Before The Match:-
Let's begin at the beginning. Preparation, Preparation, Preparation, without it...well look at todays result.
Too many players were late arriving. It was a team decision to arrive 40 minutes before each KO. This was the time YOU agreed was needed to allow everyone to catch up on weekend chit chat, sod about with boots etc allowing at least 20 minutes for a decent warm up and focus before ko. It was sloppy again today.
Too many players failed to read the clear text notice about, meeting time, travel arrangements and kit. It's kids stuff to cry about broken phone screens - everyone's capable of calling me or any other team mate to cross check arrangements. It's happened 3 weeks running. Its crap
Too many players are taking their starting position for granted and not for the first time. Late nights are fine if you can perform, if you can't, step aside for team mates who can.
At this level, against opposition of this quality we're just not good enough to be cutting corners and thinking that we can coast and find a tempo mid -game. Manuden are back to back premiership winners for a reason; we can compete and we can win but not without preparing properly.
As part of the preparation you were all asked to revisit the last match report v Manuden, I can only guess at who and how many bothered, or if you did bother who actually took everything on board.
The Match Itself:-
Turning to the match - the sloppiness ran to our choice of ends, stupid. It took 5 minutes and a defensive mix up for us to concede a soft penalty. A stupid yellow followed for Chippy for dissent - a yellow that proved very costly later. Revill rescued the situation with a magnificent save which should have galvanised and inspired us but didn't.
Playing 4-5-1 with Jack in the middle of the five it should have been reasonably straightforward for Bowles and Olli (backed up by Ryan and Glen) to hold wide with the team in possession pinning their fullbacks with Josh and Sam breaking from the middle to link up with Kim as point man. Josh was quickly in tune in the 6th minute when a Jack/Kim combo released him but he was closed from both sides before he could pull the trigger. Two minutes later a promising move broke down when Bowles bizzarely played a blind ball inside. In the 11th Jack/Sam/Kim linked up well to release Josh but the final pass had too much meat and Josh ran out of room. In the 13th Kim did exactly what he was there for receiving, shielding and laying the ball into Bowles who broke clear but blasted over.
In the 15th Chippy conceded a free-kick for a shirt pull on a player with no space and his back to goal - a shirt pull obvious even to me positioned the other side of the halfway line. Revill took a step the wrong way and couldnt recover so they were gifted a 1-0 lead. Within 2 minutes of the restart with too many players heads still not on the game a simple slotted ball though the middle sliced us open for 2-0.
By the 25th minute we hadn't recorded a single attempt on target so our first corner gave us chance to make amends - Ollies performance was reflected in that corner which didn't even make the front post. In the 27th Bowles again played a loose pass under no pressure turning our attack into theirs. A minute later he hit a 40 yard crossfield pass to nobody (4-5-1 !!). Two minutes later and completely rattled another one-touch inside blind pass was cut out gifting them a breakaway 3rd goal.
In the 40th minute, probably frustrated by his own performance, Ollie cut inside ran across the pitch and for the fourth time attempted a 25yard strike(off target) on the run on the turn. So much for playing wide in a five. In the 41st ours and Ollie's second corner did at least reach the front post but didn't beat the first man. A minute later a yellow followed for Ollie's dissent/foul language - so much for the pre-match.
At 3-0 down we would still normally feel a result would be within our grasp so the half time interval was the chance to quickly put the wrong things right but with Chippy, Ollie and Bowles all pleading innocence the interval was effectively wasted. For those still interested we reshaped into a 4-4-2 and started on the front foot. Glen shook off his lethargy and broke clear into the box. A moment of indecision and his side foot volley turned into a pass to the 'keeper, a pity as the run and technique was good quality and more promising. They responded quickly and only a brilliant save from Revill kept them out. Our tempo was much better, Bowles squandered a gilt edged opening but the lead up play and his positioning was more encouraging, two minutes later Kim drew a great save from a 'keeper who'd had little to do until then. That opening 20 minutes of the second half saw the best of us and although they were defending well you could smell the opening. Unfortunately Chippy could smell the bacon and a (kind) ref awarded a second yellow (for what might have been a red) so we were down to 10 men.
We went 3-4-2 for the last 25 minutes with Neil and Mark coming on for Kim and Bowles. Ryan and Kyle were initially disturbed and both had a couple of hairy moments with wild swipes. This aside and although we were never likely to get back into the game we never stopped competing. We produced some very good moments at both ends, Kyle's overall defending being the highlight and earning him MOM. They added one more when we were undone by 6 passes and superior numbers as we pressed at the other end and there's nothing to say about that.
If nothing else the game finished on a high for us as we expressed our commitment to competing at both ends. At 5-0 down its all too easy to throw your hands up but Sam caught the eye in the 88th as he tracked half the pitch length to cover, he only got in a half tackle and looked beaten as they closed on number 6 so it was great to see him recover again to put in a near post block tackle. Fabulous, and he wasnt the only player who's attitude redeemed it for us in the second half.
A Reminder Of What We're All About
"About The Team" on The Website
The "Association" (dictionary definitiion) - "an organised group with a common objective"
"The Association is an organised group formed by John and Gary to bring together a group of mates............."
"Winning is the common objective whilst playing skillful football in the spirirt of Clough and Shankley without mugging off each other, the opposition or the officials. First is First"
Our first formation season was difficult and we lost as many games as we won but in 4 1/2 seasons we've gone on to win 113 games out of 164 - thats 70%, a fantastic record.
We've collected 8 trophies comprising two treble seasons, a double season and collecting three league titles.
We still have FOUR trophies to compete for, thats three knock out cups (Manuden will be our first round opponents in The League Cup) plus The League is not dead, we just need to win our remaining games and see where we end up.
As a reminder:-
2009/10 - although we were runaway league winners we still lost 2 games (Casuals and SBW Town Res.)
2010/11 - we lost to Littlebury (4-2) and Heath Rovers (4-1) and needed Abaacus to pull off a double header win over Heath to give us the title
2011/12 - we lost to Bentfields, Abacus and Hatfield Heath and only Drew against Bricklayers and Cobras but still won The League.
We might have lost 2 and Drawn 1 so far but there are teams (like us) who can trouble Manuden, including Swifts who we must beat in the return There's along way between now and end of season - there will be lots of twists and turns for all teams (bans, injuries, sickness, holidays, upsets, poor decisions) - football, that's why we love it.
The Players
We're an extraordinary small and tight group, possibly unique in Sunday Football.
We started out in 2008/09 with a small group built around Jack, Kyle, Sam, Kim, Joel, Ryan & Neil, with Dan and Lee also playing cameos this season that's 9 players now in their 5th season.
In 2009/10 Revill, Ollie, Chippy and Billy joined so thats 13 players together for 4 seasons
In 2010/11 Steve and Josh came on board so thats 15 players togethe for 3 seasons
In 2011/12 Bowles, Dazza and Glen came on board, joined by Ben and Mark this season.
From this small group we've seen players take long breaks, suffer season long injuries, sustain fractured legs, arms, wrists, fingers and noses, incur long and short bans for all sorts of nonsense but we've stuck together and won together now we'll finish it together - with Trophies please (not just top of the Unfair Play League).
We got what we deserved for a couple of poor performances and its true that we've lost some of our armour of invincibility but we'll do now what we do best - pick ourselves up, go back to basics, play football on the floor with pace, purpose and power and the results will follow, the trophies are all there for the winning.
