Match of the day

 Match of the day 

We didn’t go to church this morning. Instead, Roz went to pick up Uncle Albert while I put a continental breakfast together, bread and butter and jam, coffee with cream and sugar - real butter and real jam, real cream from real cows, real cane sugar. After breakfast - here’s why we didn’t go to church - Uncle Albert and I sat down to watch his Arsenal at Everton: Sanchez, Mesut Özil, Lacazette; Rooney and young Dominic Calvert-Lewen.

     Rooney! The first ten minutes were all Arsema; but the eleventh belonged to Rooney when he got the ball in a bit of space just outside the 16-yard box and made it 1-0 Everton.

     Then, it was all Arsenal again - and Jordan Pickford, the Everton goaltender.

(Outside a flock of starlings, in their winter coats despite the warm weather, were attacking the two rusty dogwoods between our house and the Baxters’ next door, stripping away the bright berries.)

All Arsenal stymied by Pickford until the fortieth minute, when Nacho Monreal punched in the rebound from a Granit Xhaka shot Pickford couldn't knock far enough away. And it was 1-1 at the half.

Winter Starling   /   Rebecca Lowe

“An entertaining half of football,” Uncle Albert said. He was right. “Help me up,” he said. I did. He stood almost still for a minute, just rocking a little to the left and back, left and back. I reached for his elbow, but he waved me away and set off slowly in a brisk shuffle to the bathroom. “You could get me a cup of coffee, though,” he said.

     He’d drunk only half of his first cup. But I poured it out and made another, teaspoon-and-a-half of sugar, plenty of cream and set it by his chair. He was in the bathroom a while. I watched the starlings, at least two dozen that I could count. Finally, I called, “Uncle Albert!” “Coming,” he said. “Have I missed Rebecca Lowe?” he asked. “I hope so,” he said.

     “I’m afraid so,” I said at the same time. “She’ll be back at the end of the game though.”

Tom Davies was on to start the second half for Everton in place of Ashley Williams. “Was Williams on a yellow card?” I asked Uncle Albert. “I don’t think so,” he said, “but he should have been.” Uncle Albert doesn’t like Ashley Williams, who he thinks is something of a thug. I don’t agree, but I don’t say anything but, “Mmmm” (sounding a bit like Dr. Feight).

     The fifty-third minute: in a stunningly, beautiful Arsenal-at-its-best passage of play that brings three players into the box, Özil heads in a perfectly weighted Alexis Sanchez pass, and it’s 2-1 Liverpool. And in the seventy-third , five minutes after Gueye goes off on a second yellow, Lacazette scores on a lovely pass from Özil, just touch-touch: Özil passes to Lacazette who passes it into the net past a helpless Pickford.

     And the game is effectively over, though both Everton and Arsenal score another goal.

(The starlings must have been savagely hungry. By the time I’ve taken Uncle Albert home and come right back, they have stripped both trees and are gone.)

10.22.17