2nd Team Vs Kings Heath Pickwick

Right, lets get the negativity out of the way first. This was by far our worst performance of the season, the marking was appalling, the passing was for the most part weak and inaccurate and a lot of our decision making was poor all of which lead to the ball being given away too easily and allowing a very weak Kings Heath side to stay in the game right until the end.

However, in amongst all of this was some hockey. We started okay passing the ball around at the back and trying to get the ball wide but were unable to really create any chance of note. Fortunately for us this week, due to players being unavailable and Chris "I will only be able to play a few minutes" Tibble having a dodgy leg, we had a guest striker. Gary O stepped in late for us having secured a pass from Mrs O and was Johnny on the spot when a ball was played with pace into the D and he managed to get a nice deflection and lift it into the goal for 1 nil. We maintained some pressure and an almost carbon copy of the first goal soon followed when again the ball was played into the D for Gary to get his stick to the ball and put the ball past the keeper.

As per usual I have no recollection of the order of the goals but I'm sure Kings Heath scored next. Tibble having decided to give his leg a go moved himself to right back for a period and was "marking" the aged bandana'd Michael Bolton lookalike (post haircut). Thinking that marking was an unecessary luxury for a defender Tibble tried to cover the angles and failed miserably, the ball being passed to the unmarked forward who managed to put the ball beyod a very angry, disappointed, frustrated, distraught Craig who made his thoughts very clear.

Fortunately, following a short corner we extended our lead when Ricky, following some excellent persistence (please note the police enforcement) managed to reverse the ball over the keeper to give us a 3-1 lead.

Kings Heath scored again but I can't remember it. Cue to some squeaky bum time and more poor play from us. However, Richy Roberts was on hand with some silky skill, bamboozling the Kings Heath defence turning one way then the other, dragging the ball left then right, tip toeing through the defence, he played the ball to Simon* in the D, carried on his run, took the ball back of Simon and duly slotted the ball into the goal.

We again made it hard work late on when a ball into our D was intercepted by Tibble who then completely cocked up what was supposed to be a pass out to left midfield and passed it straight to one of their players on the top of the D. He stepped into the D and hit a hopeful ball towards goal. In trying to cut the ball out Chris N managed to deflect the ball past Craig at his near post, 4-3.

That was nearly the last action and we were glad to see the end of the game having managed to scrape the win.

* Correction - my recollection was incorrect and the assist should have gone to McNay.  I can only apologise to the offended person in question and will buy the a drink of their choice next week (free drink cannot be rolled forward to any future weekends)