Northside Monash 3 Lane Cove West 2.

1^st July, Koola

I was hoping to report that we were now into dangerous territory of finding out the last time we won five in a row. Unfortunately, unlike last week, Northside Monash became the first team to do the double over us this season.

It is becoming evident that we tend to save our best performances for the top teams and self destruct against weaker opposition and this game was no different.

I was rightly accused last week of writing a very “defence” based report for a game where we scared 4 goals. Well I do see things from the back after all but I’m afraid this weeks game was lost by mistakes we made at the back.

We started the game with a virtually unchanged team with the exception of Chris Mitchell who thanked us for his annual game last week and declared that on Sunday morning he realised why he doesn’t play every week!

With Matt arriving late Dave Clarkson filled in up front and we got off to a good start with the majority of possession and pushing forward to good effect.

Bob whipped in a shot/cross that Dave Clarkson just failed to get good contact with otherwise it had goal written all over it.

John Sneddon & Peter Ware nearly replicated the goals from last week but the corner was just too high and Mark Sehn as usual was scaring the living daylights out of their defence.

In fact Matt who had arrived at this point said that for the first 20 minutes all you could see was LCW going forward.

We didn’t seem to be getting any decent clean opportunities in front of goal though and a number of times we would reach the edge of their area and not manage the killer shot or pass to break down the opposition. Even when we got shots on target there keeper showed very safe hands.

It looked like we had finally broken the deadlock when Matt came on and with what I think was his first touch smacked the ball onto the post, the ball deflected at a 90 degree angle across the goal and we all stood waiting for it to cross the line. Nope – it somehow managed to bounce along the goal line and out for a goal kick!

Then disaster struck!

Tony who had hurt his back picking up the dog (!) had passed goal kick duties to Howard. I shouted across to Howard that Tim was now on (the pitch) so he could take the kick. Tony misinterpreted the call and went for the quick short goal kick before Howard had a chance to take it.

Unfortunately he passed it straight to the Monash forward who smacked it into an open net. We haven’t let one of those in for a while!

So ended the first half to much wailing and gnashing of teeth as we planned our usual “get out of jail” routine.

Unfortunately more stuff up’s in defence put us three nil down before we even had a chance to take the game to Monash.

My mind has selectively blocked out some of this so sorry if I have the order wrong but I think we conceded either a corner or a free kick. The ball was floated in – Bob looked like he had it covered but it seemed just too high, it bounced, Howard could only get his chest to it as it headed towards our goal. Tony however had it covered as he shouted “Keeper’s Ball”. However, you roving reporter had a “Red Mist” moment and decided to belt the ball into touch only to slice it into the bottom corner.

The next goal was even worse as Monash pumped a hopeful ball over the defence and Tony came out to his penalty area to claim the ball down low. Or so it seemed. It actually went through his legs allowing the Monash forward to tap the ball home.

Howard then did what he claimed was “almost” the best tackle of his career. In fairness he did get a slight touch to the ball before sending the Monash guy into the turf. It was one of those moments we all agreed afterwards where there was a sharp intake of breath by his team mates and I for one tried to avoid eye contact with either the Ref our the opposition. The result – our first yellow card of the campaign from probably the best a Referee we have had.

So we were now three nil down and looking thoroughly hacked off!

As usual we stepped up our game and began to put pressure on Monash. Peter was doing his best to cut a way through the centre with Bob and John Sneddon and Dave C. were making progress on the flanks.

When we did pull one back what a cracker it was too. Corner of the eighteen yard box and John smacked it over the outstretched fingers of a very good keeper into the top corner.

And we continued to push forward and with 5 minutes to go Bobby finally broke through and smashed it into the net.

A bit too late unfortunately as the Ref blew the final whistle. It’s been a while since we threw away a game with silly mistakes but let’s hope it will be a while before it happens again.

Mark Sehn (again) was Man of the Match as he marches relentlessly towards player of the season methinks.

So heads up for Saturday and let’s take it out on Lane Cove.

Martin Poolan