Divison 3 - RESERVE GRADE - MATCH REPORT

Lane Cove West 2 - 0 Kissing Point

Round 5, and the mighty reserves took a 2 win & 2 loss record into this game against Kissing Point, who were currently joint 
top-of-the-table with three other clubs.  So today was always going to be a test.  

Despite this we had good reasons to look forward to todays game, not only were we unbeaten on "Fortess Blackman" but 
there a distinctive aroma of "snags" in the air with the Club putting on some smashing after-match eats and drinks 
in this first of a few "club days" we can look forward to this season down at Blackman.

Unfortunately we were without any match officials for this game or indeed the first team game (thanks KDSA NOT!).  So
yours truly stepped up to take charge of the first half of this game.  At least this way I could start my warm-up early
with a hope of making an appearance in the second half.

Kissing Point made a very strong start in the first half of this game, they won the toss, chose to play "uphill" and 
for most of the half, played some nice passing football.  A lot of Kissing Point's nice passing play was being orchestrated
by Vinnie, who if nothing else made me laugh due to his "mullet" and typical WOG-like west-sydney accent. 

The referree's nerve was called into account quite early after a good passage of play gave Vinnie a run into the box
with a chance to score but a good old' fashioned shoulder-to-shoulder challenge from Sean Morrish had vinnie "swandive"
in the hope of winning a penalty.  Me, I wasn't having anything of it and waved away the protests.

Paul Mulvihill did a fantastic job as the first half wore on by keeping Vinnie in his pocket, winning basically everything
and even started to receive complimentary plaudits from his newly found WOG friend.  

Paul won a great battle with Vinnie in midfield to race up the right hand side of the pitch, and had not one, not two, but
three chances to play in a ball to the penalty box after 2 deflections from a Kissing Point defender.  It was during this 
three chance that Rod Andrews connected beautifully on the volley to put Lane Cove West 1-0 up.

Soon afterwards we blew for half time - a perfectly timed goal to rattle the nerve of our opposition. 

The second half had us running up the pitch, and to be honest we were expecting to be under the kosh from Kissing Point but
the pressure never really came.  The goal before half-time had really knocked the wind out of their sales.

Paul Muvihill brought on Ed Lee for John Prideux who went off with a corked thigh, myself swapped in at left back and Hank 
bouhgt on for Goal Scorer Rod Andrews.

I had made a bet with Ed that should he score I would "treat" him to his after-match snag sandwich if not, he'd be buying me 
one instead.  This was obviously just the incentive that Ed needed, as within 10 minutes of coming on, he ran down a great 
long pass to strike a wicked shot which the goalkeeper managed to parry back into ed's path who calmly slotted away our second. 
2-nil to LCW! and a free snag for Ed!

The final passages of play had LCW more likely to score than our opposition, particularly helped with 2 substitutions need to
swap injured goalkeepers around.  We also noted that a number of the Kissing Point guys were "doubling up" in the first team
game, so they obviously decided to save themselves for the 3pm game.

So all up a great day for LCW reserves, a good win, a good performance, a good strong solid side with numbers on the bench to 
ensure the job was done.  So now to round 6 - lets hope we can continue the good run and win 2 from 2. 

Author: Al Cooke