Saturday’s league game saw Meredith Road come away to Coventry Cathedral United on what was sure to be a hotly anticipated contest, with Meredith Road being widely accredited with being the second best team in the league. A change in formation saw Cathedral deploy a narrow diamond midfield formation with the wing backs encouraged to bomb forward at any given opportunity.
However, after kick off it was Meredith Road who largely had control of the game but Cathedral’s formation could only force Meredith Road to lump the ball down the wings, with which Cathedral soaked up and dealt with comfortable, who whilst in contrast to the opposition, were attacking with short sharp attacking football. It was on 15 minutes when the deadlock was finally, broken. The diamond midfield formation working a treat. From pressure on the Meredith Road box, Ian Jefferey, Raj Bains and Demsey Slater played a one-touch triangle of passes resulting in Slater slotting in to the keeper’s near post from inside the box. Meredith Road immediately piled on pressure but again could only resort to long balls. Just 2 minutes later, Cathedral conceded a penalty from a late challenge by goalkeeper Lee Cox bringing down their striker who was played through, from which Meredith Road duly equalised with a penalty down the middle leaving the keeper stranded.
However, Cathedral didn’t let their heads drop and after large spells of neat play, snuffing out the away team’s attacks and creating dangerous chances, they found themselves ahead again thanks to a surprise wonder goal from full back Ben Attrill. A cross from the left wing could only be cleared to Attrill, who had followed the teams instruction to get forward as he half-volleyed a well struck and arrowed shot into the corner which the keeper could only get the slightest of fingertips to. After the goal, the away team were very much arguing amongst themselves and it was Cathedral who carried on piling on the attacking pressure and playing the better, attacking football. Neat, one-touch passes in the middle of the park between Raj Bains, Gaz, Thomas and Daniel Quinn and interplay between Demsey Slater and Ian Jeffery was a joy to watch as Raj Bains tested the Meredith Road keeper with a couple of shots from the edge of the box. It was only a matter of time until Cathedral got the 3rd goal and so it was, when Demsey Slater through on goal and just about to pull the trigger, was hacked down in sliding kung-fu style chop which the defender seen lucky to go uncarded. Daniel Quinn stepped up to convert the penalty and extend the lead. 3-1 to Cathedral. It was only a matter of minutes when Cathedral extended the lead to 4-1, when a ball to Ian Jefferey from deep had the keep rushing out who was out of the box and with defenders trying their best to guard the goal in his absence, Jeffery launched the ball towards the goal which hit the back of the net. A succession of corners which Cathedral failed to defend aptly led to Meredith Road bringing the score back to 4-2. On the stroke of half-time however, Cathedral deservedly added a 5th goal, thanks to an Adam Nutting header from a corner.
In the second half, it was a case of trying to repeat the first half of performance for Cathedral without Demsey Slater. It wasn’t too long before Meredith Road made it 5-3 when a deflected shot trickled in. Midway through the second half, it was 5-4 thanks to a counter attack from Meredith Road which resulted in a low driven cross across the box which the Cathedral defence failed to deal with and found their player at the far post to strike in. With the pressure piling, Meredith Road finally found the equaliser they were looking for with about 10 minutes left to play - a strike on the bounce finding it’s way over the keeper to make it 5-5. With 10 minutes left to play, Cathedral may have feared the worst and knew they had to do something, deciding attack was the best way of defending. One attack saw the Meredith keeper rushing out, Dan Quinn trying his luck from a distance with the keeper having to thank his defender for clearing it off the line with his head. Finally, with barely any time left to play, Cathedral launched one last attack, Daniel Quinn play in Raj Bains who ran forward central to the edge of the Meredith Road box, laying the ball off to his right to Ian Jeffery, who unselfishly squared it for Thomas from which their defender made a last ditch tackle, with the ball then falling to Gaz, and with the goal at his mercy, his name ready to be written in the stars, his could only sky it over from a few yards out. the final whistle went and the game finished 5-5.
Cathedral would have maybe taken a draw at the start of the match, however with the way the game panned out they’ll be desperately disappointed to not have taken all 3 points from a thrilling game. Much encouragement from a swift attacking style of play was a big positive.
Match reort written by Raj
