BNU Masters 3 v Seatoun A, 10/3/10 at Happy Valley 1

The clanging sound this week was not from a penalty bouncing off the crossbar but the sound of iron gates closing in vain behind us as we got out of jail. Seatoun (though this season with an A suffix as they have 2 teams) have always been one of the strongest teams in our division, won it last season, and thumped their B team 8-2 last week, so we knew we were in for a much tougher game than the first. But we hung in there for 90 minutes, rode our luck, took most of the opportunities we got, and drew the game.

We were also a little undermanned - regular keeper Mike R is still away, while Cliff, Paul B, Rob, Chris T and Steve who had all played last week were not available. However, we welcomed back Mike O and Stu and had 12 starters.

The game began with Seatoun playing their usual possession game but not threatening too much. With the hard surface and new ball, control was always going to be difficult, and in the first few minutes one of their passes across the back bounced off a fullback and Ian pounced on the loose ball, got it under control and ran into the box. Their keeper is normally a good shot-stopper, but this time was too slow to come out, and Ian had an easy put-away at the near post. Seatoun started to pick up their game and push us back in defence, but couldn't open up an shooting opportunities. But then they had some luck - a hopeful skied ball held up in the slight southerly and was going to drop near our goal-line, but Pete lost it in the glare and it bounced off his knee straight to one of their forwards who fired it in. We hit back very soon after, with Mike O  getting some room on the left wing and crossing to Paul G who got enough contact to wrong-foot the keeper. The ball rolled towards the goal-line and it looked like one of their backs was going to pull off a desperate clearance but he ended up burying the ball in the side-netting. Was it already in? - we'll have to wait for the TV replay ...

Seatoun continued to dominate overall, and started trying to shoot from long-range instead of trying to put in a killer pass behind. Pete handled these well, catching or tipping them away, until one from their main playmaker out wide on the right was hit too well. It dipped over Pete, hit the far post, and went in. Mike B also suffered a calf injury and could not go on, so we were now down to just 11.

We continued to get chances on the break. Dave J made a great run down the right, cut back inside and set a low cross to Ian who side-footed over, and another shot from Ian very soon after was fumbled by the keeper but no-one could take advantage. We could even have had a penalty, but for a series of Wayne Barnesian (sorry, wrong sport) oversights from their ref - first Paul G managed to not be seen being caught by an offside trap, got into a one-on-one with the keeper which was initially saved, but as Paul went for the loose ball he was grabbed by the ankle and brought down, which again was apparently not seen. But we can't complain too much - it was our home game and we didn't have enough players to ref the game too, so Seatoun agreed to do it, and did so fairly.

The second half was even more controlled by Seatoun, and we were down to 10.5 men when Dave D's hamstring started playing up. We kept doing a reasonably good job at keeping them at bay so they took speculative shots from outside the box, which Pete could see better now he had the sun behind him. He had to make a few fingertip saves and we conceded a number of corners. Eventually, they did create a chance from closer range, and it was well put away from near the penalty spot. Fortunately, they missed a easy-looking tap-in from a dangerous low cross, and couldn't get a 2-goal cushion. We made them regret it when Dave R, now playing left-back, brought the ball out of defence and played a through ball over the Seatoun backs for Ian to run onto. This time, the keeper was quickly off his line and made it a 50-50 ball, and they hit the ball simultaneously. The keeper went down, tried to put a hand on the ball (10 yards outside the box) but Ian got to it first and rolled it into the empty goal.

Seatoun continued to command most of the play (have I said that often enough?), but by now the pace was slowing and our defence held until the final whistle. Dave D finally limped off and was replaced by spectator Gary who did a fair job in trainers and no shinpads. Ian tried a couple of long-range speculators - one from near half-way which went just wide and another from right wing which landed on the crossbar. We were pretty happy with the final result - Seatoun should have won but didn't make enough of their chances, and we made the most of ours.
3-3 (HT 2-2)

Ian