8th March 2008 - Hedge End left blowing in the wind

Hedge End gathered at St Luke’s for their away game with LH Romans at a brand new ground,   Henry Court in Fareham. We had a feeling that it wouldn’t be our day when Doug got out his laptop from the car and entered the school address in his sat nav. The first poor decision of the day came when we followed him, forgetting that as a Navy man his system only started from Portsmouth . But at least we had left early and travelling 20 miles for a journey of 8 was all part of our ‘making the opposition waiting’ strategy. Still, the hope was that Doug's sense of direction would improve in the game. The mind games continued as half the team spent another ten minutes walking around the school trying to find the pitch.

Still, we were in good spirits as HE continued with their squad rotation and in came the younger members. This must have been a first for HE with only 2 players out of 14 over 30! A far cry from last season when the back four had a combined age of 175! Recalls for Chappers and Ben ( fresh from their ECB coaching course – apparently they are waiting for their call to NZ ) Luke, Tim and Rory we were looking young.  Sunny was also back and Ali continued with his South American look. Still there were some controversial positions with Doug keeping his place upfront and the midfield pairing of Ali and Keith.

The tactics were simple, we would play against the wind in the first half hopefully coming in only two or three goals down, and then hit them for six in the second half.  One could say that half the plan worked, but unfortunately it was only the first bit!

Still the game started brightly with HE playing some neat stuff and looking dangerous upfront. A key reason for this was obvious; Matt was leading the line from the subs bench! Still after a couple of early scares, HE took the lead after some neat play on the left sunni sent over  a fine cross and Luke was there to finish-off. The lead didn’t last long as Romans scored leaving Dave with no chance. Still this didn’t deter HE from continuing to attack and HE took the lead again. Another fine move was finished off by HE’s version of Peter Crouch. Having scored with his head in a previous game, he proved his all round (and a better sense of direction) ability by firing in a shot from inside the box. Actually perhaps firing in is a bit strong. FIFA are actively looking into a potential match rigging, as surely he must have paid the opposition goalkeepers judging by the poor attempts they made in trying to stop the ball crossing the line. That was about as good as it got from HE’s point of view as Romans made good use of the strong wind and some poor/unlucky defending, as their finishing provided accurate and Dave soon found himself picking the ball out of the net another four times for HE to end the half 5 -2 down which to be truthful didn’t reflect the game.

But the good news was that we had last year’s top scorer up front (and more importantly out of goal) and we had the wind.  HE started the half confidently looking much happier at the back and plenty of fire power upfront. But to be truthful HE huffed and puffed throughout the second half but were unable to really test their keeper. The closest we came to scoring was a disallowed ‘own goal’ which HE accepted with good grace (as always) To their credit Romans played well at the back and showed their promotion form, but this didn’t stop HE working really hard and after a fine save by the HE keeper, the second half ended 0-0. On the positive side we let in two fewer goals than they did in the second half – well done the defence.

In summary we played well for 75% but as always HE came away having played well and enjoyed the game.

There were a number of notes worth oberservations/quotes

I didn’t realise that Dave could make playing in goal a spectator sport! – Matt

Dave didn’t have much to do  - Keith ( until someone pointed out that he let in 5)

Is Dave trying to get in the British Olympic diving squad – the whole team

What a world class save – the opposition

For the first and probably last time in 10 hours between the posts, for 2 seconds, I almost looked like a goalkeeper – Keith

Special praise should go to Rory for a fine performance at the back, Luke and Tim for showing good form going forward and Doug and Ali for being a real pain in the bottom whilst on the sidelines waiting to get back-on. (they reminded me of the two women in the Les Dawson show)  

We could always try the secret tactic of bringing 22 players next week and having two teams. On the plus side we still remain competitive and the curry evening isn’t far away!