Ducks Win Derby Day Spoils

There was a hint of spring in the air as we made the short trip to a sun soaked Bedgrove Park for our first meeting in a while with our friends from Bedgrove Dynamos.

Bedgrove have played at this level for a number of seasons now and this would be yet another test for our ever improving squad.

The first half of the game saw both teams somewhat unusually quiet compared to previous meetings. Our midfield quartet of skipper Andrew Carr, Elliott Behan, Joshua Harrison and James Gibson (playing against his old club) all battled hard whilst our defensive three of Igor Chrzanowski, Charlie Davis and Aqib Zahir dealt well with all the home side had to throw at them, ably backed up by Oliver Foster in goal whose confidence is improving with every game. Kaelin Shaw started the game as the sole man up front but spent most of the half working hard in midfield as this was where the ball found itself the majority of the time.

The two highlights of the half were Bedgrove having a goal disallowed for offside and us taking the lead through a long range sided footed strike from Charlie Davis. I felt we could have been a goal or two more to the good at half time and we put the home defence under a lot pressure without really creating any clear cut chances.

As usual the second half of the game saw numerous changes with Joshua Cotton, Harry Grantham and Nathan Bosworth all coming on at half time and the first ten minutes of the half saw us take control of the game with goals from Harry (who persistence paid off as he didn't give up on the ball and was able to squeeze it under the home goalkeeper and in) and Joshua Harrison. We also took this opportunity to introduce Jacob Oliver into the game to add a bit more bite into the middle of the park.

At this point Bedgrove woke up and put us on the back foot for a good ten minutes during which time our defending got sloppy, we took our eye of the ball and conceded two goals which put what was looking like a comfortable victory in danger of becoming a glorious defeat.

This mad ten minutes forced me into rather drastic tactical changes by way of a quadruple substitution which saw Jack Rollins and Nelson Nkanzei join the game and Elliott and Kaelin return.

This seemed to have the desired effect when Joshua Harrison broke free of the opposition defence, brilliantly took the ball around the keeper and powerfully shot home to restore our two goal lead with his 20th goal of what has been a fantastic mini conference season for him so far.

Our lead became three goals again when Nelson Nkanzei picked the ball up out wide on the right and shot the ball into the top left hand corner for a brilliant first goal of the season for him. Nelson is a popular member of the squad and everyone was pleased to see him on the score sheet! Recent signing Hugo Pinto also joined the game to shore things for the closing minutes in centre midfield.

The final two goals seemed to knock the stuffing out of Bedgrove and the game finished 5-2, a really good result against really good opposition to go alongside a really good performance (apart from the middle 10 minutes of the second half).

Man of the Match today was Charlie Davis who gave his best performance at the point of our defensive triangle. Whilst Charlie is one of our most consistent peformers his performance today was extra special.

We now have two Sundays off for half term before a busy final month of the season beings with a home game against Seer Green United on 1st March.