3s vs Alexandra Park – 29.10.16

3’s Match Report vs Alexandra Park – 29^th October 2016

This weekend’s game was led by a minute’s silence to remember to Nick Papanastasiou a top guy and true boar who sadly passed away whilst on his travels in Vietnam. Both teams showed there respects by engaging in a minutes silence prior to kick off.

Merton lined up with a 4-4-2 formation designed to move the ball quickly up the field to utilize the pace and flair of Glenn combining with the strength of Denys to ensure we could create chances to get an early goal against an in form Alexandra Park who have been bothering the top end of the table so far this season. The game kicked off with Merton under pressure in the first 10 minutes with a number of chances falling to Alexandra Park’s right winger and striker with nothing coming to fruition.

Ricardo was forced off early on in the first half with a suspected injury to his ankle with Frankie coming on from the bench to push into left midfield and Andy dropping to left back. The game was fairly end to end with a number of chances for both sides materializing in the first half with most play coming down the wings for both sides yet neither side could convert until late in the first half where Alexandra Park scored the first goal of the game despite goalkeeper Dan doing his best to keep the chance out.

As the second half kicked off Merton were pressing from the midfielder to get an early goal back with a couple of chances flying over the bar or being comfortably saved by the goalkeeper. The second goal of the game came for Alexandra Park from a corner in which in some poor judgement from Frankie coming off the past far to early led to the opposition able to head home with ease at the far post. Merton looked to be struggling to get back into the game at this point with few opportunities a sub was made in which Elz was brought on after playing for the 1’s and taking on a forward role at the expense of Denys. Almost with his first touch from a cleverly worked quick free kick Elz tapped in from the back post and Merton were back in the game. As Merton continued to press the team was switched to a 3-4-3 formation in which seemed to help pile the pressure on to the opposition with chances presenting themselves more frequently than any other point in the game it looked like Merton would be able to get back into the game.

With a few minutes to run a late flurry from Alexandra Park saw their right winger forge a run into the box and an attempted tackle by Tony who had been solid at centre back the entire game saw the Alexandra Park player go down and a dubious penalty awarded. The initial effort was saved well by Dan with the follow up turned in by Alexandra Park which led to the final score of the game at 3-1.

Although not the result that the 3’s had wanted to honor Nick’s memory the game was played in good spirit with the opposition after the game going and paying their respects to Nick’s family and friends who had come down to watch and support the game.

MOTM – Glenn and Nick

DOTD – Frankie