I tell you what, Paul Beesley will be over the moon that you've brought that up and compared those moments. Could you tell me which one was better?
Quite hard to be honest, I only saw Beesley's lob as it happened, while I must have seen Hodges' lob more than a hundred times.
The way I remember the friendly we were leading 1-0 and looked quite comfortable, probably didn't want to do more than we had to. Averøykameratene then equalised late in the second half which immediately made us really go for the win, throwing everything forward. It was like the players realised they were about to miss out on a huge win bonus. Just at the end the ball dropped to Beesley in the box and he lobbed the goalkeeper which made me think of Hodges' lob straight away.
Couple of other random memeries from that match..
* Dave Bassett looked to have a decent touch as he exchanged some passes with Dane Whitehouse at half time.
* The home side had a right winger called Erik Sivertsen who was absolutely lightening. The home crowd laughed as he outpaced Roger Nilsen in a chase for the ball. I got the feeling it was something they saw him do to anyone. A few weeks later I read that he was invited to Sheffield for a trial.
* After the game the hosts were preparing barbecue food for United's players and staff, which certainly interested Jostein Flo, walking straight from the pitch towards the lovely smell and wanted his team mates to come along.
JF: "Beez, come, they have grill food up here!"
PB: "Josh, have a shower first!"
JF: "Okay. I need food!"
* Lots of kids wanted the United players' autographs after the game. Some of the youngest thought I was also a Blades player as I was wearing a United shirt and stood outside the dressing rooms. As they handed me their notebooks/papers I tried to explain that I wasn't a player, but then they looked really, really disappointed, so in the end I just signed a couple of them, then drifted away from that area.
* Before the game I was handing out some leaflets from the Scandinavian Supporters Club, as a german kid (surely a tourist) approached me, struggling to ask me something in English. As I had learned some german at school I suggested he tried asking his question in german:
BB: Bitte, versuchen sie deutsch zu sprechen!
German kid: (very relieved) Ach, sie sprechen deutsch!!!
BB: Ja, ein bischen!
GK: aøklsjdø fljas dølkfj aølsdkjf ølkasjd øflkj asødkljf øbklasdjfølkj asdølkj føklj sadøklf jøklas jdølkfj ølksød iouewpoiruj poewijuriopew uiopujrpoiaweu iorjskdjføjxcm,.vm czxn xn akdjsøla jdølj øalsdjoiejwpoiruj ejd flkjd sfj lsdj kfjsdlfji
BB: Err, I think we need to try this in English after all...
After some more awkwardness I think what he wanted to know was which position in the table Sheffield United were. I told him the season hadn't started yet, and he seemed to understand that.
