Cup fever struck for Olympic on a blustery afternoon on Pitch. Sports Council Cup 2nd Round after Olympic just got past the very friendly Manxman Amatures on penalties in the last round.
This time Olympic were pitting themselves against 1st Division opposition. The impressive Nigel Carlson kept his place in goal with a back four of Scott, Lynch, Clark & Brown. Rob Plummer is unavailable after he suffered a nasty knee injury last time out which may keep him sidelined for a while. The ever present Black & Grundy anchored the midfield with Sterling & Mason on the wings which left goal scoring duo Sholicar & Tomlinson upfront. Heaton returning for his second spell with the club is on the bench with player manager Dave Lloyd. McCari, Hartley, Roberts, Walmsley, Round & Jonny Brown were all absent.
Olympic started brightly carving out a few chances early on however it was the opposition who took the lead. A freekick was given away on the edge of the box, the wall decided to jump and the ball went underneath them straight into the path of the big number nine who had the time to turn and stab the ball home unchallenged.
If the opposition attackers thought they were in for an easy game with lower division opponents they were in for a shock as every time they even had a sniff of the ball Clark & Lynch took it off them within seconds whether in be in the air or on the floor. The first goal came from a freekick on the halfway line which the returning Stu Clark fired accurately into the area. The ball bounced about and finally dropped to the feet of Sholicar who smashed the ball home nearly taking Carl Black with it. 1-1 game on ...
From that point forward it was always going to be Olympic who got the next goal. Lee Grundy and Carl Black came agonisingly close from range. Olympic deservidly took the lead when Carl Black robbed the ball off a centre half before racing clear. With only the keeper to beat he calmly lifted the ball over him to score an exquisite chip. OLYMPIC 2-1 ...
They didn't have to wait long for their 3rd either. A great piece of battling from sholicar, he stole the ball off a defender and managed to put it into the path of Black, He picked out Sterling who charged down towards goal slightly off centre. He pulled the ball back towards Tomlinson who was surely going to tap into an empty goal but the defender got to the ball and turned it into his own net. OLYMPIC 3-1 goal goes down as Sterling ...
Olympic go in at half time in complete control. If you would have guessed which of the teams were in the 1st Division at this point you would have had to pick Olympic.
No changes for Olympic who kicked off the 2nd half. Olympic opted for a long ball upfield however it was gathered easily by the back four. They swept the ball out to the wing and when the ball ended up in Olympics box there was only one place it was going to end up. 46 minutes played Olympic 3 Advanced Scaffolding 2 ...
For the next 20 minutes Olympic were on the back foot and only good work from the back four and a world class save from the goal keeper Lynch that kept Olympic in front when it looked like the opposition had scored. Lynch looks like he has played for Olympic for years at the moment.
Alan Heaton replaced Ian Mason and Olympic seemed to get a grip of the game again. Their goal keeper was called into action a few times efforts by Heaton, Tomlinson & Sterling keeping him busy. Then came a great moment for Olympic to win the game when the referee rightly awarded them a penalty after a foul on Sterling. The ever confident Tomlinson stood up however the spot kick was saved. The keeper could only parry the ball back to the feet of Tomlinson who thought he had a tap in however the keeper had other idea's to again dent Tomlinson in a magnificent double save.
Olympic did finally get a deserved 4th goal with about 10 minutes to go. A goal kick was won in the air by Lee Grundy, the ball went back into the air and this time was won by Carl Black who headed forward to send Sholicar free down the right. He showed great pace to get into the box skipped past the opposition as if they wasn't there. Sholicar managed to lift his head up and roll the ball across to Tommo who took a touch before slamming the ball in. OLYMPIC 4-2 .... game over or was it??
The talking point of the game came in the last minute. Stu Brown won the ball after sliding in with the opposition. The winger reacted first and tried to get up but it looked like Brown held him back. The winger wasn't happy and aimed a punch at Brown who was on his knees and wasnt even looking. Bang out of order and if the cufuffle that followed the opposition was shown a straight red. Unbelievably Brown was also sent off and is lucky not to be seriously hurt. The referee said Brown was guilty of a stamp on the winger and thats why he punched him.
From the following free kick the ball was headed to the edge of the box and the opposition midfielder manage to fire an unstopable shot into the top corner. 4-3 however that turned out to be the last kick of the game. Olympic are through to the next round after a ugly scene marred a good game.
Stu Brown is set to appeal and the man of the match award goes to Oliver Lynch making his full debut.
Clifton next week in the league ......
