Lane Cove West 1 ,
31 May 2008, Blackman (Upper)
Team:
Kye
Jason Warny Nick G Woz
Nial Dave
Charlie Eeles
Subs: Milce
Shelley
Well I guess it was eventually going to happen, we lost.
I think we’d all concede that North Turramurra were the strongest side
LCW had encountered thus far this season, but having said that, LCW certainly
didn't turn in their strongest performance of the year.
The scene was set at Samuel King Oval after a convincing win by the
Reserves. The surface was pretty bumpy and undulating courtesy of the cricket
pitch in the middle of the park (at least this is what I'm going to blame all
my elephant touches on anyway). This did not suit LCW's
style of play and took some getting used to.
LCW started promisingly enough. The midfield dominated the early
exchanges with Dave, Paul and Nial creating plenty of
space. However this did not translate into a lot of opportunities up front and
there were few shots on goal. Nth Turra then started
to threaten on the counter attack.
Nth Turra scored their first after about 20
minutes from what initially appeared to be a fairly innocuous throw into LCW's penalty area. The ball dropped between a few LCW
defenders and a Nth Turra mid ran in from deep on the
far side and headed the ball home for their first.
Despite the familiar scenario of being 1-0 down, LCW suddenly became
sloppy on the ball and few passes were reaching their intended target. Half
time couldn't come soon enough for LCW.
We unanimously agreed at half time that we had to get first to the ball
and win more 50/50 challenges if we were to have any hope of winning.
Unfortunately Nth Turra were first to score in
the second half. Their winger cut the ball back along the deck and their
striker ran through and slotted Nth Turra's second.
LCW then switched to a 3-5-2 formation in the hope of creating more goal
scoring opportunities. The change left our defence a little short (no pun
intended Jacca) and Nth Turra
continued to push forward. We may have conceded again had it not been for some
scrambling defence and clearances off our own line. Kye
was also called upon to make a number of sharp saves.
LCW finally got on the board with 5 minutes to go. A break was made down
the centre of the park and a through-ball threaded behind the Nth Turra defence on to a rampaging Shelley who obliged with a
clinical finish.
LCW then proceeded to throw everything at Nth Turra
in the frantic last minutes of the game. Unfortunately we couldn't find the
equaliser that we'd somehow managed on a number of occasions earlier in the
season.
I suppose one encouraging point to come out of the game was that despite
playing relatively poorly against the league leaders, LCW still created a
number of opportunities and could have easily put away another goal or two.
Chris Riorden