Match Report
Hazlemere Sports Reserves 2
Beacy 1
A contender for the most disappointing of days since this team formed 2 years ago. A squad depleted by Injuries, unavailability, late drop outs and players who after a long seasons hearts were not really in it fell to a last minute defeat to Hazlemere sports reserves who had been bottom of the table prior to this game. Such was the lack of available options Gordon Preston who’s season has been decimated by injury was named as one of the two subs, having not trained or kicked a ball since August. That’s is by no means a critiscm of Gordon, just to evidence how short we were, in an ideal world I would like him to have trained several times before he returned to the fold.
The game had an end of season feel to it, the terrible surface did not help the quality of the football, in a half of few chances Ryan Coker went close twice, first missing a chance due to an unfortunate bobble following good work by Davies and then seeing his goal bound strike saved by the hazlemere keeper from point blank range. To highlight the lack of chances our only other chance came on the stroke of half time, Ryan being fouled and the ref awarded a penalty, which was tucked away via the inside of the post by Piercey 1-0, the last action of a drab first half.
It’s fair to say the second half was little better, the star of the show may well have been the ref, who’s performance got progressively worse, shaun coker on the end of a bad challenge which set the tone for a second half were the ref was in constant discussion with the coker brothers following some strange decisions. In terms of changes the game the game got to the 60th minute and the lively Hazlemere number 3 was causing problems down the left, manager gunnell opted to bring Kingson on for Roberts who had done well in the first half, but fair to say it was a lot harder in the second half against the game’s best player. With the game drifting, it looked for all money we would probably get a scrappy 1-0 win, however on 70 minutes a ball was played into the box, the hazlemere forward controlled it with his hand before firing in from close range, despite the protests of several beacy players, the ref awarded the goal, a very poor decision and somewhat inexplicable how he failed to see this 1-1. Shortly after Wilkinson was replaced with Preston, following a lively run by the sub down the right hand side, he was caught on the edge of the area, the ref did not award a free kick, much to the irritation of shaun who was booked for dissent. With 10 minutes to go brother ryan joined him in the refs note book having caught the keeper late whilst going in to challenge for the ball which had been spilt, within minutes a second yellow and a subsequent red arrived for Ryan, this time there was no doubt the halzemere player had got him sent off after cynically falling to the floor, the ref who had seemingly not seen the incident issued ryan with his marching orders. With the game now entering its final minutes the ref again took centre stage and allowed the winning goal to stand, following a push on piercey the ball feel kindly to the hazlemere forward who lashed home from close range.
In summary our performance was dire, matched only by that of the ref who got several key decisions wrong. We don’t want to use this as an excuse though, despite all the absentees we should of won this game, hazlemere battled away but in honesty are a poor side who look to be heading towards division 4 next year. We will move on from this, big game next week and I know you will want to bounce back and finish the season in style.
Man of the match – Chris Summers – Did everything that is asked of him, the stand out player other than chris was Jonny who worked hard all game.
Match Ratings
Chris Summers – 7
Mark Bumpstead – 6.5
Pete Ebberson – 6
Dave Roberts – 6(replaced 60 – Kingson 6)
Matt Carpenter – 6
Rich Davies – 6
Jason Douglas – 6.5
Shaun Coker – 6.5(booked 65)
Jonny Piercey – 7
Tom Wilkinson – 6(replaced 70 – Preston 6)
Ryan Coker – 6 (booked 82, sent off 87)
