Report:
As we arrived and had our usual chat and banter Ashford had divided into
2 teams with different bibs and were practicing shorts passes and
triangles. No 22 looked particularly useful. For the first 15 minutes we
barely touched the ball (except with the back of the captains stick and
some fine saves by Jamie). The pitch was very bouncy and our defenders
seemed to be penalised whenever they touched the ball. We looked set for
a thrashing.Luckily No 22 had to depart but to match things up (not)
McIver had to depart with a pain in the arse, a change from the normal
pattern of him being one! (not really). Finally Ashford scored following
a fabulous save by Jamie and a flick to the top corner, well a dodgy
scoop which the defenders on the line played and missed to.
Gradually we started to pass to eachother and get used to the very
quick pitch. Wynn hit the post from nothing and we sensed we were not
out of the game.
We pushed forward at times leaving only 2 defenders and the Coutts
bank clerk somehow managed to avoid giving away a p flick (and getting a
yellow) despite 3 attempted (and failed) back stick tackles...great use
of the advantage rule which ended up helping us.
After good work from Josh and Michael, our teenage wingers who both
visibly grew in confidence as the game progressed, Roberts tucked away
an excellent finish. We pushed forward to look for a winner, Roberts hit
the post again and finally received the ball from a short and was so
surprised he put it wide.
Overall a good quality game where Ashford played the better hockey
and constantly looked on top but we had perhaps the closer goal
attempts.
One abiding short corner memory (apart from the pushes 10 yards wide
of target) was Pete Watt's misunderstanding of our Rambo short corner
routine when instead of passing the ball to Pete (Slater) on the P flick
spot listened to the call of Pete....P flick spot and ran there himself
having taken the short......I guess you had to be there! |