Match reports;
Manchester’s premier league season has got under way with two home fixtures the first on Saturday night verses CSL Herne Bay United ,for some players their first taste of the new rules.
The Manchester team had major changes to its personnel from last season, The loss of Jaime Labon has left the club wondering how they are going to replace the seventy plus goals he scored last season, two experienced players have rejoined the first team squad Club captain Mike Crowther and Mark Colton back after a year’s break, and Junior Aaron Scott has forced his way into the starting lineup.
Once again Darren Whitley has taken on the role of first choice goalkeeper and managers chief whipping boy.
The game got under way with m/cr putting csl under constant pressure having five or six goal scoring opportunities before Steven Manford scored the first of his seven goals, twenty seconds later csl’s first shot 1-1 second shot on target 2-1 to CSL whilst J Carnell is playing a blinder in the CSL goal . Manchester level the scores and with Csl taking its sixth shot and third on target they regained the league thankfully the Manchester defence tightened itself up restricting the Csl attack whilst adding three goals without reply .
Csl got a couple shots on target again and were rewarded with two more goals with each team getting a goal the half time score was 7-6 to Manchester. The Manchester coach was as red as his teams shirt and we think everyone in a twenty mile radius of the Arcadia heard and felt the Blast that was directed at the goalkeeper .
It obviously had the desired effect with 9 more goals scored by Manchester with only 2 conceded.
The game was played in the right spirit by both teams with only one blue card being issued towards the end of the match a total 7 team fouls were awarded against m/cr and 13 against Csl though out of this 9 were awarded in the first half against Csl and 5 against M/cr, It has to be said that the manner in which the two teams played didn’t change from start to finish and the drop off in the number of team fouls was probably down a lack of fitness on the part of the referees the onus is really placed on the officials now but if all teams enter into a game with the same attitude as these two teams then we should have few problems and a great season.
Match officials referees; Stuart Henderson, & Chris Freeman Timekeeper Gil Manford and assistant Micheal Crowther Jnr.
The Sunday game featured Herne Bay, with Derek Bell & Tony Czifra refereeing with Gil Manford and Micheal Crowther Jnr once again doing the timekeeping.
The start of the game took on a similar pattern to the previous game with Manchester applying most of the pressure and Herne Bay counter attacking, though the goalkeeper was making some fine saves it came as no surprise when he let one in and Manchester were a goal down after five minutes but that turned out to be their only goal of the half whilst Manchester scored 4,halftime Manchester had a deserved 4-1 lead with Darren making a valuable contribution and the appearance of Mark Colton as a defender gave the team the composure it was lacking in its preseason matches . Manchester was in total control which allowed all the players to get plenty of floor time whilst the final score was 7-3 to Manchester it has to be said that one of the goals was a tactical goal conceded when Manchester incurred a power play against it with 5 minutes to go and elected to concede a goal rather than play with three outplayers.
The game was well referee’d with Manchester conceding 14 team fouls to Herne Bay’s 10 whilst both teams lost a player to a blue card powerplay .
Once again the two teams made it an easy game for the officials and enjoyable for the spectators.
Paul Colton
