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City Life 1 - 1 Steeple Bumpstead Res 24/11/07
This particular Saturday was the final game of a run of home matches for City Life which had seen 10 of the previous 12 matches played on home soil. With Christmas approaching it seemed sensible for the 3 wise men to meet before the game. Unfortunately only Matt, Mike, Colm and Dave could make it so it obviously wasn’t that close to the festive season. The need for the chat was to gain some midfield cohesion for the match ahead. It was time to start dominating from the middle of the park. Mike whipped out his ‘heat’ maps from the England match v Croatia to show how the Barry, Gerrard, Lampard combination dominated and ran the show!!!! Hopefully our performance was going to exceed the effectiveness of that.
The first half of the match was largely dominated by the lads in purple, constantly looking for ways to breach the watertight Steeple defence. Chances were largely limited to long shots and when we did get inside the opponents penalty area the finishing was not as clinical as it had been in previous weeks. With 10 minutes remaining of the first half Steeple Bumpstead earned themselves a corner with one of their spasmodic attacks. The delivery from the right was Beckham-esque and their tall centre half towered above the two City Life defenders to send the ball crashing into the net. Wayne, stand-in keeper for the first half picked the ball out of the net, the first work he had to do all game. The first half then resumed it’s usual pattern of City Life dominance in terms of possession with little end product to follow and so the referee blew his whistle with the lads facing their first defeat since September.
After a few rousing words from the coach the second half kicked off. The game was developing into a battle devoid of much quality with the ball switching between teams like a potato straight off the fire and passing between hands on the way to a plate!! It wasn’t pretty but there was much industry and effort going into the performance. Both teams were left to half chances and none of them were threatening the scorers. Then, when all seemed dead, one of those half chances paid off. They do say if you don’t buy a ticket you will never win the raffle and on this occasion the Steeple keeper will wish he had never gone to the village fete! The ball was picked up by Mike about 30 yards out. He shifted it slightly and decided to get his £1 out for a strip of 5 tickets. No booby prize this time for Mike who had been buying tickets all season so far. This one thundered across the grass like a snail having a day off. It didn’t swerve, it wasn’t powerful, it didn’t even take a bobble however Mike’s 421st shot of the season found it’s way through the keeper’s legs and into the back of the net. 1-1.
From then the game was full of more hustle and bustle with City Life looking the more likely to make the breakthrough but it just wasn’t happening. The game finished a draw, keeping the unbeaten run going but with the feeling that 2 points had been lost. This feeling accentuated by the celebrations from the opponents who had earned themselves a draw. With the next three games against the top three in the league there was much to be looking forward to.
Matt Double
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Dave Halse, 05/12/2007 |
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