Middle Park Football Club

The 2008 MPFC Reserves finished the season beating Hellenic Moorabbin 3-0, clinching their third championship in a row and completing a 3 year unbeaten record. A comprehensive achievement..

The MPFC Reserves team in 2008 missed some opportunities of nailing the championship even earlier. Being 2 – 0 up against Old Xavs and then Gospic Bears and having to settle for two draws against both teams, meant the MPFC Reserves would have to settle on a challenging last month of having to win every single game until the end of the season. Gospic Bears held Old Xavs to a draw in the last round, handing the 2008 championship to MPFC on goal difference and a game in hand.

There have been some memorable games the MPFC Reserves team was involved in this year. Some games were hard fought, some easy wins, some games just made you think, “now if they only played liked that for 90 minutes”.

A game that comes to mind was the away game at ETA Buffalo. 2 – 0 down at half-time and playing with a hang over, the Reserves rallied, came back and won 3 – 2.

When the final whistle blew, the ETA players just stared at each other wandering what had just happened. The ETA supporters just stared at the MPFC Reserves walking off the park. Another day, another win, job done – let’s not talk about the first half. The reverse fixture saw MPFC thump ETA 12 – 0.

Also, who could ever forget the game against Campbellfield Lions away? Horrible pitch, horrible wind, horrible day. Dibbsy scored. Happy to drive south back home with a point. The day could’ve been disastrous.

MPFC Reserves were challenged this year. Teams such as Albert Park, Old Xavs, Gospic Bears, Campbellfield Lions lifted when they played us. Old rival Albert Park made sure we had some tough games against them. That game at Bob Jane Stadium was an absolute pain the neck. Let’s not talk about how many opportunities were squandered in front of goal.

Opposition teams such as Gospic Bears and Old Xavs performed as reasonable opposition.. As much as Old Xavs would like to beat their chests and claim they were worthy runners-up, they couldn’t beat MPFC or the Gospic Bears. They drew with Gospic Bears twice, drew with MPFC once and were soundly beaten on their first encounter with MPFC. I must make a mention of the usual match reports from the Old Xavs website. Not only were their match reports consistently crap and predictable, it also explained the reason why they would like the smell of their own butt burps (thanks Chris P) and make you truly believe the Summer of Love from 1967 is well and truly alive in East Kew.

Accusing the opposition’s team game plan of being a matter of just playing long bombs and then glorifying a loss (MPFC 2 Old Xavs 1) when their goal came from a long hopeful bomb just made you more determined to win the Championship. Thanks Old Xavs for the motivation. Pity Gospic Bears didn’t finish runner’s-up. Good solid opposition, who pushed MPFC on both
occassions.

Now enough of bridesmaids, back to us.

Contributions from players who progressed into the 1^st team squad during the year such as Iain S, Martin G, Dave M and Mark Stone does not go un-noticed. Thanks for your contribution.

To the guys who weren’t consistently in the starting line-up but helped out when needed such as Owen W, Tom J, Stevie L, Matt W and Nik T, thanks for helping out.

Additional new players such as Carl T and Andy S made fantastic season’s for the club. Their speed and tenacity created havoc amongst the opposition and worked wonderfully well together as attacking midfielders, especially when the 4-1-2-3-2-1 formation was utilized.

I’m not going to single people out here - To the rest of the squad members (who some have shared championship season’s with me before), thanks for creating a fantastic team spirit, thanks for your efforts, this achievement is a credit to all of you and Congratulations on winning the Championship and helping the Club achieve 3 Championship’s in a row.

This one seems a little bit sweeter.