There was a lot of grunting and nodding of heads. Hat Trick Boy began to feel uncomfortable. By the end of training, he felt a lot worse. After an hour on the pitch being shoved, shouldered, elbowed and pushed to the ground, every single part of his body was hurting. He could only hobble home.
The first person he saw when he got home was his Mum. He straightened up and tried to pretend he was not limping and losing body parts.
‘How was training?’ she asked.
‘OK,’ he told her and disappeared as fast as he could.
He headed for his full size goals at the bottom of the garden and found Tilly had draped pink sheets over them and was pretending it was fairy land. She had tied pieces of string round her barbies and they were hanging from the crossbars. For a brief moment, Hat Trick Boy wished the Hammers FC team were in his back garden shooting balls at the goal where Tilly was playing. Then he realised he wouldn’t wish that on anyone, not even his worst enemy (who as it happened was Tilly).
So Hat Trick Boy went back inside to his room to wait for Cowpat to call round on his way to the park. Hat Trick Boy and his friends always went to the park on Saturday afternoons. Hat Trick Boy went on his bike. So did Uno. But Sid had to wheel his bike. He had added so many bits it looked more like a shopping trolley than a bike and was almost impossible to ride. Sid refused to take any of the bits off, just in case he might need them, in an emergency.
Cowpat was the only one without a bike. He didn’t want one. He had a skateboard, and he was faster than Sid was on his bike, which wasn’t difficult. He was also faster than Uno on his bike, which was more impressive. The only one he couldn’t beat was Hat Trick Boy.
Normally Cowpat threw a soggy piece of toilet paper at Hat Trick Boy’s window when it was time to go. Hat Trick Boy’s Mum had told Cowpat a million times she did not want her windows splattered with wet toilet paper. Cowpat always burped politely and then totally ignored her. This Saturday afternoon Hat Trick Boy waited and waited for the soggy toilet paper to appear, but nothing happened. He was still sitting by the window, waiting, when he saw Cowpat skateboarding back home. Hat Trick Boy waved at him but Cowpat did not look up and just disappeared inside his house.
Hat Trick Boy and Cowpat had been friends since the day Hat Trick Boy was born. As babies, they had used to lie next to each other and burp in each others’ faces. Nine years later, they were doing the same thing, only now they did it standing up. Today was the first time in his life that Cowpat had gone to the park without Hat Trick Boy. Hat Trick Boy knew what this meant. Cowpat had snubbed him. The friendship was over.
Something inside Hat Trick Boy began to ache. It wasn’t something that had been bashed or shoved or elbowed this morning. It wasn’t his legs, or his arms, or his back or his chest. It was something so deep inside, Hat Trick Boy didn’t know what it was called. But he could feel it, hurting.
If only Cowpat had actually bothered to play at the trials, he would have received a letter too. Cowpat was good, Hat Trick Boy knew that. The problem was getting Cowpat to want to be good. Cowpat’s Mum and his teachers had been trying for years, and had never succeeded.
But if Hat Trick Boy could get Cowpat to a Hammers training session, there might still be a chance for him. There was no point bothering with Sid and Uno, they had had their chance, and they had failed. But Cowpat was different. If Big Al saw Cowpat play, he would want him in the team. And that would change everything. It wouldn’t matter that Sid and Uno were no longer Hat Trick Boy’s friends. It wouldn’t matter that Hammers FC was not a nice football club. It wouldn’t matter that he didn’t have any other friends at Hammers FC. He would have Cowpat; and that was all he needed.
Chapter Five - Talking to Cowpat
Hat Trick Boy knew the hardest part of his plan was persuading Cowpat to come to training. Talking to Cowpat was never easy. Cowpat wasn’t much of a talker, or a listener. If you said, ‘Hello Cowpat,’ he might burp back at you or he might pull down your pants and run off at top speed, laughing.
Hat Trick Boy knew Cowpat better than anyone. But he was feeling nervous, and because he was feeling nervous, he did a stupid thing. He was normal. He waited until lunch time then sat down next to Cowpat and said,
‘Hello.’
Cowpat farted and moved away. Hat Trick Boy followed. Cowpat sat down in the middle of a table of receptions eating peas and meatballs. Hat Trick Boy sat down next to him. Cowpat threw a meatball at Hat Trick Boy and shouted,
‘Food fight!’
Then he ducked and moved as fast as lightning out of his chair. Before Hat Trick Boy could follow he was being pelted by peas and meatballs.
