In the space of a week, we got the ball rolling on the idea of a Finance vs IT match, and within the said week, we had all signed up. 12 players no less!
It just goes to show, that with a bit of hand holding and nudging, big things can be achieved. It proves that the desire is there. We got 12 signups, for a 5-a-side game with 1 sub each, which is what we have struggled to do amongst the general group on a weekly basis. I'll be honest, it was a lot of work. What people often don't see, is the background work that goes into it. Finding a game, that is empty, a venue, then having to change it all, when the group of players change dates etc. It's thankless, and tiresome. But it's all worth it...in the end. To do it over and over, weekly, though, while trying to find the right balance, could be almost a full-time job, which is untenable.
A lot of what we do at FC7, has reasons. This wasn't about just adding a bit of banter and needle to what would of been just another weekly game. There were many inter-twining threads to this. We were delivering on a 2 year old promise, to our fallen comrade, Luca, to get that IT vs Finance match finally sorted! There was another reason for setting this game up. Rivalry, creating a little bit of harmless banter, to entice people into footy, rally players who weren't in the IT/Finance collective to get their acts together.
We can't be sure, but it has the potential to do that. Shaun Whittle, from the "Planning" department, was already envious. In fact, he seemed pretty determined to get his own team together. Being ambitious, we can probably get another team made up of the rest of FF and then even branch out to get together a non-FF team. These are only ideas and talk however, but reality can sometimes materialise from even the wispiest of thoughts. We will see.
Our CFO, has dusted off his boots to join the game, and true to form, once we confirmed the date, then suddenly extra interest from other players within IT and Finance materialised. This is just the start though, there will be plenty of chances for everyone to take part. Again, the fear of missing out, is a tool we need to utilise more, as harsh as it might sound.
In my previous article, I mentioned, the unforeseen problems of returning to "normal", but one positive that I didn't bring up, was that we are all seeing each other face to face more often now.
A whatsapp message, can be ignored, be irritating, or can be muted long term. But someone coming up to you in the office, and getting in your face, can't be. We need to do this more. We're also lucky to have drinks in the office offered to us all, every 2 weeks on Thursday. Strangely, this has actually created it's own set of problems for our weekly Thursday game......we have had to cancel some games, or move them to another day (more on this later). But it has meant that we get to push the footy agenda out, to people who we thought had no interest in playing.
Women, for example. We have already found 5/6 ladies who have expressed interest in a kickaround, but I can already see, that this is akin to when we started our men's game. It's just about getting that 1st game setup. I'm eager to separate this out from our usual Thursday game, however, after much pensiveness.
Not being sexist, but we have already created a separate 2G group for the ultra competitive/better players, and the last thing we want is to experiment on our weekly bread and butter Thursday game, it could be great, but it could be detrimental, either way, I'm not willing to take the risk. I think we look at a Tuesday or Wednesday game, and see what the interest is. After all, talk is cheap.....and we for the last year or so, have seen a lot of that. There's an actual difference in talking and doing, but the idea has been thrown out there, so it's up to me, to setup a date and then for the talkers to deliver.
Intra-department games was Jumbo's idea. So credit where credit is due. I was a little doubtful, but once we got Padraig aka The BigFlop taking care of organising the Finance side of things, things were sorted in lightning speed. Another lesson for me, to be more willing to delegate. I'm not too harsh on myself, as everyone involved has great ideas, but when it comes them, helping on delivering those objectives, they often mingle back into the crowd.
We know need to 100% make sure this game goes ahead, it's booked, people have paid, but these things are never set in stone. There's things out of our control. Injuries, people being sick. self isolation due to Covid testing, other commitments rearing their head, all of which contribute to players dropping out. We have a buffer of 1 player each, and potential backups, but we've been in this game too long, to know that this game is anything but certain. If we can deliver it......then it could be a catalyst for more interesting and refreshing angles to the FC7 story.
A lot hinges on this match...
The 3rd option we are investigating, is games against other companies. This, in my opinion, is proving to be harder than anything we've come up against before. For all the moaning I do about our own bunch of Se7enistas, they generally come through, getting some commitment from other companies is almost impossible. We have irons in the fire, with Disney, Clarion Events, Pioneer Gaming, 6P6 & Beauty Pie. That's all they are, currently, potential matches. Often people seem eager, but the reality is that talk, well, it's always easy to talk....."doing" is what makes the character of a man or woman.
But still...they are options we never had before, I can only do my bit and reach out to these companies. Ultimately, it comes down to cold statistics. I tried to explain this to Jumbo. The more people we have in our football whatsapp, the more players we have to sign up. Same applies to playing against another company. The more companies we reach out to, the more likely that at least one of them will deliver.
All of this is "what ifs", but still. We need to look to the positives. Positive thinking equates to positive outcomes.
We have a lot on the FC7 plate, so plenty to be getting on with!
We wouldn't want it any other way.
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