Profile Featurette #2

Kelburn Park.
aka. Samford Bridge
aka. St Charles' Park
aka. The Theatre of Means

This field is the most important landmark for The Sam. Its brilliantly cut lawns and superb caretakers make it one hell of a pitch. But it has a long and interesting history, culminating to when The Sam first met...

In the fourteenth century, as Maori warriors were searching out the land for Moa, they came across a harbour. They were mildly interested in it, but their facination, was just to one side of the harbour. Up a steep hill, which they named 'a' or 'the' terrace, they came to a patch of land, which was as flat as could be, and had no trees growing on it. To the side there was a little white cottage. very soon, this plump little old man walked up to them from the cottage and said, "who the bloody hell are you-coming onto my park. The fields closed! I'll tell you what, get off, and i'll draw up some lines beside the field so you can play in it.

And so the Kelburn Park name was made famous. In the early 20's, New Zealand football was dominated by a team called 'The Martin'. This team was based at Kelburn Park. After four years of domination, strife in the team culminated in a huge battle at Kelburn Park. The reason for the battle was that a player called Dennis Smith or "DeSousa" decided the team should be called The Dennis because he was the best player and he called Martin 'Rubbish' The team faded into nothing because neither side won. In the 60's, Mean McClean's won three successive titles and went onto beat Lisbona-the team founded by Dennis. Frank Smith, son of Dennis and father of another annoying 'prodigy', decided that Kelburn Park should be back in Desousa hands. The two teams played each other for 48 hours non stop to decide who was going to keep the park. Simon Hornblow, an unknown relative from Charles' past, scored a whopper of a goal to ensure the park stayed in good hands. A memorial fountain was put up to remember that important day. And for 40 years nothing happened.

Bobby 'Crazy eyes' Bi'basso arrived in 1986. Kelburn Park was first used again in 2005. Sam met Charles at a class, and Nick and Keeth arrived minutes later to begin The Sam's era. The next week, The Sam had equired for times as many players including Tony, Arthur, Derek, Geoff, plus many more and including Chris Smith. Chris had been sent by his father to try again capture Kelburn Park. Chris always made a point to play at Kelburn rather than other field in order to play a battlle and capture it. Tony and Charles unfortunetely were sucked into his trap. They were lured by Arsenals attractive men so they played on Chris's side during the battles! The Sam has yet to forgive them for this. Fortunetely the non Arsenal supporters always won (obviously) so the park was kept. As a last resort, Chris decided to try and split the team. He started a war with Arthur. Most of the team immediately rushed with Arthur but there were worries that Tony and Charles would join Chris. But eventually Chris suffered a major defeat.

Kelburn Park has been very kind to The Sam. The Sam play around 80-90% of their game time at the park, yet only one injury has been made there. Also, because of the small distance to the university, students will take an hour of as a treat to go and watch The Sam, thus we have The Sam groopees. Long may the grass grow.