[The Saucepan Man]

Thanks Ang.

Giles and I both played up front for our local football team. Whenever a goal was scored, it was always either him or me. Giles had a great talent for scoring goals. He could fire footballs into the net with ease. He had a real cavalier attitude, and it always seemed to pay off. Whenever he had the ball, he only had eyes for the goal, a target for him alone and no one else. He was my rival, essentially, which I always thought odd. We never really hit it off together.

“Look at his skill,” people would say.

“La La La!” I thought jealously. “I’m better than him.”

But, more often than not, I would find myself off-side when I made my runs and constantly had to endure linesmen’s calls. I guess I had to accept in the end that he was simply better than me. So, whenever jealousy struck, I took refuge in penitence and recited Ave Maria.

Still, we had a great football kit. Ann, a local artist, designed it for us.

There are the same number of words to find as there are in players in a football (soccer) team, all related.