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Reports
Manchester PrideGames 2005
20th August 2005
Ricky’s Primary School, Manchester
Lenny, Ricky, Gary, Pete, Theo and yours truly (Ricky) all went up to take part in the football 5-a-side.
Apart from Licky and Renny, the four of us stayed in a hostel in Manchester city centre which was cheap and cheerful, and was also the hostel that Stonewall were staying in.
On the Friday evening we had to register for the Pride Games to get
our goody bags and so on. Me and Gary got to the registration first.
The registration was held in a bar that was tucked away and hidden from
view and was difficult to find. The street was dead quiet and the only
commercial venue we could see was something called "Basement"
so we headed there. On the wall in the entrance
hall there was a poster of a scantily clad muscle mary which convinced
Gary that we were at the right place. I wasn't so sure. But we headed
down the stairs and at the bottom there was a guy sitting at the reception
handing some keys to a guy wearing nothing but a towel. Yes, Gary had
led us into a sauna. "We've come to register for the Pride Games"
said Gary. "Great, did you still want to come into the sauna?"
the receptionist said!
Anyways we eventually went to registration and met with the guys from Dublin and an infinite number of badminton players. We also met the guy from the Manchester FA who was organising the 5-a-side.
On the Sat morning bright and early we met up with the Stonewall people at our hostel to get the Pride Shuttle Bus to the venue, which was Ricky's primary school I believe.
There were two 5-a-side squads from Dublin and Village Manchester, and one each from Yorkshire, Leftfooters, Stonewall and Merseyside GFSN. The tournament was played on two 5-a-side pens with 2 groups of 4. In our group we had Dublin B, Village Mancs B and Merseyside GFSN. It was the first outing for both the Dublin and Liverpool teams which was great.
Our first game was against Dublin and we quickly got thrashed 3-0.
In our second game against the Merseyside GFSN we were quickly 2 in
the lead I think, but they equalised and the game ended up finishing
3-3 (Pete scoring 2 and Lenny scoring 1). By this point we felt we should
have done much better and were dreading playing Village Manchester.
Lenny was also suffering from an injury and Gary was
complaining at pain in his eye and accusing me of cumin in his eye the
night before.
The way Village Manchester played is quite tough, but it appears that we like to play that way too and we really raised our game. I think it was Ricky who scored first – the first time (in how many years Ricky has been coming to Leftfooters) that he had scored a goal at a non-kickabout. The game finished being 2-2 however with Pete scoring the second of our goals.
One memorable moment I remember from that game was when I challenged
loud mouth Graham for the ball and we ended up falling to the ground
with him falling on top of me and him refusing to get up. Also when
I came out of the pen I realised I had blood all down the bottom of
my shorts, as if I was going through some kind of menstrual cycle. It
turned out it had been from one of the Manchester players whom I had
committed a "rough" challenge with, and his knee had somehow
ended up rubbing my groin area.
Our real turnaround began when we had to play the teams in our group
for a second time. Dublin was first up and by this time we were a bit
scared of them as they were top of the group by a long shot. But as
everyone knows, it takes about an hour after the first kick-off for
a Leftfooters squad to warm up and it was yours truly who opened the
scoring (!). Pete scored a blinder too and we ended up winning 2-1.
Next up again was Merseyside. We scored a whopping 5 goals in 12 mins
and conceded only one, with Gary and I scoring 2 a piece (Gary
scoring directly from kickoff!) and Pete scoring the 5th.
This led the way to the crunch match in our group between us and Village Manchester for the 2nd place and therefore a place in the semi final. The Manchester lads had been watching our games against Liverpool and Dublin and had seen how we had raised our game and were keeping a special eye on our kickoffs after Gary's goal from the centre spot. I opened the scoring (!) and the game battled on until they equalised. Then Pete scored another cracker and we were leading for most of the game. About 15 seconds from time though there was a scuffle around our goal and we conceded and finished the game 2-2. This allowed Manchester to go and get beaten by Stonewall in the semi final (Stonewall going on to beat the Yorkshire Terriers in the final 3-2).
