your team has reaped the benefits of your complete turnaround. In fact, you are the league's poster boy for sportsmanship and fairplay. Even when the referees try to pick a fight with you you just walk away from it. That takes some serious self-control.

As far as handbags are concerned: I did mention that the other guy did take a blow in response to his behaviour but perhaps because I used slang ('bitch-slap') it was not understandable to some readers. I wasn't trying to protect Manny at all. He certainly needs to control himself as well. That is, indeed, why I used his example. If I wanted to protect him then I would not have used any incident regarding him whatsoever. I would have ignored it. As far as the girlie-punch that was thrown at the D's player, I already told Manny that he needs to enroll in Wednesday afternoon boxing lessons with Niko of Synergy JuJitsu so that he doesn't embarrass mankind ever again with such awful technique & effort.

Does that clarify things?

Best,

Dale

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Response to the Response to the Letter of Complaint

Thanks for the lecture, shouldnt you be working now? Yes, it does clarify things.

We all commit fouls, some times deliberately and sometimes just badly timed tackles. So be it!

But walking up to players with clinched fists, pushing, striking players has to be a direct red card. That is solely the job of the ref. It would be in JIFL and all players best interest, nobody would ever argue that. Please Dale get on to the refs, tell them to red card these idiots. Ask them to focus on this, just for the next month. Lets see if it could change something...

Peter.

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Response to the Response to the Response to the Letter of Complaint ...

I was just about to sms you about not replying to his comments since the last thing we need is more controversy in this league. Oh well... Anyway...

Cheers

(Marvin)

Ultimate Response to the Response

Too late. I already answered.

-Dale

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