Hello, and welcome to hankgames without Hank, where the AFC Wimbledon Wimbly Womblys are beginning their regular season journey here in League Two. This is exciting stuff. We are in the bottom tier. By the way this is our new stadium, I hope that you like it. I tried to make it look as much as possible like the new Plough Lane stadium is gonna look in 2018 when it opens in Wimbledon's historic homeland. Very excited about that. It was the one that looked the most like it and had the most, closest to the right number of seats.

Anyway. I'm so excited about a new season of AFC Wimbledon Wimbly Womblys. I mean, this is just gonna be huge for us. We need to, we need to get promoted, obviously. We don't want to be languishing in League Two, one, one, one bad season away from not even being in the Football League anymore, not being available to play on FIFA. We want to have our eyes up, up toward League One where we can...

Look at that, look at Akinfenwa, Meredith. He's just massive! He's both a large physical presence and a large spiritual presence. Adebayo Akinfenwa paired with Bald John Green up front. We've got Other John Green née Bennett in central midfield along with Barcham! I don't have a name for him yet. We do have a name for Taylor, though, Meredith. Taylor the Swift. We even have a song for him. "I've got a blank space baby and I'll score your goals".

Today's topic comes from a Project for Awes... Look at Akinfenwa, Meredith! He's just a, he's a wonderful person to have in the game. He shows that all different types of bodies can be professional soccer players provided that you are an astonishingly good athlete and extremely fast.

Today's topic comes from Amy. Several people donated to the Project for Awesome to get the Wimbly Wombly topic of their choice. Amy donated, thank you Amy. Oh, that was not a good pass, Adebayo Akinfenwa. And her topic is "I'd really love to hear John's thoughts on Le Petit Prince" or Le Petit Prance as I think they say in France. "I always smile when it's referenced in Looking for Alaska."

So I was a French student. Looking for Alaska is autobiographical in a lot of ways, some of which are uncomfortable to me and if I'd known that so many people were going to read the book I probably would have tried to disguise my life a little bit better, especially the lives of some of my friends. But Le Petit Prince remains the only book I've ever read in French and today I will tell you the story of how I read it. It's a very sweet story that's sort of, like, almost romantic but isn't in the way of high school.

What!? I mean, is Plymouth Argyle, are they Barcelona? That was some insane passing culminating with a terrible shot by Cox! Yeah. Cox misses the mark. Alright. So... Oh no! God, we're so bad at passing out of the back. I'm just not good at FIFA 16 yet guys. This is only my fourth or fifth game playing at a... Well I guess eighth because I played with the Swedish Women's National Team. I just, I probably need to spend some concentrated time trying to improve my gameplay.

Anyway, to return to the topic of conversation. Le Petit Prince is the only book I have ever read in French and here is why. So I took three years of high school French. My wonderful teacher who is now sadly deceased, Madame Payne, was just a fantastic French teacher, very passionate, but in me she had a terrible student, one who had absolutely no potential. And she, despite this, tried very, very hard to teach me French, she never gave up on me. I...

Great. I am pleased to know that one incredibly rich club has sold a player to another incredibly rich club while my transfer budget is $600,000. Do you think that I was in the market for Ángel Di María? Jeez, I'm trying to get, like, gingers out of League Two right now. Anyway. So... Yeah. So the... Oh God. Sorry, I'm panicking because there's a lot of, there's a lot of, a lot of hullabaloo right now. Thanks for the... Frickburger!

So I took three years of high school French. I hope that we don't go down this season, Meredith. It would be a very short Wimbly Wombly miracle if we just got demoted to the Conference and were no longer allowed to play FIFA. I had a... Anyway, give me your tactical suggestions in comments. I know that I need to be more patient in my build up and have more width, I am already aware of that so thank you for... Oh God. It's like they play with more players. I just don't understand this fancy new FIFA. It's so much more like regular soccer. I hate... If I wanted to play regular soccer I would put my boots on and go sweat somewhere.

