Men's 1st Team Vs Bournville 3

Bournville 3rds 4-2 Yardley 1stXI

Goal scorers: Noor Zaman and Alex Makepeace

Yardley’s recent spell of favourable results came to a juddering halt when the team travelled away to face Bournville.

It proved to be a classic ‘game of two halves’. Both teams made a bright enough start and both enjoying some good possession, Yardley’s midfield of Ricky, Alex and Jeevan combined well and won several challenges to put the team on the front foot. This link up released Kyle down the wing but definite chances were rare in the early exchanges. Bournville slowly started to get more of a foot into the game and eventually winning a bizarre flick. Yardley’s keeper, Neal Makepeace made an excellent save, parrying  the ball away. Yardley began to look stronger going forward and Jahed playing in Ricky who won a free hit outside the shooting circle. A q uick exchange with Alex who played the ball in, with Noor getting a touch before it went into the goal to edge into the lead.  Bournville came back strongly to level the scores. However, the half was far from over. Jeevan cleverly won a short corner when Bournville went in for a few tackles. Ricky pushed out to Alex who drag flicked into the left corner to regain the lead before the interval and be pleased with the performance so far.

During the second half Yardley’s old faults came back to haunt them as they seemed to lose their way with some poor marking that  ultimately cost them the game. Yardley soaked up pressure quite well for a while with  Ed, Noah and Mat pressing on their players, Zach being instrumental in his passes to find Kyle and Paul. But with little attacking threat and difficulty getting out of the own half for periods, it become somewhat a training exercise after Bournville equalised.  During the final ten minutes, Bournville scored  two goals in quick succession to put the game to bed. Late on, Noah took a knock on his arm that ended his game somewhat prematurely, Yardley hung on but couldn’t raise their game for any further response.

Next week, Yardley host West Bromwich at home.