1s vs Alleyn Old Boys – 30.09.17

BI weekly catch up part one

Woody Misses his penalty, everyone else scores theirs, subsequently gets dotd and then doesn’t write the match report. Harrison still hasn’t learnt about the EC rule and drinks 4 pints for it. 7 before 7 is still a possibility.

Part two

Merton welcomed Alleyn Old Boys to the Hood after dispatching West Wickham in the cup the week before. I feel bad for Simon, scores the winning peno and doesn’t even get a match report to do him justice.If only the glory of him pointing to his stomach after scoring could have been captured.

With everyone on time and Kerns/Siri running late as per, we kicked off holding our own for the first 15 minutes or so. In my time for Merton, I think i’ve only ever conceded one worldie, the amount of penos and shit goals i’ve let in makes me question life sometimes. This game was no different, 1-0 down, ball to the back stick was half cleared and slotted in from about 7 yards out.

Alleyns had a lot of the ball in the half and the penalty to make it 1-1 came out of the blue, blatant push in the back, Sam Harvey slotting it to the keepers right to make it all square. This seemed to push Merton up the gears as the passing got quicker and more direct, this probably led to the second goal, or Sam perfecting his ‘bobble ball’ technique ( just think about Stan Collymore and his goal against Tim Flowers https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WN2F6WQk8zk)

2-1 and Merton pushing for a third were pegged back almost instantly by Siri imitating his inner Claudio Bravo and coming for a cross that wasn’t really there and subsequently headed into an empty net.  2-2 at half time and Van instantly letting everyone know that Siri went from MOTM last week to DOTD this. Such a team player.

The second half was low in quality, Alleyns defended pretty well and we didn’t really have many clear openings. 15 minutes into the second half Alleyns cut down the left, reserved the ball and delivered an overhit ball to the back stick with their winger did well to knock back into the box straight to their forward who tucked in from 3 yards out.

Merton 1s first loss of the season. All in all a good performance against a pretty good team, but a couple of mistakes costing us. However the style of football has certainly changed from last year, with the long ball being replaced with a more fluid passing style. Carrying on these sort of performances against div 1 teams into the league will see us pushing for promotion/the league.

Motm – Sam Harvey

Dotd – Siri