Scorers: Keverne , Wyn-benis
A trip to the league leaders who had put 5 past us at the start of the season would be a good measure to see how we had improved. Obviously that test required all players to be on time and I took the risk of meeting in Ilford rather than Bounds Green ( which is in the comfort zone of the players), as sooner or later as a captain or a parent you have to trust people to make their own way in life.
Needless to say, I was amazed to see in Vodafone’s results reported 3 days after the game that call volumes were down, maybe they hadn’t accounted for all the calls I received on the exact location of the ground (a postcode can’t lie). The seven standing on the pitch were soon joined by Tom who couldn’t get into the changing room. Stephen having counted the players on the pitch obviously thought we would start with 7 and had locked the changing room and taken the key out with him. That boy will go far. Olly, who is a psychiatrist, then thought it would be interesting to see what would be the impact on the skipper’s fragile state of mind by getting lost, going to the wrong pitch and then turning up as the whistle blew.
A miracle that we started so brightly (maybe this is the way forward) and we were soon knocking the ball around like Barcelona (ok I admit that our players are slightly bigger and maybe a touch slower). We had created quite a few chances but were struggling to Old put them away. A break from Old Parks saw them take the lead with their first shot of the game. Chances continued to be made and not taken and it took a deflected shot from Tom to make it level at half time.
The skipper then went off at half time with a recurrence of last week’s injury and Dunn came on in midfield with Derek moving into defence . Max was having another blinder in goal, dominating his area and acting as a sweeper and pulling off some excellent saves. Unfortunately the ball wouldn’t quite bounce the right way for us in attack and Andy and Tom both had good chances but found the Old Parks keeper in inspired form. We then failed to clear a bouncing ball in the area and Max was beaten by a wonder shot.
No heads down from this team , commitment to the end, and when the oppo’s keeper failed to hold a cross it was David who was on hand to level the scores . A great game, played in an excellent spirit and let’s keep playing like this and keep this 4 match unbeaten run going in the league.
