Yep, did you think I was joking? With the squad we've got, and particularly with it being such a fucking distance away, I don't really want anyone turning up expecting to play and not playing. If you know you're not playing and still want to turn up then that's fine, but I don't want people going all that way, getting up early, then standing around and then going all the way home again without playing.

So the first thing to do was to offer anyone who fancied a week off a week off - like I explained before, anyone accepting this isn't subject to the same rules as if you have a holiday or something, so John is highly likely (considering the form he's been showing) to get straight back in the side for the Cold Ash game. At the moment I'm still left with 4 subs, meaning one person will not play. I'll see tonight whether people would rather all turn up and risk being the 4th sub (can depend on how the game's going) or whether someone fancies a rest/lie in/etc. After that I'll ask if people would rather know who the 4 subs are going to be, so they can then make up their minds with that knowledge. After that there'll be a quick 4 minute rifle shooting test, a 3 hour written exam and a cake-baking contest to decide who's in the starting line up. That's how far we've come.