Men's 2nd Team Vs Wolverhampton and Tettenhall 4ths

Wolverhampton and Tettenhall HC 4’s   4    v    3   CoBHC men’s 2s

CoB Goalscorers: Lindani, Sean Brookes, Robin Stanley

A rearranged fixture as WTHC 4’s couldn’t make our home fixture and classed the game as a walk over, giving the 2’s a 5-0 victory. None the less they wished to play us, so we set up this friendly fixture in the league’s blank week.

The game was competitive and both teams treated the fixture with serious commitment. The home team marginally had the better of the first half. The big difference was their fast movement off the ball behind the away team’s defences. Lots of times the home team turned over possession, quickly pouncing onto the back three defenders. They attacked with an overload on numerous occasions with it being 3 v 5 and of course with those odds got 3 goals early on. The away team settled into the game gaining composure and confidence on the ball with ten minutes of the half remaining. The off the ball movement of players developed and easier pass options thus materialised. From a 16, Ian played a short ball to Stan who got away from his marker and hit a long diagonal through ball to Sean on the right wing. He drove to the edge of   of the “D” and crossed to Lindani who had three attempts to beat the keeper. Going into half time 4 - 1 down the away team addressed a few problems which needed addressing. The team decided to have the midfield track back more to support the defence, to be composed on the ball and to find space for pass options.

With new targets set for every player CoBHC 2’s started the half with confidence. The accurate passing and solid build up play gave the away team long spells of possession. This put pressure on the home team’s back line and they started to give away frequent penalty corners. These shorts were injected more and more accurately giving the shooter better chances as the game went on.

Eventually the away team’s pressure resulted in Sean getting a cross from the right and he calmly controlled the ball and shot far into the corner giving the keeper no chance. 4-2. The away team buoyed by their sudden resurgence looked for more attacking options pushing a higher line. Eventually CoBHC got a third with ten minutes left. This was from another short, a perfect injection by Ian found Stan who drifted with the ball to his right, then let loose a powerful low shot hitting the back board beating keeper and defender, 4-3 (one behind!)

Then as the home team pushed hard to develop a bigger lead, they put the defence under hard pressure and mistakes started to materialise for the first time this half. This pressure resulted in the strangest set of green cards and yellow cards I have ever witnessed. Everyone was of course correct.

1. A strong stick tackle - yellow card down to 10  (Previously green card early in the half)
2. A block of a players run green card down to 9     (previously warned by umpire)
3. A tackle when not 5 metres away – green card down to 8
4. Strong stick tackle – green card down to 7

The team was down to 7 for about a minute before players started filtering back onto the pitch. All the team dropped deep for this period and defended robustly to stop any shots at goal. There was no loss of control by the away team, no temper flare ups, just simple silly errors whilst under stern pressure, which the umpire rightly punished.

The game was played in good spirits by both teams and eventually the away team built up solid pressure which meant the home team had to work hard for their 4-3 victory.