Bengeo Tigers FC

A venue change from the booked up John Warner pitch saw the second meeting between the two sides playing on the full size pitch at Sele School (the Sumatrans goals having been taken down last week). Our visitors opted to play with the wind coming from behind them for the first half, giving the Sumatrans the kick off. Sam Milne started in goal. The defence consisted of Zack Barber, Kyle Bates, captain Jack Stewart and Ben Adams, whilst midfield started with James Brett out left and Craig Webb, Joe Franklin, Calum Dunnage and Andrea Augello making the balance, leaving Robert Heffer alone up front. Sam Rider, Tyler Jervis and Ryan Lankester started ‘on the bench’. The first few minutes saw no pattern to the play as both sides probed and adjusted their game to cope with the gusty wind. In the fourth minute, the Sumatrans won a corner and up stepped James Brett to blast the kick well into the danger zone. A John Warner defender jumped high the intercept the ball and head to safety. The first clear chance came in the 11th minute when Zack passed the ball up field for James Brett to put in a well weighted ball to Robert. Off on one of his blistering runs, Robert struck a shot which just went wide of the post. Moments later, Zack put in a decisive tackle and again sent the ball up field, this time to Craig. A little jink through for Andrea, who with fantastic pace from out wide, reached the ball before the Warner keeper, beat him and just when a goal looked certain, a superb piece of defending saved the day for our visitors. In the 15th minute Kyle took a goal kick which was intercepted by James. A quick pass to Craig saw him pass the ball through to Robert, who ran in beating the defence. As the Warner keeper came off his line, Robert placed a looping ball out of reach and the perfect trajectory saw the ball drop into the net for one nil. Another piece of play saw Robert pass the ball back to Calum who shot just wide. Tyler replaced Calum late in the first half, which had seen defenders Zack, Kyle, Jack and Ben coping admirably with anything that came their way. The second half started with the same line up that finished the first. With the Sumatrans now having the wind advantage, the game took on a different completion and the midfield battle was being wrapped up by Craig, Joe and Tyler. Four minutes into the half, some good passing between Craig and James resulted in setting up a shot for Andrea, who this time was thwarted by a good save from the Warner keeper. Determined to keep in the action, Tyler fired a cracking 20 yard shot which flew just over the bar. In the 44th minute, another jink through from Craig set James up for a low shot to make the score 2 nil. Two minutes later, Robert emulated the famous Walcott runs from his own half, but finished the job himself for 3 nil. In contrast to the first half, the traffic was by now almost all one way. Tyler added himself to the score sheet after 57 minutes of play to take the score to four nil. A tactical change saw Craig and Kyle swap positions and shortly after, Sam Rider replaced the authoritative Sam Milne in goal. Another fine set of moves between Ben, James and Robert set Kyle to fire a 25 yard shot which flew just over the bar. Smelling blood, Kyle, moments later fired home his first competitive goal for the Sumatrans to take the score to five nil. Ryan Lankester entered the field of play, for James Brett and immediately got into the action. Kyle, clearly enjoying his scoring moment, hit his second and the Sumatrans sixth in the 67th minute following a long throw from Zack. Receiving the ball with good control, Kyle beat a defender and then gave the keeper no chance with his well struck shot. A rare John Warner attack in the dying seconds saw one of their strikers beating the Sumatran defence and putting the ball wide of keeper Sam to get themselves a consolation goal. Well done to all the boys today on a deserved and well taken victory. Men of the match today were Craig and Kyle. Mick Barber