When we arrived today to face a team who are currently sitting fifth in divison 1 and three divisions ahead of us, we knew we were in for a tough game. One look at some of the opposing players size and height would have made some other teams worry about how they would perform and indeed we did have a number of conversations about the suspected ages of some of them.
We tried to fire up our players to make a good start and they definitly didn't disappoint. Straight from kick off we pushed forward incredibly quickly and within seconds Jake F was steaming towards their defender who looked a little panicked as he was forced to kick the ball out for a throw-in. We kept the pressure on and the great partnership between Jake and Katie is becoming clear for all to see with some great link-up play, movement and dribbling as well as some excellent tackling.
It wasn't too long before Crosfields were able to put us on the back-foot a little and this was more due to their size and strength than their actual ability which we were able to match today. Cue Alex and Kyle with another top defending performance, covering a lot of ground between them and performing some vital tackles exactly when required. This meant that Crosfields resorted to taking a lot of long shots on goal which didn't really come close to worrying Jako who was superior to the shots in every way. Not to discredit Crosfieids however as they did send a couple of shots on target that truthfully would have slipped past any other keeper but Jako's reactions were just top drawer!
Birthday girl Hollie clearly wasn't worried about the bigger players as she ran into them and tackled hard including a couple of nice slide tackles that achieved the desired results. Ethan shone again with some fancy footwork and nice little cheeky tackles that left Crosfield looking at the ground where the ball had once been. We timed our changes well today as every player had to play hard to keep up with some of the bigger players and when Thomas came onto the pitch midway through the half he was clearly up for the game. A few words of encouragement were passed to him before he entered the field and he had clearly taken everything on board as he put in his best performance of the season so far. Great footwork at times and some very strong tackles meant that almost every time he went for the ball he came away with it. A true Man of the match performance!
Jocob joined in shortly afterwards and immediately gave us an advantage with some now trademark ridiculously long throws and a more focused and determined overall performance than his previous game. Five minutes later Jyoti swapped with Katie and pushed forward up the field, totally taking the Crosfield defender out of the game and making him stay back. Despite a David and Goliath situation, Jyoti tried hard and remained solid in putting pressure on their defence meaning that they had to make sure they got to the ball first otherwise he was set to pounce on it! The game finished all square at half time in what at this point had been really exciting to watch.
No changes were made at half time and Crosfields got us underway by immediately pressuring our defence. They seemed very solid at this point and we were showing some tired legs, which unfortunately meant they slipped in for a relatively easy tap-in about 5 minutes into the half. We kicked off again with our heads held high and well played to Ethan who dropped into defence to give Kyle a few minutes break, and giving a good solid performance.
The midfielders were rotated a couple of times this half to keep their legs pumping and to allow a few minutes rest here and there and Kyle came back on shortly afterwards to give Alex a well-deserved break. Jake F came back onto the pitch hungry for a goal and at this point Stu asked the ref how long was left to which he was told 5 and a half minutes. "That should be long enough to get a goal shouldn't it?" he said after giving a couple of pointers to Jake who went out and did exactly as he was asked, firing a powerful shot from about 20 yards away. The ball flew past the keepr and bounced into the goal off the post in a super finish! The game was back on and this lifted the whole team, also meaning we may have to look forward to the dreaded penalties!
The last few minutes saw a good battle from both teams who were eager for the win, but neither could make it through and the full time whistle saw the game standing at 1 -1.
After a quick break Jako took his place for the Crosfields first penalty which they blasted wide much to our delight. Our follow up hit the keeper in his stomach which likely made him think twice about getting in the way of one of those again, and then Jako saved the next. Jacob's face lit up on the promise of a treat for a goal and he stepped up and casually placed it into the top left corner of the net. Crosfields equalised in the bottom corner of the goal and then our next also hit the keeper in the stomach. Crosfields missed again and it was up to Captain fantastic to see what he could do as he comfortably followed jacob's shot, also into the top left hand corner. The rest of the penalties became a bit of a blur due to the nervous excitement and at one point Crosfields scored another which Jako was really unlucky not to stop as it bounced off his leg and under him. A few more penalties were missed or saved until Thomas stepped up knowing that he would put us through to the quarter finals if he could score. He didn't disappoint us when the Crosfields keeper went looking for the ball in the top left corner as Thomas drove it beautifully into the top right sending him completely the wrong way!
The delight on the players and parents faces were to behold as they realised we were through. The same unfortuantely could not be said for Crosfields as the realisation set in that they'd just been beaten by a fourth division team! Their manager who had been very jovial up to that point was clearly not happy and was not impressed was asked about their team sheets and simply told us that they don't bother with things like that! One of our players even claimed that their big defender then went on to play for the older team who were playing next - Enough said!!!
The strength, determination and character we showed today was an absolute delight to watch and made all the coaches incredibly proud of the team. Regardless of the result in the next round, we fully deserve our place there.
Thanks again to all the parents for their continued support and encouragement :-)
