THCC 6 - 3 Ecclesia 2008

Starting line-up: Danny Fitz (GK), Jonathan John (LB), Matt Taylor (CB), Mark Bowtell (CB), Stephen Bingham (RB), Lee Thomson (LW), Oli Taylor (CM), Luke With (CM), Luke Williams (RW), Jimmy Nimmo (ST), Jonny Pilkington (ST)  Bench: Jamal Holder  

Intro: The THCC boys turned up ready to work hard today, as some players would have to be out of position and we only had one sub, Jamal, who at the last minute kindly gave up his Saturday morning in bed. As the game got underway it was clear THCC weren't going to role over for this one, and for the fast half we possibly looked the better side against a team that had won 3 of 4 games so far this season. Luke With worked tirelessly in the middle as we've come to expect from him. Jimmy was tracking back well, and Lee was forever causing their right-back problems. The team was working hard to fend off their attacks and get it forward quick to create more chances for Jonny to miss. To be fair he only had the one! With 40 minutes on the clock Danny Fitz reacted poorly to a questionable refereeing decision and as such was given his marching orders - 10 men - in comes Jamal for whom the nimble-footed Luke Williams had to give way.

HT (0 - 0): Second half and THCC started ok, realising that it wasn't beyond them to get something out of this game. With a player less and Oli now dropping in at centre-back we struggled to create many chances, but still always looked dangerous from set-pieces. Their first goal came after lots of pressure down our right side, and a well-paced ball behind our defence. The ball was squared in to the middle and after Oli had done all the hard work to get back and in front of the striker, he got his foot on it to place it neatly into the goal. If he didn't their striker would have but that didn't make us hate him less! With our heads down they took advantage of their extra player again. This time it was a simple ball through the middle of the defence which with some confusion at the back their striker pounced on and it ended up an easy tap in. Luke With's constant hassling of the ball and sometimes the opposing player saw him getting in trouble with the ref on more than one occasion. A good example of passion boiling over, and he was constantly berated by the opposition which really didn't help matters. Once Luke lost his head, despite all his attempts to calm down he found himself with a second yellow card and we had a second red of the game. We never got going after that and the end of the game petered away with not much fun being had by all. One to forget and to learn from. On to next week.

MoM: Matt Taylor