When Hat Trick Boy did manage to stand up, he had been hit more times than he had been at training with the Hammers. Even worse, the first thing he saw was Mr Hound staring at him and looking very cross. Hat Trick Boy spent the rest of lunch cleaning up the mess around the reception lunch table.
Hat Trick Boy didn’t try to talk to Cowpat until the following day, Tuesday. He spotted Cowpat in the queue to go into lunch and headed towards him. But Cowpat saw him coming. Cowpat moved further down the line until he was standing right behind the reception teacher Miss Finley. He waited for Hat Trick Boy to get closer. As soon as Hat Trick Boy reached him, he farted so loudly Miss Finley thought an elephant must have escaped from the zoo. The first person she saw, when she looked round, was Hat Trick Boy. Cowpat was no where in sight.
On Wednesday, Cowpat threw a mud ball at Hat Trick Boy and shouted ‘mud fight’. Unfortunately for Hat Trick Boy, he was surrounded by the same receptions that had so enjoyed the food fight on Monday. They went running after Hat Trick Boy, thinking it was a brilliant new game. Very soon, Hat Trick Boy looked as if he had been made out of mud.
On Thursday Hat Trick Boy had just started telling Cowpat about training when they walked past Miss Finley. Cowpat chose that moment to burp so loudly that she dropped her tray in fright, thinking she was under attack. When she looked round to see who had done it, she saw Hat Trick Boy.
Nothing happened to Hat Trick Boy on Friday. This was because he was already in detention for frightening Miss Finley. He was quite glad to be in detention. At least nothing can go wrong in here, he thought, sat on the chair right outside the office. Then Cowpat walked past, and did a silent but deadly fart. It was only after Cowpat was out of sight that Hat Trick Boy smelt it, and then so did Miss Finley, who was sat in the office keeping an eye on him. There was no one to blame but Hat Trick Boy, sitting all on his own, right outside the door.
Hat Trick Boy walked to training by himself on Saturday. He wasn’t thinking about natural disasters any more. If a natural disaster had happened right under his nose, he wouldn’t have noticed it. He was too busy feeling sorry for himself. He had spent all week without his friends and getting into trouble; it had been the worst week of his life. He was so miserable he didn’t even feel like playing football. He couldn’t remember ever feeling like that before.
Hat Trick Boy might not have been in the mood for football, but the manager, Big Al, certainly was. He had them running round the pitch, running round cones, running round each other and finally running into each other, at full speed, just to, in his words, ‘toughen you up’. Then he threw a ball onto the pitch, told them there were no teams and that the first one to score was the winner. A mad game of football started with 20 different boys and 20 different teams, and a pile up of boys as big as a mountain, with the ball lost somewhere at the bottom.
Finally Hat Trick Boy and the ball emerged from the pile. He started running, the ball at his feet, towards the nearest goal. There was no one in front of him but Jon Jamerson. Just before he reached Jon, he brought his leg forward as if to shoot but instead rolled the ball to the side and ran on. He was past Jon. His heart was pounding. He kicked the ball. He saw it shoot like a rocket into the back of the net. He jumped into the air, yelled in triumph, and ran off to celebrate. But as he drew closer to the other boys, his run got slower and slower. No one e
lse was cheering. No one else was even smiling. In fact, all the other boys were looking at him as they might an annoying fly, buzzing round their TV screen, getting in the way. Hat Trick Boy no longer felt like celebrating.
Then Big Al split the boys up into teams and gave each a summary of what they should be doing.
‘Your tactics,’ he told the first group, ‘are to make sure that after every tackle, you have the ball, and he’s on the ground.’
To the second group he said,
‘Remember, you don’t just have feet, you have elbows too. Use them.’
It was a painful half hour for Hat Trick Boy. Later, he would tell his Mum it had been OK. But the truth was he hated it. He just wanted to play football. He didn’t want to have to fight his way down the pitch towards goal.
At the end of the training session, Big Al told them they looked like a bunch of fairies and needed to get a lot more physical. Hat Trick Boy rolled his eyes and looked away. He saw Jon Jamerson nodding and looking very serious.
‘There’s one more thing,’ Big Al added. ‘I’ve arranged a friendly with a local side that’s just started up. Here, next Saturday, at Hammers FC. It'll be a great chance for you to practice the Hammer tactics I’ve been showing you.’
He paused and parted his lips in what was supposed to be a smile. He had hardly any teeth, and those that remained were tiny and the wrong colour, as if they had gone mouldy.
