The UNITS took on Dudley Sports this morning at Brown Westhead Park. Once again we found ourselves moved off our normal pitch and onto Pitch 1, the worst pitch so not the best start to the morning
Add to this the squad once more stretched to the hilt with injuries, work commitments, sickness and general absentees and we started with
Mala, Two-Ton, Danny, Eggy, Taylor, Baker, Coco, Ross, Ginge, Hunter & Pountney
Subs were Turner, Cuzer and Rad
Dudley were on the end of a 10-2 hammering by the UNITS earlier in the season so they clearly had revenge on their mind this morning and it was clear to see early on their gameplan was for damage limitation playing a 5-4-1 with very little ambition to get forward
The first 10 minutes was UNITS asking all the questions without creating clear chances, then the referee gave Dudley a generous free kick and the ball came in, Baker lost his man and he guided the ball into the bottom corner 0-1
Nothing worse than giving a side with negative intentions a goal head start and that's exactly what we did
Amazingly on 15 minutes Dudley were playing for time, taking an age over goal kicks, kicking the ball as far as possible into touch and this just added to the UNITS frustration
We created 5 quick corners on the trot, one of them resulting in a sliced clearance hitting the bar, we tested their keeper but all from distance and the best chance of the half fell to Baker who controlled a cross beautifully on his chest before poking wide from 10 yards when he really should have scored
Despite all our possession Dudley were doing a number on us, 10 behind the ball, wasting time and soaking up the pressure and we came in 1-0 down with not much to show for our efforts
Cuzer once more was forced to change the shape at HT due to our lack lustre efforts in the first half, Ross coming off for Turner as we changed our shape to 4-3-3 as we needed to get more bodies in the Dudley final 3rd
The 2nd half started as the first ended, UNITS having all the ball yet Dudley defending well, happy to clear their lines long and showing little attacking intent, the onus was clearly on us to open them up
However, we were nowhere near our best, too many players waiting for others to make things happen rather than taking the game by the scruff of the neck
We were hit by the ultimate sucker punch on the hour when after a blatant hand ball by their lone striker, one he even stopped for, amazingly the referee who had a shocker all morning, played on allowing a low cross to come into the box and Danny at full stretch diverted past Mala, OG and 0-2
The UNITS quickly went 3 at the back and despite all our pressure our best chance fell to Eggy who rattled the post from 6 yards and two goal mouth scrambles were hacked off the line
With 8 minutes left Tayl's picked up the ball and curled it over the keeper from 15 yards to give us hope
We were basically now playing 2 at the back as we threw caution to the wind and we were denied a nailed on penalty as Hunter was clattered from behind, with only 2 minutes left Tayl's squared for Hunter to guide home into the bottom corner as our pressure finally paid off as we levelled late to square it up at 2-2
Bottom line is despite the fightback we were nowhere near good enough today, too many players not taking charge and we've dropped 2 points in what should have been a home banker with the right application
Man of the match went to Keith who showed up some of the others with his desire and commitment
Cuzer
