Greenwich Gunners

Susie Costaregni The Dish Published in the Greenwich Time on February 25 2006 Scene . . . While the U.S. ski team was competing in Turin last Friday, the Greenwich Arsenal Football Club's star players, the Greenwich Gunners, were sporting their gold at The Ginger Man in Greenwich, celebrating their league championship in the Shoreline Adult Soccer League over 40 division. The club, founded in 1997, fields three teams: The Greenwich Arsenal over 30; Greenwich Arsenal over 40; and Greenwich Gunners football teams. In their inaugural season, the 2005 Greenwich Gunners won the division championship with a 14-1-1 record. Home fields include Greenwich Eastern Civic Center and Greenwich High School, and they hit the road for games throughout Fairfield County. Team players in the crowd included team manager Lou Constantini, Gary Cunningham (chief executive officer of Execution LLC, Gunners' sponsor), Joe Constantini, Gabriel Forero, Dave Gelcius and Mark Grund. For more information on the league, go to www.greenwicharsenal.com or www.saslsoccer.com. greenwicharsenal.com editor's note: This article wouldn't have happened without the diligent effort of Dave Gelcius, vice president of corporate communications for The Gunners. "60 Minutes next," said Dave. "Then the team calendar. Medals only. Hey, it's for charity."

Susie Costaregni The Dish Published in the Greenwich Time on February 25 2006 Scene . . . While the U.S. ski team was competing in Turin last Friday, the Greenwich Arsenal Football Club's star players, the Greenwich Gunners, were sporting their gold at The Ginger Man in Greenwich, celebrating their league championship in the Shoreline Adult Soccer League over 40 division. The club, founded in 1997, fields three teams: The Greenwich Arsenal over 30; Greenwich Arsenal over 40; and Greenwich Gunners football teams. In their inaugural season, the 2005 Greenwich Gunners won the division championship with a 14-1-1 record. Home fields include Greenwich Eastern Civic Center and Greenwich High School, and they hit the road for games throughout Fairfield County. Team players in the crowd included team manager Lou Constantini, Gary Cunningham (chief executive officer of Execution LLC, Gunners' sponsor), Joe Constantini, Gabriel Forero, Dave Gelcius and Mark Grund. For more information on the league, go to www.greenwicharsenal.com or www.saslsoccer.com. greenwicharsenal.com editor's note: This article wouldn't have happened without the diligent effort of Dave Gelcius, vice president of corporate communications for The Gunners. "60 Minutes next," said Dave. "Then the team calendar. Medals only. Hey, it's for charity."

Michael Winnall Award - Jim Elrod Over 30's MVP - Nicolae Piperea Over 30's Goalscorer - Jason Brasher Over 30's Rookie - Tello Silva Over 30's Einstein - Alex Dixon Over 40's MVP - Simon Gravatt Over 40's Goalscorer - Avdulla Djema Over 40's Rookie - Creton Hines Over 40's Einstein - Ian Carss Gunners MVP - Celso Pereira Gunners Goalscorers - Joe Costantini and Claudio "Luis" Martinez Gunners Rookie - Victor Kuri Gunners Einstein - Stephen Cahill The Number One Fan Award - Mr. "Papa" Costantini

Michael Winnall Award - Jim Elrod Over 30's MVP - Nicolae Piperea Over 30's Goalscorer - Jason Brasher Over 30's Rookie - Tello Silva Over 30's Einstein - Alex Dixon Over 40's MVP - Simon Gravatt Over 40's Goalscorer - Avdulla Djema Over 40's Rookie - Creton Hines Over 40's Einstein - Ian Carss Gunners MVP - Celso Pereira Gunners Goalscorers - Joe Costantini and Claudio "Luis" Martinez Gunners Rookie - Victor Kuri Gunners Einstein - Stephen Cahill The Number One Fan Award - Mr. "Papa" Costantini

