Pass and Move it's the IUE groove. Crystal Piazza 0-5 IUE

Romagnoli, Wed 21 Feb 2008. Scorers: Manolo, Luis, Irial (3)

Pass and Move is a novelty song released by Liverpool FC for their (losing) appearance in the 1996 FA Cup Final. It includes such lyrical gems as 'Rush has scored more than all the rest/Respect to the Liverbird upon his chest.' Anyway, A couple of interesting things happened after last night's game. One, I found about about how Ali checks to see whether her jeans need washing. Ask her, it's, erm, interesting. Two, I had a violent nose bleed at six in the morning while unwinding reading Sebastian Faulks.

After our excellent performance last night, I think I will take it easy with this match report. I am a litttle bit sleepy to be honest. So, with some of our star players missing Miguel had to be brought in last minute for Francesco after the latter didn't bring his ID. Lucky that, that Miguel was right there in the changing room. I bet he doesn't remember though. The opposition had a new tactic: not wear the same colour shorts or socks, and have a stupid tricolour shirt (purple, white and yellow - not even the shirt of their side, but that of SanCat, the team that owns that pitch. The idea was to get the ball on the floor and make it do the work, getting the opposition to do all the running. The Romagnoli pitch is easily the best in the league - I actually wanted to get it for us - so big and such a great surface. We used it fantastically. Playing with a sweeper has opened up the pitch for us a lot, and we scored three goals in the first half that all started with the ball at the back. Simple but quick passing and moving put us in so many times that we couldn't fail to score a few. Manolo, Luis and Irial all finished off great moves. We also missed bucket loads of chances. We could have been 6 or 7 up at half time. We defended competently, knowing when to gett rid, but more importantly when to play it. We won headers and made clearances well. The ref gave them a few dodgy freekicks around our box but we dealt with them calmly. Thankfully he didn't give them a penalty for a couple of claims they had. We mised the play up well, with a great combination of short passing, long balls into the channels and crosses.

Three-nil at half time. Simon, captain for the day, was worrying about the Celtic result. I was worried about covering the spaces better and winning more of the second balls in the mdfield. They put an extra man upfront in the second half, and played more long balls, but achieved as little penetration as a timid first year EUI economics researcher. Our wingers got tired, and we looked less fluid as we covered the spaces less readily. We still played some absolutely beautiful stuff, with Irish heading in a cross from the left, and then getting his hattrick with an absolutely belting volley after Johnny, just on as sub, headed it into his path. They missed a generously awarded penalty(we knew he would give them something). A am glad that boy missed it in particular because he was a **** (insert for own expletive). He had socked Mate in the ear and studded me in the back of the leg. Ha. Charles' reaction was great.

I was determined to get through this game without conceding, and screamed manically for the last few minutes for people to carry on working, carry on marking, carry on covering the spaces. I make no apologies for doing this. 5-0 was a deserved result, and it could easily have been so many more. A great performance on a great pitch. We even got quite a few fans all the way over there. Debut for Jeremy after a year and a half of coming to training. Well done to everyone. Some great performances - everyone played well actually. It's only three points though. Thanks to Si for missing the Celtic game for us. Training Friday at 9 at Cerreti

Also, great to see Alex Trechsel last night in Finnegan, then at the Baraccio, then at the new Kitsch pub. We missed you in that fight last week mate.

Team (1-3-4-1-1): Charles - Luke - Mate, Simon, Dom - Manolo, Luis, Ernesto, 'Miguel' (Johnny) - Norberto (Jeremy) - Irial