‘I say a friendly, but I really mean the opposite. Get my meaning lads!’
Then Big Al and all the boys, except Hat Trick Boy, grinned. Hat Trick Boy tried to smile but he couldn’t. His lips curled back but he looked as if someone was forcing him to eat a dead slug. He couldn’t hide it any longer, from himself or anyone else. He didn’t really belong in Hammers FC.
Chapter Six - Hat Trick Boy Writes a Letter
Hat Trick Boy had a lot of thinking to do. He spent all weekend thinking about how he hated playing football with the Hammers and how he missed his old friends, Uno, Sid and Cowpat. When he wasn’t thinking he was staring out his window, watching Cowpat go up to the park, and then waiting to see Cowpat come back again. But Cowpat didn’t come home until it was almost dark. Hat Trick Boy couldn’t help but notice Cowpat was covered head to foot in mud. He wondered what Cowpat had been doing to get so muddy.
By Monday morning, Hat Trick Boy had made a decision. He wanted to quit The Hammers, and he thought the best way to do that was by sending Big Al a letter. After all, Big Al had invited him to join the Hammers by letter, so Hat Trick Boy could leave the Hammers by letter as well.
That Monday, instead of going outside at lunchtime, Hat Trick Boy asked Mr Hound if he could stay inside. He told Mr Hound he had work to do. Mr Hound put a hand on Hat Trick Boy’s forehead to check his temperature. It felt normal and, to Mr Hound’s surprise, Hat Trick Boy looked sincere. So Mr Hound gave Hat Trick Boy his permission.
Hat Trick Boy sat down at a desk in the empty classroom and wrote a letter to Big Al.
Hat Trick Boy sucked his pencil. Maybe he should have mentioned his nose was a bit runny. He tried to sniff and nothing much happened. He forced himself to sneeze, and felt much better. So he added,
Then he folded the letter, wrote Sir Big Al on the envelope, and realised he didn’t know the address. He couldn’t send it. He would have to give it to Big Al in person. But Hat Trick Boy didn’t like the idea of putting the letter in Big Al’s hand. He didn’t like the idea of what Big Al might do. Hat Trick Boy screwed up his letter and tossed it into the bin. Playing with the Hammers was bad, he decided, but whatever Big Al did to him, after he read the letter, would be worse.
Hat Trick Boy wished he could ask Sid what to do. Sid was really good at making things to do things you didn’t want to do yourself, like cleaning your shoes after you had stepped in dog poo. Hat Trick Boy just got his Mum to do it. Sid had built his own machine. It was a weird thing made out of bottles of water and a thing that looked like a dead hedgehog and smelt like one too. But Sid said it worked.
Anyway, Sid wasn’t going to help. Sid wasn’t his friend any more. Sid was outside somewhere with the others who also weren’t his friends any more. Hat Trick Boy looked outside the window to see where they were and what they were doing, and almost fell off his chair in astonishment. They were all outside… playing football.
Chapter Seven - Hot Shots FC
Hat Trick Boy watched his friends playing football for a long time. He wanted to join in but he didn’t know how to ask. He wished, more than anything, that he had never heard of The Hammers. He wished that the letter he had just written was already in Big Al’s hand rather than in Mr Hound’s bin.
After a while, Cowpat, Uno and Sid finished their game of football and stood round in a huddle, looking at one of Uno’s maps. Hat Trick Boy wondered what was so special about this map. Even Cowpat seemed interested in it, which was unusual. Normally the only time Cowpat showed an interest in Uno’s maps was when he folded them up into paper airplanes and fired them at Jon Jamerson’s back (and then ran off at top speed, laughing).
Hat Trick Boy decided to go outside and see what his friends were doing. They were too busy staring at Uno’s map and didn’t notice him approach. The map, he saw as he got closer, was of a football pitch. The players were marked by crosses, with arrows to show where they should run, and there was a dotted line to show where the ball should go. Some of the players had tiny speech bubbles with words inside. Hat Trick Boy stared fascinated. At the top of the map he read the words,
‘Hot Shots FC tactics – Shock and Awful’
‘What’s Hot Shots FC?’ he asked.
All three of his former friends turned round in surprise. Uno quickly folded the map away.
‘Have you lot joined a football club?’ Hat Trick Boy asked.
‘No, we haven’t joined one’ Sid told him.
‘Then what was that?’ Hat Trick Boy demanded.
