Cheam 1s rocked up to the Woking ground on the back of a decent, if slightly disappointing, start to the league campaign - a 2-2- draw last week that would have felt like a decent start in a new division, if we hadn't been 2-0 up at half-time. This weekend we had closer to our full side, and the players rocked up determined to register our first 3 points of the campaign and get ourselves truly up and running, writes Omar Shibli
Woking 2s were a decent side and took the initiative early on in the game, with strong play putting Cheam on the defensive and forcing good defensive work and, of course, saves from Andrew Oldale. A number of short corners were won by the opposition, and a number were save by the padded wonder.
Cheam started slow but came back strongly, eventually dominating play in the first half. Possession and chances increased, and our pace caused Woking all manner of concern. We also won our share of shorties, and took one early on to ease the presssure, with a Seb Jennings drag flick deflecting up into the net off a defenders' stick. He'll claim it was going in anyway, no doubt...
After this, poor discipline looked to cost us, with a series of fouls building up.
Koen Overeynder managed to talk himself into a green card and Duncan Edwards saw a green card for a pretty innocuous stick tackle somehow upgraded to a yellow, for shaking his head in disbelief as he made his way to the sin bin.
As you can see from our card count inevitably Cheam's flow was somewhat disrupted and what could have been a chance to stretch our lead became an excercise in defensive discipline with severely depleted numbers.
At one point, Cheam were defending resolutely with 9 men, keeping Woking at bay. We held out and it proved to be decisive. Following that spell, great team play meant William Lindsay was on hand to increase Cheam's lead - 2-0 - and put daylight between us and Woking.
After the break, Cheam put out a solid display, and possibly should have stretched our lead. Woking also had chances though and Andrew Oldale was once again on hand to bat away any danger. Further cards and perhaps increasing nerves, as we recalled last weekend's dropping of 2 points from the same position, also possibly played a part.