LTD 1 - 1 Oaks Athletic

It was pleasing to come away with a point in a game where the Oaks never really hit top gear, but battled hard and kept their heads whilst the opposition lost theirs, and despite having less of the possession, could argue they created the better chances. With our best player and captain missing through injury (although still present on the sideline to offer support and point out who needed kicking), we were always going to be less effective going forward, but we did have a boost with Scott making his first appearance in over a month. Ty also made a well timed return with Parker being unavailable. The Oaks longest serving player, Deano, was handed the captaincy but the arm-band was no where to be seen (strange that!).

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pppppppppppppppppTyrone (GK)
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ppDeano(RB) (c) Rob (CB) Milly (CB) Eye-Ball (LB)
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Jordan (RM) Gollum (CM) Mikey (CM) Scott (LM)
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pppppppppppSharpy (CF) Nick (CF)

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Subs: Jimmy, JP

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The Oaks created some good chances to score in the first half, including a fine link up between Sharpy and Mikey with the former back-heeling the ball into the path of the latter, who had made a good overlapping run. Unfortunately the ball took a huge bobble as Mikey went to strike it inside the box, and skewed well wide.

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Nick then put in a perfect cross for Sharpy from the right, but Sharpy couldn’t direct the ball on target. Eye-Ball also played a great reverse pass to put Scott through on the left, only for the linesman’s flag to be raised.

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LTD are a good ball playing side, and displayed this for significant periods of the first half. However, they always seemed to opt for the ball over the top as the final pass, which the Oaks back four had more than enough pace and strength to deal with. We also sat off to avoid being caught out too high, but on the one occasion we did attempt to play the opposition forward offside – and according to Jimmy’s flag did so successfully – the LTD forward raced through to score. The referee decided the offside was for a player who was not interfering with play (without consulting his linesman), and the Oaks went into half time a goal down: 1-0.

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The second half continued much like the first, with LTD enjoying the larger share of the possession, but achieving little with it. Apart from claiming the odd high ball, Ty only had to make one save of note as he dived to his left to parry away a rasping shot from outside the area.

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The game changed when LTD had a man sent off for kicking out at Nick, who kept his head, and stayed on the pitch. It wasn’t until the last 10 minutes that the Oaks really started to make the extra man count, as Scott took up a more central position. One particular move out near the right saw a number of passes exchanged, before Scott found himself space in the box, but couldn’t connect cleanly with his shot.

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By this time JP had come on for Jordan, and Jimmy replaced Gollum. Jimmy’s ability to break up the play in the middle gave Rob the opportunity to move further up the pitch as we searched for an equaliser, and this was to prove a decisive tactical change. Mikey won a free kick out on the right and when the keeper could only parry the ball into JP’s path a fine reaction save was all that denied him a headed goal. The Oaks packed the penalty area for the resulting corner, and when the ball was only half cleared Sharpy played it back into the danger area, and Rob beat the offside trap to poke the ball home. We were surprised not to see the flag go up, even if Rob had clearly not been offside, and the goal stood: 1-1.

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Despite the Oaks reverting back to 4-4-2, Nick nearly grabbed a late winner but his header from a tight angle was deflected away and the game finished 1-1.

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It was satisfying to pick up a point, and we were definitely the happy of the two sides as LTD would have expected to get more than one point from the six available from us. Although this performance was an improvement on the previous test, a much sterner test awaits against Springhouse next week but we gave them a good game the last time we met and there is no reason why we shouldn’t do so again.

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Eye-Ball