Evening! And welcome to the latest in our apparently never-ending run of (nearly all) home matches. Apparently we’re actually going to be away on Saturday, although I’m yet to be convinced the fixture won’t be reversed.
Strange game Saturday wasn’t it? I don’t think I’ve ever been so upbeat after witnessing Cowes concede five goals. After fifteen minutes of madness that saw us go in trailing 1-4 at the interval the talk in the clubhouse at half-time centred around how many more we were likely to concede, but massive credit to the team who more than deservedly ‘won’ the second half and, it could be argued, gained a moral victory overall. At 2-4 Andover were rocking and had the visiting keeper not pulled off a couple of miraculous saves – most notably from Ash Brett’s bullet header – it would have been 3-4 and I’m certain we’d have gone on to get a point or more from the game.
Visiting number 9 Zach Glasspool was very impressive as he banged in a hat-trick, including a couple of stunners that had the staunchest of Cowes diehards applauding, but all in all I was quite unimpressed by Andover, despite them extending their 100% start to the season to seven matches. It’s rarely I’ve seen a team lose their discipline so readily, not so much in the way of fouling, but the dissent offered to the officials and the bickering amongst themselves as they struggled to contain a makeshift Cowes side at 2-4. The glum faces and stony silence from the visiting bench told a story which suggests it’s not going to be plain sailing for Andover this season, especially when they start coming up against some of the division’s other front runners…
Speaking of which, tonight we welcome in-form table-toppers Blackfield & Langley, riding high at the top of the table with ten victories from ten and a mighty impressive 36-5 goals record. Think we’re in for a difficult evening, although games against the Gang Warily side always tend to be tough. We’ve only played each other sporadically over the years, but we’ve lost our last eight league encounters, and going back to 82-3 we’ve managed only seven wins and four draws from 30 league encounters.
Still, every team’s there to be beaten and with (hopefully) a few of the 1st team squad back in contention for tonight you never know. That’s what I’m telling myself anyhow.
The 1st team are back up here a week on Saturday when Shaftesbury come visiting, but before then the Reserves host Ventnor this weekend, so if you’re not travelling to Alresford I look forward to seeing you all up here for that.
In other news, hopefully Mick the Mic, our regular announcer, will be back in his seat tonight so you won’t have to put up with the dull, monotone droll you endured on Saturday. I have to say, excellent selection of tunes before the game and at half-time though. I wonder who put that CD together…?
Enjoy the game.
Toby.