Match Report

Our first away fixture of the season involved a little jaunt round the M25 to Horton Kirby to play another new team to us in a very pleasant village setting. With a full squad to select from the team lined up with Gary Rosslee in goal, Pat Mongelard, Steve Blanchard, Roger French and Lee Southby making up the back four, Mark James, Trevor Stewart, Paul Storkey and Colin Ebdon in midfield and Paul Smith with Toby Manchip up front. Toby Harlow and Ian Shoebridge were on the bench.

The game kicked off in glorious autumnal sunshine which increased the dazzle from the shiny new boots of Lee Southby. The game was very evenly matched with Farnborough having discovered how to play the passing game but needed to work on keeping our shape. Welsh Tavern exploited the amount of space we allowed them in the middle to put pressure on the back four and scored 2 goals before half-time. One was an unstoppable free kick from outside the box which flew into the top right hand corner and the second followed a rebound off the post with the Welsh Tavern forward reacting before the defence to put the ball into an unguarded net. From a Welsh Tavern corner Gary pulled off the save of the game as the ball was whipped into the box and was headed goalbound only for Gary to instinctively tip the ball over the bar to earn applause all round. The pass of the half came from Lee "shiny shoes" Southby who having won the ball on the left attempted to play the ball out to the opposite flank and only succeeded in launching the ball into touch some way behind the intended recipient. Lee''s comment was - "sorry, I''ve got new boots on!".

We tightened things up in the second half with Toby Manchip dropping back and filling the gap in front of the centre backs (a job that he is more than qualified to do) to good effect and Paul Storkey running things in midfield. Everybody put in a very good team performance but we just could not get the breakthrough we deserved despite us having more of the game in the second half. Again a free kick from outside the box combined with a fortunate bounce allowed Welsh Tavern to increase their lead and the game finished at 3-0 which did not reflect our contribution to the game. The man of the match votes were very evenly distributed throughout the team as expected but the deserved winner was Paul Storkey for his tireless running.

Things are definitely looking better so long as we continue to pass the ball around.