Abbey United FC are the next best thing to Cambridge United; a group of fans that play against other fans' teams around the country in friendly games, usually on Saturday mornings.

Here's the report of their first match of this season, on Saturday against Mansfield Town fans.

Mansfield Town 4 Abbey United 1

It was the start of a bright new era for Abbey United. Quite literally, as we were wearing United's bright yellow third strip from last year.

The day didn't start well - leaving my directions on my sofa was not good - but thankfully, all 11 players turned up before kick off. Despite the game starting on time, the annoyingly picky ref decided that we were short of time and would have to play 40 minutes a half. Now, I don't normally moan about refs but this bloke seemed to have delusions of grandeur. I have no idea what level he felt he was refereeing at, but it wasn't a friendly match between two fans teams!!

Sadly, in a team of 11, we had no goalkeeper. One of the Mansfield lads who had just come along to watch ended up playing for us in goal and did a grand job. I would like to thank him personally, but I have no idea what his name was. There were also several new players in the squad, and the starting XI was:

GK: Mansfield bloke, RB:Jordan Worland, LB:James Barringer, CB:Mark Case, CB: Mark Bentley, RM: Andrew Lang, LM: Jack Rogers, CM: Frankie Fry, CM: Richard French, FW: Jamie Bates and FW: Kyle Scott.

There was a rolling sub for the game, as Tom was the last man over, so it was he who had the privileged role of watching us.

The opening goal was from a free kick. A 'good foul' from Jordan stopped a goal scoring opportunity, but the Mansfield player flicked the ball over the wall and into the corner. Our keeper for the day assured us that the goalscorer had never done that before in his life. Soon after, we hit Mansfield on the break and a good ball over the top was thumped home by debutant Jamie.

We were playing some nice football at this stage, but were struggling to communicate with each other, partly due to not knowing each other's names and partly due to a slight lack in confidence in ourselves. We couldn't hold out until half time however, and went in two one down after a mix up between the keeper and Andy saw the ball slip in to the corner of the net. HALF TIME 2-1

A slight reshuffle in the second half saw left back James move to left wing and Mark C move to left back with Jordan moving into the middle and Andy starting the second half on the bench (or on the touchline with the flag depending on how grand you want me to make it sound). Richard started at right back.

The plan was to get in behind them, between their full backs and centre halves. Unfortunately, the third goal came early on in the second half and after that we were always struggling. It was probably (i.e. definitely) offside, but alas it's not worth moaning now. We had some bright play after this, and had a few half chances but it was obvious that we didn't have any players who would naturally call themselves 'a striker'.

With 15 minutes to go 'Mansfield bloke' came out of goal and Mark C went in. A willing, but not natural goalkeeper. Mansfield finished off the scoring with a header from a corner that the goalkeeper (Mark C) really should have claimed. FINAL SCORE 4-1

The game was followed by 'snap' back at the local pub, (For those of you who don't speak East Midlandsish, snap means food) and the pleasure of watching the second half of Aberdeen versus Dundee United.

Overall, it was a decent performance, considering we didn't really know each other, didn't have time for a proper warm up and that we didn't have a proper goalkeeper. The new players promised to play again, and so there is something to work with for the future.

We could have a game against Grays next Sunday, so if you feel Abbey United is for you, get in touch with me (markgcase@yahoo.co.uk) or Richard (richardfrench@abbeyunited.co.uk)

For more information (and to see some very attractive footballers, for you girls out there) go to www.abbeyunited.co.uk

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