Men's 5th XI Vs Leek 7

A week after the inter squad friendly, due to a bye week, the 5ths looked to continue their good start of the season with a tricky league fixture away against leek.

With a couple of players pulling out due to illness/injury, Jacob Cunningham was called up for his 2nd men’s appearance after an impressive debut against Beacon 2 weeks prior.

First half begun and Telford dominated the play, with most opportunities being found out wide to Dylan, Seth & Jack who then would search for a ball up top to Chris Evans or Ewan. A couple of good chances were made early on with the oppositions keeper making a good save against Ewan’s shot from the left, just inside the D.

However after 15/20 minutes the game would shift into Leek’s favour. Despite Leeks best efforts to penetrate Telford’s defence they were either blocked by Brent & Paul through the centre, by Freddie & Suhktaj down the channels or they would have Seth to be concerned about - Seth throughout the whole game displayed the importance of tracking back & applying pressure to the opposition. Countless times he made it difficult for Leek to have a moment to think about on the ball, before he would snatch it and begin the attack by passing it to the engine in midfield, John H.

The midfield were key in this game as John H, Tom & John K would “scramble” to pick up any lose balls and be alert to passes from the defence to then unleash forward. However the first half ended 0-0.

2nd half begun and in almost a flash Telford had a great opportunity to unlock the deadlock: Leek made a poor pass back to the player who began the 2nd half (pushback) and Ewan completely alert took full advantage of this and swept the ball from them. Dylan, from the right channel, then sprinted forward as Ewan threaded the ball between 2 defenders and into Dylan’s run. Then Dylan timed his pass across the D to perfection (as he had to wait for the rest of the team to catch up!). However Chris E would find a defender in his way and unable to get a shot off.

This half saw the game swing in both teams favour on multiple instances, which for a neutral was very entertaining! But for Telford we wanted to regain control.

This control started off with Alex making many fantastic saves, to make sure that this game would be added to his collection of clean sheets for this season.

Brent & Paul showed their ability and experience to prevent Leeks attacks from getting into the D. However Jacob ensured that defending wasn’t the only thing our defenders were great at, as countless times he would intercept passes and quickly release the ball out wide to start a counter. For Jacob’s 2nd men’s match he has clearly shown he is capable of playing men’s hockey (big well done Jacob!).

Despite a thrilling game it had been with loads of chances, no goals were yet to be seen. However what was seen was 2 green cards which went leeks way during the 1st & 2nd halves.

Not long remained in this game and by not long I mean 1 minute! The players would’ve likely casted their mind back to 2 weeks prior where they were 2-1 down with 6 minutes left left to go and worked tirelessly to score 2 to gain the victory!

Despite the fear of no time left Telford made 1 last attack. Dylan darted with the ball down the right and gained a long corner. Seth took control of the corner and passed it sideways to … who you ask? Being completely honest I can’t remember! But nevertheless this mystery player with a Telford shirt fired the ball into the D which then deflected to John K who took it from the centre and to the left and then took it back on himself and found Tom. Tom then took the shot which went the way towards Ewan, in front of the keeper on the left post, and Ewan dummied the deflection (definitely didn’t miss-time the deflection) and it hit the backboard! 

Literally seconds after the restart of play the whistle then went. Telford win 1-0 in an very entertaining game and gain another clean sheet (top work by Alex throughout the game).

Special mention to the Leek umpires as they were absolutely phenomenal. Leek provided an all-round great afternoon, from the match to the hospitality and we are very much looking forward to the reverse fixture, later in the season.

M.O.M:

Dylan Burrows (For always ensuring that he stretched the pitch out wide so the team had loads of space in the centre of the pitch to create chances & progress forward)

Goal Scorers:

Tom Keeble (69’)

Assists:

John Keeble (69’)