Match Review
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AGFC 3 vs. 2 Loco Splott
Date: 20-Oct-2009
Venue: Sophia Gardens
Note:
Not an "official" match for stats purposes due to game being only 1 hour long
Goals:
Dave Miller
1
David Morgan
1
Own goal
1
Man of the Match:
Anthony Beresford
Report:
In the background was a certain amount of controversy: 11 v 11, so potentially official...but only one hour of pitch time, so unofficial....Guaranteed to send the stats men scurrying to the Terms of Reference, rule books, small print and anything else that may resolve the matter: should the game count for the official record books or not...? As for the football, this was the owd enemy .....the 25th encounter `tween Locos and AGFC...clash of the titans....both teams had won 10, 4 draws....how could the men in green not take this one seriously??
The game started with several probing moves by both sides, with Locos looking the more organised; no wonder: Steve the Knowles had switched allegiance as Locos were 2 short-- could AGFC afford to lose a player of such pedigree and still prevail? To make matters worse, the AGFC talisman, the good Dr Hayes, had opted to play in goal to fulfil his rotation obligations (didn't stop him shouting alot though!!). Things settled into a rhythm as the Loco reinforcements turned up, Steve switched to reffing, and the teams concentrated on playing some serious football.
After 20 minutes, Morgan, back from a layoff with a broken thumb (you`ve got to hand it to him, Scott!!) suddenly came alive. Spotting a loose ball bouncing towards him 25 yards out, he beat the defender to it and hammered a volley into the top corner for a serious contender for goal of the season. A few minutes later, after some well-organised defending by the AGFC back division, DaveM found himself inside the box close to the goal-line. A pivot, a dribble and a sneaky shot `tween keeper and post from close in made it 2-0 and gave AGFC some breathing space in the run-up to half-time.
The second half saw the inevitable fightback by the Loco lads, but not before a mixup in their defence led to an own-goal from one of their defenders who diverted a mean-looking cross past his own keeper under pressure from Em, Fraser and Morgan. The fightback: A smart low drive by a Loco kid just beat Enda whose fingertips pushed the shot onto the post only for it to ping along the line and sneak inside the other post: 3-1. A barrage of airborne attacks followed which brought out the best in TonyB, Huw, Chris and Pete who adopted a "repel all" approach which worked well until a bouncing ball deceived TonyB much to his annoyance, allowing the dreaded Loco strike force to nip in and reduce the arrears to one. Corners, crosses and slick passing moves followed from Locos, but AGFC also had their moments with Fraser finding himself one-on-one with the keeper after being put through by a perfectly-weighted through ball from TonyB. Em, Simon, Dave and Morgan were tiring but to their credit kept competing until the death. A game well won by the team in green....bring on the next challengers!
Editors note: Anyone who was at the game will all agree that Tony B completely deserved the MoM, knocking back the years, knocking out the headers, and nearly knocking himself out with self-flagellation when Loco scored their second. AGFC v Loco means something to this man and he is at his best in Alamo conditions. Well done Tony B!!
Reporter: Tony Beresford