On Sunday, our men’s 1st team had to summon a team to play the away leg of the Weymouth/Portland game. However, a bank holiday on Monday, and the approaching final exams made it really hard for us to gather enough players. Our team had only 7 players going until the last minute, when Michael Stephanou (Napa) decided to step up and come to the trip as well, disregarding his “tough” studying schedule. 8 players (one of them being the big Tankov, wrapped in the last 3 games) seemed too little for a game that is known to be violent and majors always stack up. The final team summoned for the game including Napa remains in SUWPC history as the big 7 although they were eight, in the same way the 3 musketeers were actually 4.

Our team dominated every quarter of the game, by playing the most well organised and sensible game they have ever played. The fear of getting wrapped with three majors held the team together and led to the Stags playing as effectively as possible in both defence and attack. The third quarter had the surprise wrapping of Napa with 2 majors, due to a set of mistakes in the game sheet that had him down with 3 majors. This led to our team playing with no sub for almost half of the game. However, the big 7 knew that one more challenge was presented to them and there was no other option than accepting it.

Near the end of the game, and because there was no 30 sec stop-clock to limit the duration of the attack, the Soton lads managed to hold the ball for long intervals thus minimising the opportunities for the opposition to attack. A master of time-wasting and dribbling with the ball rose to the task and held the ball effectively for long duration; his name was Will Logothetis (el Loco). But after some odd majors, el Loco had to leave the game and so our team played with a man-down for the rest of the game (30 seconds).

When Josh Rowland (one of the big 8) was asked about the game through whatsapp he responded: “Yeah I think it was the best match of the year”. It is believed that, during this whatsapp conversation, he was sobbing from the stress and the exhilaration of being part in one of the SUWPC’s biggest wins (no actual evidence of his emotional state exists but this way things seem more dramatic).

The final score at the end of each quarter was:
1st quarter: 3-1, 2nd quarter: 6-2, 3rd quarter: 10-2, and, 4th quarter (final score): 13-2

Thank you to the girls for the support and filling up the game sheet with our names during our game.

The big 7 (and their hat numbers) namely were: B Kingsley-Smith (1), P. Logothetis (2), M. Stephanou (4), T. Walton (6), J. Rowland (7), Nick Tankov (8), A. Horlock (10), and, W. Logothetis (11).

Scorers:
4 – Josh Rowland
4 – Panos Logothetis
2 – Tim Walton
1 – Michael Stephanou
1 – Alex Horlock
1 – Will Logothetis

Majors:
3 – Michael Stephanou, Will Logothetis
2 – Panos Logothetis
1 – Tim Walton