2005-6 Season
Kenchels FC 2 Raynes Park Vale 3
Writing by Dotden/Memory by EP
A sensational penalty save kept us in this game but we failed to capitalise on Craig ‘The Cat’ Belsham’s moment of brilliance and ended a run of three games without defeat.
Our defeat coincided with the return of Stevie B after an absence of, strangely enough, three games, I think. Anyway, let’s get on back to the match.
RPV were last-minute replacements for Old Dorks, who’d been clobbered by injury and couldn’t get a side out. Chris New-b-Wan deserves a big up for digging out this new fixture, which is well worth a rerun, and also for getting us a pitch at Old Salesians’ place at West Ewell at short notice.
RPV are a handy side who stretched us when they came forward. It was us who went ahead though, scoring after 15 minutes when Euan found himself one-on-one with the keeper and slotted his shot in off the post.
Ten minutes later RPV equalised after we failed to clear a high free kick in our area. They pulled ahead shortly afterwards when we failed to close them down in midfield and their forward turned neatly and shot from distance to score.
At the other end, we had plenty of opportunities. We hit the woodwork twice and had two headers cleared off the line. Alex went round the keeper once only to overrun.
The ‘Chels pressure continued in the second half with Rob drilling a shot just wide, Gavin hitting the post and an incident where the boy Greengrazza brilliantly ducked a header only for Gav to shin the shot.
As for Alex (new nickname Barnie), he was dangerous anywhere near the goalmouth – pinging shots all over West Ewell and surrounding postcodes.
We also struggled in midfield, where Tommy T and Chris New-b-Wan had some communication difficulties (or as the boss might say, ‘struggled to forge a midfield partnership’). Chris, a very courteous bloke, must have won about 90 tackles and on each occasion politely kicked the ball back to the opposition within nanoseconds.
The one exception was when he found himself withy Steve, Tom T and Tel all in space to pass to but chose me instead, who was at the time having a nice cup of tea with the opposition. I indicated my surprise with my now customary ‘Oh f*ck’.
At times like this, it’s good to know we ‘Chels can always rely on a set-piece even if it is at the wrong end of the pitch. In this case, we went for the Stevie B penalty giveaway, with Stevie clipping their forward as he broke through on goal.
This was the point at which the boy Craig came good – having been relatively untroubled to this point. It was a stunning save and gave us a real lift.
With just ten minutes to go, El Presidente pulled us level with a deft left-footed strike. Game on. Four minutes later it was game over when RPV won a corner and scored as a result of sloppy marking. EP pulled himself off at this point to bring Euan on but the expected equaliser never materialised.
And that’s it. A tough game, a disappointing result but notable for the return of the boy Greengrazza in the second half and the turning out of one Matt Lowndes with daughter Poppy in the stands. That’s it.
Next week I am on international duty so who’s doing the match report then? Volunteers please!
The line-up: Craig, Den, Steve, Tel, Tom B, Tom T, Chris, Euan, Gavin, Alex, Robin. 2nd half: Paul replaced Euan.
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