So I took three years of high school French. It was a very, it was sort of a failed experiment. I don't have a gift for other languages. I don't even really have a gift for English, I don't have a particularly good English vocabulary. But it was a failed experiment, but, you know, in your third year of high school French is when you have to start, like, reading in French and Le Petit Prince is one of the early books that you read because it's relatively simple. Like, it's a beautiful book. For those who don't know, it's about a, I don't know. It's kind of a fairy tale.

Oh! Akinfenwa! Akinfenwa! Beast! Mode! On! Wait, why is it one-nil? Oh, for the love of God! Are you kidding me!? Akinfenwa, don't raise your hand when you're onside, offside! Oh man. The celebration was intense but the celebration was also misplaced. Oh man. But that's what we need to do. I guess we just need to get it to our target man a little more. How about you slide that through to Adebayo Akinfenwa? No. No. You guys weren't on the same page there.

So yeah. It's this, like, beautiful fairy tale about a little prince who lives on a planet, more of a moon I guess, I don't know. Anyway, it's a beautiful story. And I read it. Unfortunately, you know, I was a terrible French student so I wasn't really able to read it in French. I mean, you know, I read through it in French but I ended up with my friend, Amanda Key, in the, in the senior lounge which was, like, this room where we all hung out, it was a great, like, just a great, like, party room I guess.

That's to your husband! Oh! Akinfenwa! No. Didn't work but it was still, I loved the way, I loved your passion! I loved it. I don't mind it at all. We're trying to get back in this game here, guys. We've had a couple shots, it's looking not terrible.

So what ended up happening is that Amanda and I ended up reading Le Petit Prince to each other in both French and English. Like we would read a chapter to each other in French and then we would read a chapter to each other in English, and it was really, it was really sweet. And it was sweet not least because Amanda and I... I had a massive crush on Amanda, she was really the great crush of my high school life. She's just a pheno... She's still just the coolest person you could ever want to hang out with. Just so smart and interesting and now she lives in New York and has a very cool life. But, like... And, you know, a husband and baby. This is not, this is, none of this is to say that it's, like, an ongoing crush, but just someone that I really liked in high school, I really admired, I thought had, like, just was like a cool, just a really cool person who was really, really empathetic and kind and smart and fun to be around. And so I just have this incredibly fond memory of reading, reading that book with her, you know, us reading chapter by chapter reading out loud to each other.

Really good save there, James Shea. Boy, right off the bar. We're looking, we're looking fragile at the back. Oh, he didn't make the save, it just hit the bar. Looking a little fragile at the back at the moment. I'm trying to improve our defense but we don't have any money to buy players so it's not that easy.

So I think probably the reason it made its way into Looking for Alaska was because that memory was so profound for me and the other sort of, the other thing about it is that as we read The Little Prince together back and forth, I eventually... We didn't have a prom at my school, we had this thing called Senior Banquet which was just a dinner where you dress up in a suit and then there's a little bit of dancing but not really. Then you went to this thing called Senior Party. To explain to you how long ago I went to high school, this thing, Senior Party, you were allowed to drink. They brought kegs to the party, like the school did, and you were allowed to drink as long as you didn't leave. This would clearly never happen in 2015 in an American school. But yeah, so Senior Banquet was followed by Senior Party.

So in the course of this, I ended up asking Amanda to be my date to Senior Banquet which took, like, just a tremendous amount of guts because, you know, she was this, to me, this, like, larger than life character at our high school. And she said yes and we had this wonderful totally non-romantic time at Senior Banquet together that was just, like, it... You know what...

They hit the bar again, Meredith. Things are really worrisome in the Plymouth, in the Wimbledon back. I feel like our front is also worrisome insofar as we're, we seem to be terrible up there as well. But our back, I mean we can't complete passes, all the things that really you're supposed to be able to do as a football club we seem to be struggling with. Maybe we need to be on semi-professional skill level until I get good at this game? I don't know. I don't know what the problem is but I know I don't want Danny Bulman on the ball anymore. Oh. Nope. Nope. You gotta see the pass! You guys gotta think through, you gotta know what you're doing. Maybe we need a 4-3-3? I don't know what the problem is. Bring in, bring in our Montserratian international Taylor the Swift? I don't know!