Although we were disappointed at loosing out on a semi-final by a whisper, we were all very proud of the way we, well, woke up and starting playing footie. Someone noticed that every single outfield player scored at least once. Theo did a great job in goal saving many a shot and we all felt like we'd done a job well done. Anthony Hardly was declared man of the match (even though he, alongside our own Ubaid, was in Manchester but playing in the Badminton events!).
After the 5-a-side we were given quite quaint looking "taking part" medals and got another of the Pride Games shuttle vans with the Stonewall lot again back to our hostel. Some of them had heard of us but never met any of us before and were quite pleased to meet us over the weekend. They had seen the last few of our matches and were joking that we were supposed to be walkovers, not battling Village Manchester players to the floor.
Later on that evening we had the Manchester Pride Games party in Manchester Town Hall. Unfortunately Gary didn't make the Town Hall reception as his eye problem was getting worse so he left to head back to the hostel. They laid on a dinner for us comprising either jacket potatoes or a pasta dish. It was very yummy and was in the majestic surrounds of one of the halls which had an amazing ceiling.
Some bloke was talking about how great Montreal was (yawn) and two of the Dublin lads won some prizes in the raffle. The Manchester team that was in our group had also paid us a compliment by saying that off all the games they played, their two toughest and enjoyable games were against us.
After the Town Hall we hit the city. Pete and Theo (after terrorising
people in our hostel with their "shenanigans" in the shared
dorm, the shower cubicles and…) decided to work their magic on
Poptastic. I went along with the Dublin lads to Canal Street where we
eventually came across the back of the Pink Paper with the headline
"Leftfooters Loose Copenhagen Cup"!!! I can honestly say
they are sooo looking forward to us coming over in Dublin, and they
are like Leftfooters long lost cousins. Ahhhh.
On my way back to the hostel later on that night I got a text from Gary. The pain in Gary's eye had got so bad that he ended up getting into a taxi to take him to a hospital. He texted me to say he was being kept overnight in the Manchester Royal Infirmary for observation. We were checking out in the morning so I texted back saying Id take his bags with him to the hospital.
The next morning I got on the bus to the Hospital after checking out of the hostel and went along to see Gary. It turns out he has an ulcer on his eye caused by his contact lens and he is staying in the Infirmary until Wednesday ;(
After I had been to see Gary I went along to Salford Quays where we had registered to take part in the Sport for All festival where I had put my name down to do some canoeing and Anthony had put his name down for Kayacking. At registration on the Friday we had also bought a £10 ticket to take part in the bell end boat race. The Canoing was fab and the weather the whole weekend was great. In fact we all got a bit sunburn (in Manchester!). For the bell end boat race we needed 10 people. Gary was in hospital, Lenny and Ricky were injured and Pete and Theo had already returned south. But Anthony came to the rescue with his badminton mates and some runners and we entered the race. After colliding with two other boats we didn't make it past the heats to the finals but we all had a good laugh.
After that was the Mad Hatters Tea Party which yours truly managed to slip into free of charge to eat tonnes of beautiful sandwiches and the most delightful cream cakes and fruit teas. Then it was back home to London ;(
Gary's eye ulcer aside, all in all it was an utterly fantastic weekend. Playing football is great in itself, but then to be able and go and take part in a completely different discipline the day after was great. It was exceptionally well organised and bodes well if Manchester wants to host a sporting event and/or a multi sporting event in the future. The rainbow flag flew over the city centre, there were posters for the Games and Pride all across the city, and the local MP's came down and gave speeches at some of the prize givings.
I was very sad to leave the city, and also very sad to leave Gary in
the hospital when he was booked on my train. Gary is still in hospital
in Manchester and is due to come back to London on Wednesday. Just heard
from Gary he was feeling a bit better. The nurses are applying eye drops
every half an hour and the pain is
slowly fading.
I'll keep you all posted as to his progress.
Manchester won't be having a Pride Games again next year due to the Official Gay Games and Fake Out Games. But if Manchester has another Pride Games again I'm def going and would recommend it to everyone. I believe Manchester are def going to bid for 2007 and they would make a fantastic job of it. Also Steve Hess who is the regional organiser for the Merseyside region (and leader of the Merseyside GFSN squad) was asking for votes for Liverpool to be host to the GFSN get-together either next year or in 2008. More about that soon. Bon Nuite
Richy