Mens vs Bishops Stortford - 17 Jun 2010

[James]

The WGC ranks for the return fixture against Bishop Stortford were unexpected swelled when the president unexpectedly turned up and played his “do you know who I am card?” to get himself on the team sheet.  With 15 players in the WGC squad it should have been Welwyn who were fastest out of the blokes safe in the knowledge that there were subs waiting, however that was not the case.  BS started by far the brighter of the two teams and were beginning to create pressure with some lovely 1 2s which were cutting the WGC defence and midfield.  It was from one such move that BS opened the scoring with the BS forward putting the ball through the legs of the outrushing keeper.  Welwyn responded from this initial setback with some good passing and some forays into the opposition half however it wasn’t long before BS won a short corner.  From the slip right the forward wasn’t closed down by defence or keeper and given time the opposition player calmly slotted the ball in to the net.  Once again Welwyn responded forcing some decent saves from the BS keeper.  Unfortunately it was soon 3-0 after BS scored from a most unfortunate deflection.  Simon Walker went out to block the shot and the ball looped high off his stick. The keeper rather lazily assumed the ball was going high and over the bar and was shocked to see it loop gentle over his head and into the back of the goal with not even enough pace to hit the back board!

Half time and 3-0 to Bishop Stortford.

Half time was used to clarify the tactics and formation and to sort out the substitutes.

The 2nd half was an altogether different affair with much tighter marking from the WGC team, more pressure being applied to the ball higher up the pitch and most importantly the team kept possession of the ball.  It wasn’t long into the 2nd half when Welwyn won a short corner and Charlie was on hand to deflect the presidents initial strike expertly into the top corner.  BS responded and were awarded a number of short corners but fine defending stopped the opposition getting clean shots away on goal.  A fine attacking move lead to WGC closing the gap to just 1.  The ball was played fluently around the pitch before Pete tried a reverse stick shot which was comfortable saved by the keeper but fell nicely to Skills to apply the finishing touch into an unguarded net.  With time running out Welwyn begun to push more men forward. As a result the defence were left trying to work out where their right back had gone only to have the question answered in emphatic style as the right back Ian popped up to score WGC equalising goal!



An excellent 2nd half performance by all the team and a great fight back.  WGC men have now extend their unbeaten run to 5 games

[Pete M]

Lies, my shot was saved by the post and it was finished off by Ian I think