The Blues travelled to Welwyn on Saturday for the 3rd game of the SEMLA regular season. Welwyn 2s had recently only narrowly beaten Hitchin A 8-7, a team which the Blues had romped to a 28-1 win over 2 weeks previously. With most of the offensive players returning for another Saturday, a high score line was predicted, even without Matthew Beresford (with a current points average of 8.33pg). Both the weather and the warmup was sluggish – the Blues’ handling looked fairly sloppy, and the overly small pitch (a youth football pitch) enabled the defence to easily knock down passes and get on the attackers hands. However, once the game began it became clear that the Blues were once again facing a more or less uncontested match. Peter Barry (7,4) opened the scoring early on, and with multiple assists from Nick Williams (5,7) put in 5 in a row for the Blues. The first quarter finished 10-0, despite some poor decision making at times from the Oxford side. Overall though, of the 10 goals 7 were assisted – the combination of Barry and Williams encouraging a more selfless offence from the Blues. The second quarter continued in a similar fashion – faceoff duties were initially shared between Ed Smith (2,1), Lance Baynham (1,1), but most midfielders eventually gave the x a go. Possession continued to be almost 100% in the Oxford attacking half – the Blues defence read their attackers well, sealing off the adjacents and sending out a man to retrieve the ball. Both Tim Sweere and Dom Hewitt (1,0) caused multiple turnovers, and in many cases the resulting possession ended in a fast break and goal. Unfortunately early in the 3rd quarter Welwyn were struck by injury – a recurring knee injury forced one of their men to the bench, and with no further substitutions on the Welwyn side the captains agreed to play 9 a side in order that the game might continue. However, with one fewer men, the Welwyn side were simply run more ragged - the small pitch allowed the larger bench and younger players from the Blues to run hard for short stints, before subbing off and letting the new legs take to the field. As the scoring margin became larger, Hewitt switched to short stick to allow his poles to remain on the pitch for longer and get more game time. After a few rotations of the ball in attack, Hewitt executed an alley dodge and buried a high to high shot past the keeper stick-side post, the first defender to get points on the board this season. The game finished with an official score of 30-1, but the Oxford bench had counted 32 for the Blues on their backup score sheet – with so many goals scored, it is difficult to say what the final score really was. Nick Williams was unanimously voted man of the match – he lead the team with a 12 point game, was ferocious on defence, and not only finished well but got himself into space the whole time, constantly making himself a nuisance for the Welwyn D. Points (goals, assists): Nick Williams (5,7) Peter Barry (7,4) Peter Baddoo (6,4) Tom Carver (4,4) Tom Phillips (3,2) Ed Smith (2,1) Kenny McDowell (2,0) Lance Baynham (1,1) Jack Templeman (1,0) Dom Hewitt (1,0)
Posted on: Mon, 20 Oct 2014 11:13:06 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015