‘We’ve made one, our own football club, Hot Shots FC.’
Hat Trick Boy’s mouth opened and shut, but no words came out. He tried again.
‘But I… I thought… I thought you…’
He shook his head. What had he been thinking? For some reason he had decided his friends weren't good enough to play football. But the truth was his friends liked football and he would much rather be playing football with them, than with Hammers FC.
‘Can I see?’ he asked, pointing at the map.
‘No,’ Uno shook his head. ‘You’re the opposition. We can’t show you. But you’ll find out soon enough.’ And then he actually smiled. ‘At the friendly.’
‘At the friendly…!’ Hat Trick Boy gasped and then suddenly everything became clear. The friendly that Big Al had organised against the local side that had just started up; it was against his friends, Hot Shots FC.
‘But they’ll hammer you!’ he exclaimed.
‘Thanks for thinking so highly of us,’ Sid said, rather stiffly, ‘but we think we’ll be okay.’
‘No, I mean that’s their tactics.’ Hat Trick Boy tried to explain. ‘They’ll come out fighting, try to hammer you into the ground and then score over your dead bodies.’
‘Thanks for the warning, but we can take care of ourselves,’ Sid told him. ‘Can’t we Cowpat?’
And Cowpat winked back.
Chapter Eight - Hot Shots FC v Hammers FC
Saturday morning dawned bright and sunny. It was the perfect day for the friendly between Hammers FC and Hot Shots FC and the perfect day for Hat Trick Boy’s brand new plan. The first thing he did after he waking up was sneak into Tilly’s room, take some of her pens, and draw a picture on his vest. Then he grabbed a piece of paper and wrote another letter to Big Al. Finally he got dressed into his Hammers kit, went down for breakfast, ate two pieces of toast, and slapped Tilly on the back as soon as she walked into the kitchen.
‘What was that for?’ she asked.
‘For luck!’
Her bottom lip began to stick out and Hat Trick B
oy knew exactly what was coming next. She was about to tell the whole world that Hat Trick Boy had hit her. It was time for a quick getaway.
‘Mum!’ he called, ‘I’m off. It’s my first match for Hammers FC this morning.’
His Mum appeared at the top of the stairs.
‘Do you want us to come and watch?’
‘Next time,’ he told her.
He headed out the door. He heard it shut behind him.
‘If there is a next time,’ he added.
At the Hammers home ground, the Hammers players were already on the pitch, standing round one of the goals and hitting balls into the back of the net. There was no sign of the opposition: Hot Shots FC.
Hat Trick Boy went over to the others but didn’t join in. He was too busy thinking about his friends and Sid’s map. They obviously had something planned, but what? No matter how well Hot Shots played (and Hat Trick Boy wasn’t sure Hot Shots could play that well) they were going to struggle against the strong, tough, physical Hammers. Cowpat was not going to be able to produce a burp so forceful it knocked them all over like bowling pins. Or a fart so smelly it knocked them out like a gas attack would. But what else could Shock and Awful mean?
Big Al came out of the club house and shouted at the Hammers to warm up. He made them run round the pitch, practice high kicks and punch the air. As Hat Trick Boy ran round the pitch, he noticed Big Al looking for the opposition. There were only minutes to go and still no sign of them.
At 9:59 with one minute to kick-off, the Hammers got their first glimpse of the opposition, Hot Shots FC. Cowpat walked out onto the pitch all alone. He was wearing a t-shirt and Bermuda shorts. He looked around the pitch, strolled down to the opposition goal, spread out a picnic blanket and put on his sunglasses. Then he lay down on the blanket and shut his eyes.
The boys in Hammers FC burst out laughing. Hat Trick Boy was the only one not laughing. He was shaking his head. If this was their tactics, it wasn’t going to work. They weren’t going to beat the Hammers by sunbathing in goal.
The rest of the Hot Shots team appeared and there was more laughter. Sid came first, followed by Uno, and three other boys Hat Trick Boy didn’t know. Because Hot Shots didn’t have a kit yet, Sid had made one. He had handed out six blue t-shirts, all different shades of blue, along with a mountain of shin pads, elbow pads, knee pads, shoulder pads, ear muffs, and nose pads. Sid had taken Hat Trick Boy’s warning about being hammered very seriously. He was determined to protect his team against the Hammers attack. One look at the nose pads and Hat Trick Boy knew Sid had made them himself. They looked like cotton wool stuck on with tape, which was exactly what they were.