Slowing slipping from consciousness, moments before being sliced open and refitted with a small gauze to block my two protruding hernias, I was engaged in a bizarre conversation with one of the nurses. I had mentioned that I had recently joined local soccer team Greenwich Arsenal, as one does in idle pre-double-hernia operation chit-chat. The nurse, rather pretty if my hallucinatory state wasn’t deceiving me, proceeded to reel off the names of John Thorsen, Richard Saunders and seemingly most of the squad. My last happy thought before falling into a deep sleep, one that was to be undisturbed by the surgeon’s scalpel, was that I had joined a club with groupies. In the cold light of day it occurred to me that a young Stamford nurse’s intimate knowledge of ageing soccer players had nothing to do with sexual relations and everything to do with physical repair. As the season wore on and the injuries piled up, I realised that my new colleagues must be the medical profession’s best customers. No wonder that pretty nurse knew them all. She must have stitched up every single one of them. My son, a fellow Chelsea season ticket holder, regarded my signing up to the Arsenal as the deepest betrayal. I tried to explain to him, as I did to my bewildered fellow Stamford Bridge regulars back home, that it was my cuckoo strategy. I told him that in three years time Greenwich Arsenal would be Greenwich Chelsea and playing in blue. It wouldn’t have been too difficult. If Wallingford can re-brand themselves as North Branford Azzuri anything must be possible. I would have started with the Italians first, persuading them that it would be better if we played in the colour of their national strip. With the Costantini clan (particularly Costantini senior) won over it would have been downhill. Eventually everyone else would then be seduced by the argument that the club would benefit from association with what will become the most successful side in the world. It’s such a shame that my plan hasn’t been given the chance to take root. Foiled by a relocation to the windy city. Oh well, there must be a Chicago Chelsea in need a big front man without a particularly good touch. Upon arriving in America last summer my first priority was to find myself a soccer team. I guess my predecessors, the Pilgrim Fathers, had the same problem three or four hundred years earlier. Sadly for them, they, unlike me, didn’t come across Tim Chase (Tim Chase not having been invented in the 1630’s) and ended up with ludicrous sports such as American Football and Baseball instead. I dread to think what might have become of me if I hadn’t stumbled across the esteemed Darien soccer coach in my second week here. When I asked him if he knew of any local clubs that might be desperate enough to take in an ageing balding Brit, Mr Chase looked me up and down before asking if I had any good t-shirts. I thought this a little strange, but reassured him that I did indeed have a good t-shirt collection. He nodded his head thoughtfully before suggesting I might like to check out Greenwich Arsenal. “But,” he added, “they take it very seriously and play to a pretty high standard.” He clearly doubted that I would make the cut. As I thanked him he asked once more, “And you’re sure you’ve got some nice t-shirts?” Months later, at a Wednesday practice session, I leant Tim a rare and treasured white shirt from Switzerland. I was playing on the side of the reds. (I’d started off playing in my blue Chelsea shirt, reasoning that it was colours against whites, but I had been told to change by Mr Paasman, who explained that it was reds against whites. I decided it would have been imprudent to point out to the deputy skipper that his bright orange Dutch shirt was stretching the interpretation of red to the point of color-blindness). I let ‘t-shirt’ Tim borrow my white shirt - a precious memento from a small village in Switzerland where I have a ski-chalet – and was then surprised to see him leave the game early, accelerating off at high speed, before I had the opportunity to ask for it back. When I questioned him about it a few weeks later the fleeting look of triumph in his eyes told me that I wouldn’t be seeing that particular t-shirt again. I started playing for Greenwich Arsenal last September. The team was top of the table. Nine months later, fortified by my contribution, we were bottom. The 2004 title had slipped beyond the grasp of a team that now had a striker who couldn’t score leading the line. I had failed to make any allowance for the different gravitational pull in this part of the world. It was only a few weeks ago, as I watched the diminutive Easton Rhino’s keeper completely disappear into the distance as he went to retrieve the ball after a particularly wild effort of mine had soared over and past the gaping open goal, that I realised there’s less gravity in New England than Old England. All those shots of mine throughout the season that would have spectacularly ended up in the top corner of the net