Saturday afternoon, 3pm. Different matches, different pundits, different squads. But one thing stays the same: the famous, overused, and often nonsensical footballing clichés that tumble out of mouths TV screens and radio stations before they can be stopped.

“Football is a game of two halves” (can anyone remember the last time it wasn’t?) and “we’ve just got to take it one game at a time” (probably a good idea actually) are just two from an endless list. More often than not, you’ll hear a pre-match interview with a manager offering the following pearls of wisdom: “Today we’ve got to go out there and show them what we’ve got. Every game is a cup final because there are no easy games in football and I want to see each player give 110%. Whoever scores first will hold the advantage.” 

Talk about stating the bleeding obvious. After the match you’re more likely to hear something along the lines of: “At the end of the day, the other team wanted it more. We scored too early and we needed to put the game out of reach but we didn’t, were at sixes and sevens for the rest of the match. One team had to lose and today it was us.” Managerial expression is so idiomatic that it begins to lose all meaning.

Meanwhile, some of the most common clichés come during the game itself, such as “it’s end to end stuff”, “this game needs a goal”, “for a big lad he’s good with his feet”, “bring on some fresh legs” and “he went down far too easily.” And just sometimes these begin to grate.

Wouldn’t we miss them if they suddenly disappeared though? You can shout as much as you want at Motty for providing us with endless obscure statistics, at Jamie Redknapp describing everything as “t’rrific” and Andy Gray’s shriek of “take a bow, son”, but I think we’d all agree that football commentary just would not be the same without these phrases.

“At the end of the day”, they’re “a great advert for the beautiful game”. Football is not just a game of two halves, it’s a game of many clichés.

My immediate thought when told I would be giving Octopush a go was ‘eh?’, which was then swiftly followed by ‘what, so they thought of a pun and then created a sport around it?’ As it turns out, I wasn’t far off, but as I was to discover that there is a lot more to the beast than mere wordplay.

Octopush was created in 1954 by a bunch of Southsea snorkelers who wanted something to do during the long winter months when the channel itself was much too chilly to dare venture into. It also goes by the slightly less exciting name of Underwater Hockey, and that is perhaps the best way to describe it – teams of six (eight when founded, hence the name) compete to push a weighted puck along the floor of the pool with their sticks, and into the opposition’s goal.

Now, I am to swimming what Emile Heskey is to the English football team; loads of effort, well-meaning, but about as effective as a chocolate teapot. Hence, I donned the mandatory mask and snorkel (required so  that you can see what’s happening on the pool floor at all times) with slight trepidation, lest I end up drowning, or worse, embarrassing myself.

We were (both literally and metaphorically) thrown in at the deep end. A brief demo of how to clear your snorkel and avoid a watery grave, some passing practice on the bottom of the pool, and next thing I knew I was in a five-on-five game being told I was left attack. Someone shouted ‘go’, everyone hared it to the puck in the centre of the pool, members of both teams dived down to try and manoeuvre the puck towards the opposition’s goal, and I very quietly swallowed a lot of water. It was very exciting, but by the time someone finally scored a goal, I had no real clue what was going on, and I imagine I wasn’t alone.

It’s nowhere near as violent as water polo, which as far as I can gather involves fourteen crazed individuals scrapping around a pool until someone loses a testicle, but due to the three-dimensional nature of play things can get quite chaotic, the only lull coming when everyone has to come up for air at the same time. In fact, despite the sometimes physical nature, it is actually a unisex sport, as I was informed that the men’s greater speed and strength is countered by women being more able to change direction quickly. What really surprised me is how tiring it was. You’re constantly gasping for breath, all the while trying to work out where the puck’s going next and plan your movements accordingly.

Obviously, as it was being played by beginners, the quality must have been slightly lacking, and I am intrigued to think what a match being played by experienced players, and especially those capable of holding their breath for more than the four seconds I could, would be like. I imagine there would be much more structure, with genuine passing play and patterns, and the communication would be a lot better due to familiarity with your team mates and their styles, strengths and weaknesses.

