The Me Me Me Show

It was a bright cold day in November and the clocks were striking thirteen. Ping Pong, his chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort to escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the glass doors of London Bridge, though not quickly enough to prevent a swirl of gritty dust from entering along with him.

A rag-tag bunch of unruly misfits gathered on platform 6 and boarded the next train to Kent middle class suburbia to take on the Met Police's finest. Arriving to the pitch, the setting was felt like something from Midsomer Murders…little did anyone know a massacre was about to take place.

In the changing rooms, the recent influx of fine young backs forced some of our oldest and baldest backs into new territory, with the fine young writer of this tale commanded out to take up position in the pack following in the footsteps of such greats as Niall "Analog signal" Flannery and Eric "Wasteman / the ultimate sex pest" Clark.

Once positions were flung out with the accuracy of an American drone strike, a warm-up took place consisting of the classic 100m jog pitchside, largely due to the fact that there was some confusion as to the kick-off time. With our experience in wrong kick-off times vast, I believe it's become part of the mind games devised by Ping Pong to lure the opposition into a false sense of security from the off. Clever Ping Pong.

The game began with a shakey start, as many the Southwark team shrugged off the jet lag from the long journey South.

Using the benefit of a slow error-ridden first 10 minutes filled with scrums, Southwark found their feet, and with the scrum holding strong up and down the pitch, young Patrick consistently released fast ball. The fast hands and feet of our backs sliced the Met up, big Paddy and Fergus carrying and gaining yards with ease. Within 10minutes the front row set a solid platform 10 yards out, the work was done, and following a flurry of digging and faultless delivery from Pat, in a vain attempt to run away from the menacing bobbies in the pack opposite, a balding Ulsterman sized gap opened up and your narrator slipped through for our first try. A man with a full head of hair, would not have made that valiant squeeze.

Our imposing front row began to dominate the Met's scrum, as the Polis (possibly all full of doughnuts) unused to Thumbs, Scott and Joe's industrious work rate, began to fold to the pressure, Matteo Quartu providing a solid drive through their scrum in the back row. Driving over and regaining possession, we found ourselves camped in their 22 for a second time in 20minutes and your kind and honourable writer went over for another.

Following the restart and a precision kick out of play from Cal 20 yards from the Met try line, a quick line out was taken as Donkey passed the active ball back into play. Ironically, "Sleepy Head" Johnson was the only man actually still awake and following a very relaxed pass (some could even say Donkey didn't have a baldy what he was doing), went barrelling through the dazed coppers standing around picking their noses and placed her right under the posts. Unfortunately, Johnson's high state of alertness seemed to take it's toll, and the energy sapping led him to nestle up in a corner seat of the Miller for 40 winks at 8pm that night.

Not long after Cal took himself on a fantastic mazey run, snaking through 3 Met Police backs, and was left home and dry again over the try line. This time however, Cal, in his ever gracious mercy, decided to save the coppers a bit of dignity and before setting the ball down and cast it behind him back over the try line in a Dalai Lama-esque level of selflessness. Thankfully for Cal, the Met Police backs offered him another chance not long after, Cal recreating the parting of the red sea and sailing in for another try right under the posts.

The next 20minutes, Southwark really found their feet potentially assisted by the fact that at least half the team had already spent the early years of their life running at speed away from Police. Ping was solid under the restarts, gathering the high ball and taking it into the Met repeatedly. Thumbs, Joe and Johnson took down the Met forwards with such ferocity, you'd swear they were delivering retribution.

Into the second half and a flashy series of moves between Cal, Fergus and Paddy, allowed Nick to come blazing onto the ball on the outside centre, step a poor Met onlooker and go over despite Lawrence's thwarted attempts at interception (Nick swore there were paparazzi somewhere, Kanye West is less photographed these days than this man). Fergus using his big mawn power, blasted through not long after for one of his own.

The Met becoming increasingly desperate utilised age old tactics and began to target our scrum half, Pat beginning to take a battering at the hands of the Met Police that would make Peckham proud. To save the man's legs for a more worthy opponent Patrick went off to a fanfare, and Donkey was brought in to take up the gauntlet.

Restarting play, Ping and Thumbs slamming into the Met forwards, left Donkey to re-circulate the ball back out and finding a gap between the forwards my natural Northern Ireland instincts kicked in, galloped away from the Fuzz and the most handsome man in London town found the try line for a third time.

With the Met Police looking increasingly tired, Cal utilised his new found fly half footwork, dancing round the Police's entire back line, ney the entire squad, putting himself in for a second try, emulating the great Michael Flatley (with mildly less sequins, and considerably whiter teeth).

Special mention to Lawrence for being in for a try on no less than on three occasions and called back by the ref each time. Thank god for his solid kicking performance with 5 conversions. Who would think a man so comfortable in pink salmon had such kicking prowess.

I think the Met scored at some point as well.

The fun didn’t end there, where upon leaving the Met Police Sportsground's lavish surroundings, Ping decided to take everyone on an evening safari through the set of the Blair Witch Project for an hour. Although no witches were harmed in the making of this safari, I heard a few squeaks out of Donkey that I can only assume were consensual.

J. Shannon – 3
Cal – 2
Nick – 1
Fergus – 1
Johnson – 1
Lawrence – 5 conversions

Report by Mr ShanShan