Theres only one Andy Evans!

At this stage of the season it is always hard to assess the relative strength of the opposition you are facing, but given the Bay Olympic team’s thrashing (7-0) of Manurewa the previous week we were expecting a tough game. The pre-match build up squarely focused on getting a good start and not being in a position to have to chase the game.

We got exactly what we wanted with the first 20 minutes being very dominant with shots going in on the Bay goal without the keeper being seriously tested. The main threat coming down our left where Richie Sharples had a great game with Geoff Dodd behind him and Matt Nugent inside, meant that Bay were getting pushed back. At the same time we soon discovered how they had scored their 7 the previous week, and that was by playing a long ball over the top for 2 very quick strikers to chase.

If anything our superiority of passing in the first half, aided by them being quite a young side that dived in somewhat, allowing you to go round them, meant that we spent such a lot of the time attacking that we got a bit stretched with wide open prairies of space in the middle. Our best chance of the first half fell to Nick who went close with a header after some good work down the right by Chris Britnall and yours truly.

The first half saw one single moment of brilliance and that came from Colin Pegg. To gain a full understanding of the build up I need to take you back to Thursday evenings’ training. Over the last few weeks our shooting has been a little wayward, and so we did some shooting drills. First up was Geoff Dodd who coolly slotted 4 out of 5 shots, impressive indeed. Now fast forward to Saturday pre-match where Geoff was asking if he could play up front after all …… Now after about 30 minutes of the first half with the score at nil nil, the ball was played over the top from our right and Geoff tucking in as any good full back would ran across to clear it. Bearing in mind Geoff was about 30 to 35 metres from our goal, Neil Skerry suggested quite forcibly that he get a foot to it and that he did. At that point I had anticipated the ball disappearing back over my head towards the Bay goal, how wrong can you be? Geoff managed to get a ridiculous amount of back spin onto it which saw the ball fly towards the top corner of our goal. Somehow Colin kept it out which Geoff was truly grateful for, it was an absolute top draw save, and Geoff is banned from shooting practice this week.

At half time it was goalless but there for the winning. The second half was really more of the same but it was good to see that the players coming on and going off didn’t affect our shape too much. The turning point came when after a move appeared to break down and Andy Evans once again chased through onto their keeper who played the ball at Andy, who with his true finely tuned predatory instincts, caressed the ball into the corner with his knee cap. Young Matty Bent came on and within a couple of minutes had helped wrap the game up. A great run down the left where he absolutely roasted their right back, cut inside and a great ball across the 6 yard box to who else but the goal machine that is Andy Evans, 2-0 and game over.

We actually did create more chances but did not want to appear greedy so settled for just the 2 goals. A word of praise for the defence though, the guys have kept 2 clean sheets in a row against teams that the previous weeks had scored 5 and 7 respectively and that is the foundation upon which you win games so well done to you guys as a unit, you certainly used your smarts yesterday to look after a strikeforce which will be as fast as we face in this league.

Next week we are away at Papatoetoe Blue where we will be looking to maintain our 100% start.