IC put Bristol mini-tour to full use

At 2pm on Friday 22nd November the first impatient members of the mini-tour arrived in the union, for a live #AskMattCann. Like moths to a flame the remaining 34 touring rangers arrived to finally set eyes on the fabled tour tops. A rather fetching yellow and black number had been hand-picked from the literally tens of other options, and was met with looks of disgust from some and approving discussions of where it sat on the ICUAFC Kit Pengness scale from others.

Once everyone had arrived we made the short trip to Paddington to board what rumours had said was the busiest train in the country. These viscous rumours were soon shown to be true and a hasty free first class upgrade for half the team was the only way to get standing room, let alone an excellently reserved seat. The unsuspecting members of the First Class quiet carriage were shown a wonderful display of train box, one of the harder disciplines of the game.

After arriving in Bristol 1 hour and 43 minutes after leaving Paddington, we made our way to the hostel, which was a literal stone’s throw from the destination for that evening, Pryzm. Despite being voted the second worst student night in the UK, IC were not to be disheartened and entered looking for a stage to dominate. After kicking up a fuss about the dire lack of a stage, Frosty had a tiny disagreement with the door staff and promptly put himself under house arrest.

The game day was finally upon us, but the club Pimp had forgotten all his essential kit so a last minute dash to Sports Direct was undertaken, and a very late decision to purchase a ball would later be totally vindicated.

The bus journey took in some of Bristol’s more cultured sights, including the cathedral, a Banksy and the museum, before dropping us near the middle of nowhere. It was here however we discovered that Georgie, one of the netball social secs, had had so much fun at a previous football event that she followed us the 120 odd miles. Creepy.

Minds turned back to the football - we were ready to bring Tiki-Taka (pronounced Punt and Rush) to Bristol. However the pitch turned out to be on the side of a hill with more bobbles than over the road at Harlington. This wasn’t ideal for the high-tempo pass and move football Tim Beasley wanted to impose on the squad and so IC reverted to Tiki-Taka.

To match the disarray of the pitch the opposition provided a flat football (hence the excellent purchase just hours earlier), and after at least an hour, some nets. The light was fading but that was no matter, and the match began.

It was a very cagey affair with neither team able to keep possession, but both defences holding strong. The game needed a goal badly and Imperial aren’t ones to disappoint. A corner was promptly conceded and no-one picked up a runner from deep who buried his header into the roof of the net. University of Bristol Captain’s Select XI 1 – 0 ICUAFC. Disaster. IC responded by winning a throw-in deep in the Bristol half and exploited Miles Covers’ long throw with the help of the tall team, Dom Wood scoring with a looping header over the keeper. Cue pandemonium in the stands and a pitch invasion.

Within minutes it was 2-1, Guy Frankel scoring after some good work from Julian Iacoponi on the right sparking a second pitch invasion. Things were going far too easily for IC.

A mistake from Frosty at the back let the Bristol Striker get one-on-one with Sam who was beaten with an elegant dink which received a well-deserved round of applause from the travelling fans. Minutes later and an even worse mistake from Frosty put Bristol clean through again to put IC 3-2 down. Calamity. Julian came to the rescue once again and levelled the game at 3-3 on the stroke of half time. What a game. The only thing that could make it any better would be 8 more goals…

A disastrous change of goalkeeper led to an early flurry of goals, by which point the floodgates had been well and truly opened. Some more football was played and the final score was irrelevant. IC had got the all-important moral victory and that was all that mattered. Matt Cann was voted player of tour, an award all too familiar for him. We headed back to the hostel with some dignity intact, ready to be lost for good later that night.

After already having sampled the worst club in Bristol, IC thought it wise to keep low quality in mind and visited Walkabout, ranked 6, followed by Syndicate, second in the worst nights in Bristol (The Tab Bristol, 2013).

Again IC weren’t troubled by the poor quality of nightlife - we knew how to make anywhere good. Channelling Shakers, we headed forth but were stopped in our tracks, much like Groves, when a photo booth was spotted. Several hundred photos and millions of shapes later the night looked to be coming to a premature end. However IC weren’t quite finished and Kebab U Like It wasn’t ready for what was about to happen. YAYA! YAYA YAYA! YAYA YAYA! YAYA YAYA TOURE! KOLO! KOLO KOLO! KOLO KOLO! KOLO KOLO TOURE! 20 minutes later and it was time to call it a night.

Sunday arrived and IC departed, making it back in time to catch the last ¾ of Super Sunday with heads full of memories of a successful domination of Bristol.