I had anticipated a difficult game against opponents from a higher league, on a 3G surface and us having not played for two weeks but the standard of some of our play was disappointing. The game was over in the first 15 minutes by which time we were 3 goals down. On each occasion, we allowed far too much room for a cross to be put into our penalty area and a free header to a player 6 yards from goal and standing unmarked right between the posts. I accept the quality of cross was good but the lack of determination to put players under pressure was unacceptable.

We did improve as we got to grips with their 3 midfielders who had initially enjoyed a lot of room to play in but were now forced into the occasional mistake and we managed the last half an hour of the opening period reasonably well. Offensively we created one or two openings but never really troubled their goalkeeper and the players deserved some credit after a horrible start that they reached the break still just 3 behind.

At half-time we tried to set some realistic targets as in all honesty it never looked like there was a way back for us. We set out to not concede again and to try to get a goal ourselves but that wasn’t to be. A rare miskick from Sang who made some fine saves on the night gifted the home side a 4th and at that point, I made a number of changes to use the remaining 30 minutes to give opportunity to some of the lads that had not had much game time and to some of the club's youngsters. It was always going to be a test for them but at times the youngsters looked very assured and the club can be rightly proud that at that time we had two 16-year-olds, a 17-year-old, and two 18-year-olds on the pitch - 10 players 22 years old, and under. I thought they did exceptionally well but occasional mistakes were punished and we conceded 3 more times to be well beaten by 7 goals to nil.

The lads were obviously disappointed but there needed to be some context put on the game and I hope that the overall experience will assist the lads as we turn our attention to the remaining league fixtures.

Gaffer Glynn Stephens
First Team Manager