Match Report

Opposition: South West United

Date: 16-Mar-2004

Time: 7:00pm

We played SWU the first game last year. This year we knew what to expect as they had given us a good nudge in the semi-finals last year. A defensive lineup with 4 forwards.

We asked the BHA to allow us to play an underage player (the Vets committee can't make any descisions like that after our debacle last year) and were predictably knocked back – we can't keep players in the game. Apparantly it's better to have them drop through the cracks rather than have them play. One bizarre episode after another. I'll publish the letter received later.

With both our fullbacks out we had to improvise with John and Ray doing the job – and doing it well as it turned out. Our half line was restructured to suit our player base and then we rotated through some of the positions during the game.

1st half.

Thanks to the new time slot and day (Tuesday) we will always be short for the first game. With Craig out injured and/or coaching and Steve also coaching our numbers are 10 at best So we started off by borrowing young Wes (Boldery) from Easts who played well in the many positions we asked of him. At some stage during the first half Steve turned up and Wes then just came on for our injured players. We scored after about 15 minutes when Darryl slotted a neat goal and they replied a few minutes later after some amazing umpiring (shit happens). It was a bit scrappy and the umpiring a little slack – an injured player holding his foot apparently doesn't mean it hit his foot. We should know not to stop by now!

During this half I managed to hit the keeper in the helmet and stir up a hornets nest of protest from a couple of their players (a small hornets nest to be true). This set the tone for the rest of the game as I found all manner of ways to hit their players when they were in the net. The goals scorers in the 2nd half got the benefit of this I reckon.

The halftime score was 1-1.

2^nd Half

The 2nd half saw an improved performance from our team. Our continual swapping of positions kept their defence unsettled and we gained the upper hand scoring 4 more goals in this half. At one stage their keeper called 'leave it' which saw Cols shot go neatly into the net (the goalie continued to get in the road of mine and Gregs but neatly got out of the way for Steve!). Steve Scored two, Our new man 'Stickers' grabbed one from a corner and could have had a couple more too. Towards the end SWU lost all resemblence of postional play and we moved the ball around quickly. Their Centre Half controlled their game but our defence was great and whenever we were threatened they defused the situation and we quickly (for vets) transitioned into attack. Most of the night we actually had a mid field thanks largely to Craig's message to me on Sunday and Wayne's fitness level. (ie he was bludging in the middle................) Steve's speed in attack opened them up on our right and with our speedy right wing (the injured Greg Hammett) on the outside they made a formidable pairing. Greg even began to try to hit the ball - apparently his recent surgery has made him able to trap (ie. "I can only trap and push since the surgery". That's good Greg – you couldn't do that before. Not true of course but funny at the time).

Our recent, but no longer illegal player, Wayne, had a good solid match. Combined with Darryl, Steve and Stickers we have a good attack and should do alright this year. Stickers, after a 28 year break from hockey made a good vets debut and we're looking for more of the same from him. There's a chance that Wes Machen will be fit mid year so we should be able to field 11 players of our own on occassions! I don't want to ask Bruce to play as his two knees (the recently bad and the older bad bad good really bad) are needed for his job.

I think we can be pleased with the result as we accomodated the necessary changes well and overall we played well (for a first game of the season). We were a little slack in marking but this was due to some fairly inaccurate passing from them – we could often sit off a bit and still pick the advertised pass. I doubt if all teams will be quiet that accomodating during the season. I still think that SWU are a good team and often don't play to their potential. Their keeper has a good eye for the ball (and a good head and stomach too as it turned out!).

Scorers: D Tucker, S Sawyers (2), C Murphy , G Stickers

Cards: None