back home had no chance here. Another phenomenon I couldn’t understand was how I could easily (although they might contend differently) put the ball past Lou or Ian in our practice games, but fail to make a dent on the score-sheet when it really mattered. The answer, when it came to me as I scored a hat-trick in our ‘friendly’ game against The Gunners, was obvious. I am programmed to score against, but not for, the Arsenal. Although it seems to strange to admit as much, I’ll miss not playing in the red of Arsenal. Perhaps in much the same way that Harry Potter is drawn to the dark side, I too am destined to flirt with the enemy. As an impressionable ten year old I did briefly transfer my loyalties from the flash Kings Rd boys to the double-winning Arsenal team. I even wore the strip back then. I might try to deny it, but Arsenal clearly has some kind of lure over me. My wife realises this. Although having no interest whatsoever in soccer, she recognises how important my new affiliation has become to me. When weighing up whether or not to go to Chicago, she put Greenwich Arsenal top of the ‘cons’ list. Perhaps she just likes me out of the house twice a week. It was a difficult choice – another six figures on the salary or Gerrit bawling me out on the training field every Wednesday evening. One thing Greenwich Arsenal has taught me is how to absorb seven different instructions at once. Often it seemed in seven different languages. Men are supposed to be poor at multi-tasking. I certainly find it hard enough to control a ball with two burly defenders converging on me, let alone know what to do with it if I’m lucky enough to retain possession. It was nice to receive so many helpful suggestions when such occasions arose, but, for a simple soul like myself, quite overwhelming. I learnt over time that the only response was to ignore it all and concentrate on my diminishing ability to kick a football. I’ve loved the multiculturalism of the club. Where else could I get such exposure to the motivational techniques and passion of the Dutch, to Croatian diplomacy with referees, to those silky South American skills, to English organisation (Ian and Richard showing that although we may have carelessly lost our Empire, no-one else can look after ID cards or put flags out on the pitch like the English), to American determination and positive feedback. I’ve never before played with such a veritable cocktail of Albanians, Jamaicans, Peruvians, French, Norwegian and Swiss. Chelsea, of course, were the first English side to field a side without any English blood a few years ago, but had nothing on Greenwich Arsenal in terms of diversity. I really feel I’ve been part of a global community brought together by the round ball. I’ve enjoyed occasionally bumping into fellow team members ‘out of work’ so to speak. So used to seeing him snapping at the opposition’s heels, I failed to recognise Roger as the smartly dressed man taking refuge from the traumas of ‘Batman Begins’ in the foyer of a Stamford cinema. I did, though, recognise Mike Vranos at a fund-raising event at our son’s school, but was confused as I knew Mike didn’t have a child there. It then dawned on me that he must attend fund-raising events all the time, such is his largess, even when he has no connection whatsoever to the event. The reason he sometimes cuts it a bit fine in getting to the game is that he’s clearly been giving away funds early every Sunday morning. But I have to say I was relieved that Mike chose to donate shirts rather than shorts to the cause. Wearing shorts that tight would have rendered me immobile in the middle of the field as well as raise my voice a few octaves. So it’s vaarwel, au revoir, arrivederci, adeus, auf wiedershen and goodbye to my brief flirtation with the red side. I leave with memories of Ian’s heroics against Wallingford, ringer Steve Cahill’s crunching goal away at Glastonbury that helped turn the tide and stave off relegation, the look on Jim Elrod’s face as I chose not to pass to him in front of an open goal at Cheshire in order to improve my own goal record, Gerrit’s geometrically-defying shot coming back off the inside of the post against North Branford Azzuri and his gentle words of encouragement throughout the season, Creton travelling across the back line at the speed of sound each weekend (occasionally taking with him any member of the opposition foolhardy enough to get in the way), Peter’s unflagging captaincy (and questionable judgement in keeping me in the side despite all reasonable evidence to the contrary), playing on the beach at Tod’s Point in temperatures that make ‘The Day After Tomorrow’ look like a reality show and my own considerable surprise at having scored three more right-footed goals this season than I have previously managed in my whole career. I will follow your future progress with interest. With Kurt’s return you’ll have a proper striker up front and all you’ll need to do to secure the Championship is to don those blue shirts.