Lane Cove West 1 Prouille 1
Reporter:
Following the disappointment of a wash-out last week
and the Kissing Point result the week before, the build up to this game was
more a case of whether we would manage to put out a full team of eleven fully
fit players. Taking into account those
that had succumbed to European holidays or enforced school holiday duties a lot
of “Horse Trading” was taking place in the background to get the A and B squads
balanced for what was a crucial game for our A team to avoid the dreaded drop.
As a result we lost Matt Logan and Jon Ball to the A’s
but gained Paul Mattes to strengthen our back four. In addition in came Wor
Bob, Martin Clarke, Dave Clarkson and John Sneddon. A fine balance of youth,
vitality and spirit I hear you cry with a dash of experience to complete the
mix! However a glance at the team sheet showed our options up front to be
somewhat limited even though we had plenty of cover everywhere else.
So emergency plan B was put into effect and I nicked
Mark Ashton to get him to play two thirds of our game prior to the A’s game –
nobody tell Ivan!
Those of you who played in the first game against
Prouille will remember the outrageous goal that they scored which was judged to
be technically 147 kilometres offside!
So there were a few grudges knocking around before kick-off and let’s
face it the opposition have a player called “Killer”!
So to adapt to our lack of attacking options we opted
for packing the midfield and hoping for the best. The early indications were that we were in
for a tight game with Bob as always looking strong at the back and reading the
game superbly and the pace and aggression of Paul Mattes getting us out of
trouble when it loomed.
This added strength at the back helped us add some
steel to the midfield with Martin Clarke working away behind John Sneddon and
Peter Ware to allow these guys to do their stuff.
Gradually we began to get the upper hand with Mark
Ashton hitting a few dangerous shots on the turn and even Martin Clarke having
a punt which unfortunately did not hit the corner flag in the traditional
centre half manner but went out of play for a throw-in on the edge of the 18
yard area. He later blamed this on Snow Blindness being so high up the pitch
In particular a product of our youth policy was
starting to make a big impact on the game.
Young Bill Gallagher was causing Prouille all sorts of problems at the
back and went close on a number of occasions.
A great through ball from Peter Ware even had Bill pulled up for offside
after his lightning pace caught the Prouille defence asleep.
As we progressed to half time our confidence was
building but a break into the box by the 9ft tall midfielder from Prouille and
a deflected cross shot off Martin Clarke’s boot over Dave W and 1-0 at half
time. Why do we always concede “BLOODY” deflected goals?
So after much swearing and shouts of “Heads up Reds”
we licked our wounds and knew we could get back in the game.
Into the second half and a very close game was
emerging but there was always a feeling that we were going to get something
from this one.
Dave Clarkson was making good progress on the right
side of midfield and starting to cause some problems. He broke through the defence at one point
only to be stopped when a goal seemed imminent. This was however, only a dress
rehearsal as shortly afterwards a great dummy by Mark Ashton (or he just missed
the ball) led to the ball ending up behind the defence. Great chasing by Dave saw him storm into the
penalty area, square the ball for Bill to slot home a much deserved goal to
draw us level.
What followed was a very hard fought remainder of the
second half with tempers starting to flare up.
A particularly irritating winger from Prouille was threatened by both
Paul Mattes and Eric but Gareth as Ref did a very good job of sorting out some
back chat and “rogue” elbows” to keep things from getting ugly.
Although we continued to compete equally with Prouille
the second goal would not come even when John Sneddon misheard Gareth and shot
and missed by miles from the halfway line as he thought he heard Gareth said
“one minute to go”. Gareth actually said “fourteen minutes to go”!
So honours even at full time.
Bill Gallagher was unanimously voted man of the match for
a great performance. He really did look like a man half his age - or a man half
his height as someone added at half time!
Dave Clarkson ran in second place with Paul Mattes coming in third.
Thanks to Mark Ashton for helping out and then playing
for the A’s, Bob as always for filling in when we need him, Gareth for a good
solid performance as Ref and Bill for beers, running the line and getting us a
point.
Signing off.
Martin P