So... I just, I mean we can't even get possession of the ball. We're just being absolutely pummeled. There we go. Then pass there. Use your width. Pass to John Green. Pass. Good stuff, guys. Good stuff! Good stuff! Cut back. You're John Green, you know how to cut back. You know how to cut back again. Fool your, fool your enemy! Oh! Akinfenwa! Eh, wasn't a great cross in the end but I still liked that bit of possession from John Green at least. I've ju... I've been fouled! I've been fouled.

So, so when I think of that story I, you know... It's funny how, like, some books live with you partly because of what your life was like when you read them or partly because the circumstances that you... Oh boy. Wow. I mean, it should really be four-nil. Partly because of the, you know, what your life was like when you read it, what your life is like now, you know, and the way that you look back and you're like "Wow. That really, that really changed things for me". And The Little Prince, you know, in a way for me is a story, like, I hardly even remember the book to be honest with you, but I remember the circumstances in which I read it so vividly. And I remember it being sort of a story that, like, gave me confidence that I was going to be able to navigate the world, that I was gonna be able to kind of survive it.

There's such an intense... Like one of the things that really gets me about adolescence, or at least my own experience with adolescence, is that there is such an intensity about your, like... There's such an intense, deep anxiety because you're beginning to think, like, "Oh, am I gonna have to do all of this adult stuff because I feel totally unqualified to do it." And you're around strangers a lot of the time and it's just, life becomes very...

Oh! Akinfenwa might be in! He's strong enough! He's not! Oh! Oh, Adebayo Akinfenwa. What's gonna happen? You coming back? Gonna give somebody a yellow card? Oh. Oh, I like it. Why!? He's taken down from behind! How is that not a foul!? I've suffered. Oh, I have suffered, I have suffered and it has been, it has been unjustly treated. Look at Akinfenwa, Meredith. To John Green! Oh! It's deflected. That was probably our best chance of the game so far.

Now we're gonna have a corner. So, we haven't scored from a corner kick yet in the history of the new AFC Wimbledon Wimbly Womblys. This is a chance! Oh, it goes begging! Oh! That's difficult. That's a frustrating moment for us guys. There's no question about it, that's a difficult moment. And now things are really getting out of control. Oh boy. And my phone is ringing! Oh. This is where the Little Prince would find a way to get a point from this game! Think of The Little Prince! Think of asking Amanda Key to go to Senior Banquet with you! You can do it boys! Whoo! Let me see who called. I'll give you the full update, whoever it is, I'll tell you. It was my wife. Hold on, I'll call her back. Don't worry.

Oh wait! No wait! I've got to defend a corner! I've got to defend a corner! Ah! I think, I think Other John Green got in there somehow. He's big and strong. No! James Shea. James, get it long! That's good stuff, guys. That's good stuff. Oh! I'm not sure who you were passing to in that situation, sir. But then again, that's probably your manager's fault more than it is your fault. OK. I'm telling you, Le Petit Prince should carry us through, get us a point. Somehow, some way. Oh! It's John Green! Oh no! He's been dispossessed! Ah! Gosh! This is a very unpromising start to our season! Oh boy.

We're in the 90th minute, things don't look good. They don't look good at all, friends. I feel that we've played with courage and with heart but it's all been for nothing like so much effort in this world. I mean to be fair, I think the one-nil score line flatters AFC Wimbledon if anybody. But it doesn't look like we're gonna get anything from this game, friends.

Well, our season starts on a worrisome note with a one-nil loss. It must be said, worries both in the back and in the front. Jokers to the left of me, fools to the right. I am sorry, I appreciate your ongoing support. We look forward to giving AFC Wimbledon their first win of the season, hopefully soon. Again, my apologies. Oh God, at least we have that beautiful ginger. Best wishes.