Saints 1 Knobs 0 - Report by Gavin

The weather forecast for the weekend was sunshine and showers and when you reflect on our league performances this season, we’ve seen something similar. We’ve played some excellent football in patches and on Sunday it was no different but unfortunately we did not prevail against a very good, energetic Saints team that sneaked a goal in the first half that proved to be the difference. It was disappointing and terribly frustrating but now we must plan ahead for next season. What could make the difference? A good keeper would certainly help. To be fair to Dave, he’s actually been pretty good but sometimes (as we saw on Sunday) communication issues occur when players are playing in unfamiliar positions…even the basics like picking up a back pass become fraught with danger. Saints found their goalkeeper halfway through the season and as their manager pointed out, he’s made a world of difference. And you could see it, with confident handling from crosses and great speed off the line to close down attacking options. So it is up to Darren our recruitment officer to find us a new Trevor or hopefully we could welcome back the old Trevor next season, although that rather looks like a long shot. And variations to our play are so important. On Sunday, we saw Saints change their strategy, where they man-marked Ali in the second-half and changed their centre-back to nullify Gavin. It’s the kind of thing we never seem to do and maybe we should be a bit more pro-active at working our opposition’s strengths and weaknesses at half-time.

As for the game…we had quite a strong line-up and had chances in the first half. Bully played Gavin in on a couple of occasions with some beautiful passes but alas, the chances were not buried. Richard found it difficult to get shots in when he received it in a crowded penalty area and John also maybe had a half-chance from an Ali cross but I’m not too sure. He certainly had a bust up with their keeper though…marvellous stuff. Ron was rightly proud in the pub afterwards – ‘that’s my boy’ he said as he stifled back a tear. Chris Wilson hit a lovely shot that just went past the post. Their goal came from the bloke with a lovely left foot but mysteriously it came from his right as he breezed past John and poked it past a non-diving Dave. Defensively we were quite sound throughout, with Darren, Chris G, Tony, Brendan, Paul and Bill all doing a pretty good job against a big lump of a centre forward and their players running off him. In the second half, we didn’t create as many chances, Chris Cox had one apparently and Richard was nearly through again. The defining moment came when Gavin raced past two defenders in the dying minutes only to see his cutback dissect the on-coming Ali and Richard, who would have had an empty net to aim at. Eventually it fell to Tony who blasted over. It was so disappointing and the sheer agony of it all could be seen in the changing room afterwards.

Not in the pub though!!! We had a fine old time. Food came out promptly and much discussion was had about this game, the next game, Bully’s adventure at the Belfry next weekend and Bill getting out on his bike. Ahhh…that’s the pleasure of playing for the KNOBS isn’t it? The pint, the chat and the ribbing afterwards. Did we have fun team??? Of course we did. It was so fun; I’ve already text Dave for next week. Roll on Standon!

League news – Blunham Vets beat MBDA at the weekend 5-3. It means if Blunham beat Sandridge next week (away) they would win the league. If Sandridge win 2 of their remaining 3 games, we could end up being 6th but currently we stand at 5th as Saints overtook us this weekend.