Want to get involved in some football in Madrid? Why not try Luc Ciotkowski’s team with no name?

This is our new team shield. We haven’t got a name yet, but we’ve got a shield. I made it yesterday on Photoshop with different odds and ends off the internet. It’s made up of a football, a little Osborne bull, sinisterly butchered player from a Pro Evolution Soccer screenshot, a butchered Scarborough Football Club (a struggling English football team that went bankrupt this year) shield and a pint of Guinness. Not a classic piece of design I’ll give you that, but, to say I’m someone whose drawings of cats and horses can only be differentiated by their size, I’ve got limited resources to draw upon. Besides, I did it mostly to cheer myself up after the Santana debacle (see Santana Debacle post).

I think the different elements sum up pretty well what we’re about.That’s not to say the pint of Guinness and Osborne sherry bull mean that we’re Spanish Guinness drinkers or Irish sherry drinkers. No, that would be far too clever for me. It’s just football, Spain and beer. Now, that could start you thinking that we’re a group of drunken Brits vainly attempting to delay the onset of a beer-gut. That’s not the case. Well some of us are fighting off bellies and we probably all like to party, yes, but since I’ve played for the team I’ve counted 11 different nationalities and at the moment I think we’re made up of Spanish, Scottish, English, French, Australian, Cuban, Italian and Argentinian players.

It was over a couple of whiskies and coke at a European Vibe night on a Friday in January 2006 that I first got involved. I got introduced to Lewis Carroll (that’s his real name, and he’s definitely not a reverend) and, after a bizarre first twenty seconds that went, “Alright, I’m Lewis.” “How’s it goin’, I’m Luc.” “You what?” “It’s Luc” “No, I’m Lewis,” “Aye, and I’m Luc.” You’re Lewis, too?” “No, Luc.” “Nook??” “Naw mate, Luc” “Lu? Alright mate. Where you fae wi’ a name like that? China?” “Edinburgh.” “Aw, you poor bastard, never mind mate, eh?” (give a boy from Glasgow a few drinks and he thinks he’s Billy Connolly) I was invited to Saturday afternoon friendly football. (Anyone can go to this now and new players are welcome. If you are interested, you can sign up on this site. There are games on Wednesdays and Saturdays at Colegio Santa Maria del Pilar, metro Sainz de Baranda.

The outside rim of the shield is butchered from Scarborough F.C.’s badge; a team that was relegated from the English Football League in 1999 because of a goal scored by an on-loan goalkeeper, after five minutes of added-on time in the final match of the season. The only relevance of this was that I was unlucky enough to be a fan of this club. Although, I’ve just realised that our team has a peculiar end-of-season misfortune in common with Scarborough, it’s a story that deserves its own post (see post ‘Champions for 25 minutes’).

Coming back to the main point, though, we’re still looking for a name. We’ve had a few already; three in two years. We started out as ‘Los Vallecanos’ (although oddly there was nobody from Vallecas in the team), then briefly became ‘Deportivo La Latina’ and then, most recently, ‘Hot English’. The end of last season saw our Anglo-Italian founder/player/manager, Roberto ‘Gentle’ Savage, leave for warmer climates. (40° not hot enough for you in the summer, Robbie?) This season we’ve got Lewis Carroll and Angelo Cavallucci at the helm with a five-a-side team and a seven-a-side team and we want a new name for a new era.

So, any suggestions?

As our Anarcho-Syndicalist red and black colours suggest, we’re going to sit round a table and argue until the person who shouts loudest finally gets their way. Either that or we’ll just name ourselves after whoever gives us some sponsorship money.

Give us some options, whatever you think of can’t be as stunningly inappropriate for a football team as some guys in our league who are collectively called ‘Audrey Hepburn’.
I’ll start the ball rolling… Staying on the lines of red and black and Anarcho-Syndicalism, what about using the name of the trade union, CNT, but pronouncing it as a word and not separate letters, and with ‘United’ at the end?
Right your turn…