With the Men’s 2s dropping down to East Div 3SE, this fixture against the Men’s 3s was always going to be one to look for on the season ticker.
And it didn’t disappoint with a 6 goal thrilling encounter.
The Men’s 2s started the game with reasonable intensity looking for some early opportunities to quieten down the decent size crowd that had gathered over at the Coopers Arena. Some close efforts from Ellis Pickering and William Doyle were snuffled out by the Men’s 3s game plan to defend deep and hit quickly on the break.
Around 15 mins had passed when the Men’s 3s got into their stride and started to threaten the Men’s 2s defence with their pace on the break. This was rewarded when a PC was given and with the sweetest of strikes from Creggy the ball flew past the pads of GK Mit Shah onto the backboard to give the 3’s a deserved lead.
The lead was doubled by the Men’s 3s who went with the exact same PC routine with Creggy thundering his second of the game past the 2’s defence.
The Men’s 2s were clearly rattled and their early rhythm was gone. With just 2 mins of the half remaining a lifeline was given when Nick O’Dell hit a clean strike from a PC past the Men’s 3’s GK John Daltry to reduce the score to 2-1 at half time.
After the break the Men’s 2s came out with much more purpose and was moving the ball around at pace in the wide areas creating opportunities, resulting in the equaliser with a clever PC routine which Jamie O’Dell finished off.
With some of the pressure lifting from the Men’s 2s, MOM Ryan Hodges got control of the game in the middle of the pitch and started to dictate play. And the third goal came from another PC with Phil Hudson deflecting in a Nick O’Dell strike to take the Men’s 2s into the lead for the first time in the match.
With tiring legs from the Men’s 3s a fine ball in from Jamie O’Dell was deflected by Michael Scrivener to seal the 4-2 win for the Men’s 2s in a very entertaining game. It was tough on the Men’s 3s who put up an almighty fight but this was just out of their reach on this occasion.
Men’s 2 now travel to Old Loughtonians 4s on Saturday 8th October and the Men’s 3s will be looking to bounce back with a home game at Coopers vs Saffron Walden 3s.