Would I try it again? No, my deficiencies with snorkel management came to the fore a bit too much, but I can definitely see the allure and I am glad to have had a go. So if you’re a keen snorkeler looking to keep yourself amused, fancy something totally different or are even just a massive fan of pun-based sports, I’d say give it a go. You never know until you try.

Oxford Men’s hockey team kicked off their season on Wednesday in the hardest possible fashion. Their opening BUCS game of the year was against an Exeter first side that won the championship last year and are currently high-flying in the National Hockey Premier League.

A brief discussion with the capacity crowd informed me just how unfancied Oxford were. This contest was the equivalent of the Blues football team playing the Blackburn Rovers first team, and damage limitation seemed to be on the agenda.

They were not wrong; it was hard, it was fast paced, and it was autumnal. It was a fixture that required Herculean effort, from which the Blues have many positives to draw. Although the 6-1 defeat may seem like a crushing one in terms of scoreline, what will live longest in the memory to those watching is not the excellence of the Exeter outfield, rather the string of top class short corner saves made by the Exeter goalkeeper in the second half. He acrobatically kept Oxford from narrowing the gap during their periods of ascendancy, preventing them from making the scoreline more respectable.

Iffley Astroturf was bathed in both natural sunlight and the glare of its floodlights as I approached. Two things seemed apparent: firstly a blatant lack of concern for energy consumption, but more importantly in the context of the game was the superior intensity of the Exeter side, who were playing in green.

Despite the din of the jet washers and the metronomic tick-tock of hockey balls they seemed unbelievable focussed, responding militarily to the orders barked out by their weather-beaten South African coach. He was a terrifying man who led them from the front in terms of focus. As I surreptitiously listened to their pre-game talk it seemed he was a psychologist too, insisting that Exeter “could only beat themselves”. His side responded with a pre-game roar that comfortably eclipsed the meeker Oxford equivalent.

Exeter had already completed nine weeks of preseason, my friend explained to me as I bottled approaching the Exeter coach myself. They were already well into their season, whereas Oxford were just warming up. This was not so apparent in the opening exchanges. As they followed the footsteps of their female colleagues, who had suffered a 4-0 defeat earlier in the day, the Oxford men battled hard during the opening exchanges. The opening 15 minutes were scrappy and disjointed, with no side able to build any passing play. Barring a couple of goalmouth scrambles excitement was at a premium, and evidently this was to the frustration of the Oxford coach John Shaw who sought to play a short possession game.

He frustratedly exclaimed “are you joking?” as yet another long pass went amiss. Shaw paced his touchline in a manner reminiscent of Jose Mourinho in his prime, and like the Portuguese football manager he had words of polite criticism for the match officials. His mood did not improve as the deadlock was broken by a mazy Exeter dribble and slotted finish. Before Oxford knew what had hit them they were 2-0 down after another attacking move. Only twenty minutes had elapsed, and before they knew it the deficit was at two goals.

A third was conceded soon before half time as an Exeter attacker found a yard of space before unleashing a rocket of a shot into the top corner. It was a goal of pure class to end the first 35 minutes of the contest and Oxfordlooked like they would have their work cut out to maintain respectibility in the second period.

The biggest complaint for Exeter at this point was their lack of half time refreshments and the jog to the team huddle was the greatest exertion of the Exeter keeper at this point. This was to change in the second half. After several sustained periods of pressure from the Oxford offense the Exeter side began to concede short corner after short corner; five in total.

At this point however, Exeter and England under 21 Goalkeeper Chris Rea came into his own, going through the full repertoire of diving stops as he kept these out in order to keep a clean sheet. Each save seemed to surpass the previous one, with the fifth defying belief as he got the edge of his stick to a flick that seemed destined for the glory of the top corner.

Oxford did manage a consolation goal towards the end of the second half, coming from a well worked move down the right, that Stobbart proded home from close range. The biggest cheer of the day however, was saved for the Oxford fresher goalkeeper, who successfully kept out a penalty flick low to his right.

Despite having a man down at this point for an intentional foot offense, Exeter pressed on, scoring the fourth, fifth and sixth goals. Although Oxford will be disappointed by the scoreline there is much encourage to be had by their performance. They must forget about the result against an incredibly talented and well drilled Exeter side, and take the positives from Wednesday night into the rest of their season.