First game that yours truly has been to after my sick leave and what a sight for sore eyes! 7 goals, a clean sheet, a Scott Bennett hat trick (although I did only see one of his goals) and not one but two red cards, the first ones ever in a game involving Surbiton Lions.
Incidentally, this Cup competition is for all the first round losers of the other League competitions if anyone is confused as to why we are starting yet another Cup at this stage of the season.
Line up:
Paige (GK)
Adam (RB), Simon (CB), Matt R (CB), Ollie (LB)
Lee M (CM), JP (CM), Dale (CM)
Gregg (LF), Scott (CF), Gary (RF)
Due to that annual faffing around involving clocks going forward, backward, sideways or whatever, I managed to miss all but the last couple or minutes of the first half. Reliably informed, however, that we were playing excellent football and were good value for the 2 goal lead. The goals came from Scott and then Gary, no info on the goals apart from the assists which were Gregg and Scott respectively
In the second half, we looked very impressive going forward with the front three really getting their passes together and always looking likely to score when threatening the opposition goal. Our defence looked rock solid and we were always getting bodies in the way, to the point that Paige appeared to have very little to do.
Scott's 2nd goal came from a laid off pass by Gary. His third soon after that, was from a long throw by Gary that the oppo were totally unprepared for and which found Scot all alone in the penalty area. He got his head to the ball to loop it into the net. Unfortunately, a split second after his head connected with the ball, the onrushing keeper's fist connected with his head in his vain attempt to punch the ball away. Scott had his hat-trick but he also had a golf ball sized lump on his right brow seconds after.
Whilst Scott was wandering around in a bit of daze, play restarted and some more good passing and movement by SLFC ended with Dale sliding in to meet a low cross by Gregg to put the ball into the roof of the net.
Scott and his new facial feature had to come off and were replaced by Kris. There then followed the incident which caused all manner of ructions in the opposition. An oppo player showed some skill to get down our left side and started arrowing in on goal. Ollie made a desperate lunging tackle that took the player down in the penalty area. It looked like a stonewall penalty from where I was on the other side of the pitch, it looked like a stonewaller to everyone on the pitch except the ref. This was the cue for their centre back to run screaming at the ref and get himself a straight red and then another player (who must have just seen the red given for his mate) to do exactly the same thing and get sent off too. Can't believe the penalty wasn't given, but effing and blinding at the ref was never going to help matters. By rights the spot kick should have given, Ewell would possibly have got a goal back Ollie should have been carded, possibly even sent off. Instead no penalty and two of their players walk. Result.
A few minutes later the Surbiton were up another goal. This was a wonderful team effort that started with Dale (or it may have been Gary) chasing back and dispossessing an oppo player near the halfway line, turning towards goal and finding Gary (or Dale - it's been a week since the game), who in turn sent Kris running down the right channel onto a through ball. Kris whipped in a great cross that was met with a solid header by Gregg that went past the keeper for number 6.
Gary then showed great persistence in chasing down the ball as it approached the opposition byline, keeping it in then driving towards the penalty area to tee up Nathan to smash in a first time shot for his second in two games.
Nathan could well have got another in the dying seconds of the game after he managed to flick the ball over the keeper but with the goal gaping, the ball bounced and spun to awkwardly for him to get any kind of connection on it and the defender was able to clear.
So another clean sheet and the postscript to the game is that due to lack of player availability and motivation, Ewell Lions decided to fold straight afterwards. Thankfully, the League has decided to award the points from their remaining games to their opponents which include us as we were due to play our home League match against them the following week. Next up is a quarter final against Double H. Let's hope the unexpected three week gap between games doesn't cost us like it did against Chessington Town...
