Cheam's M3s travelled to Addiscombe to seek new hockey-based challenges. Not content with a strong winning run on astro-turf, the 3s decided to try out their skills on light sponge. The opposition fielded a stronger looking XI than the side who suffered a mauling at the Fortress in November, and were keen to give a good account of themselves writes By Dom Beales
The game started in a low-key fashion, with most of us desperately trying to get used to the pitch, but we took a deserved lead via Goalman. Addiscombe were keen to use home pitch advantage though, and took advantage of some loose play at the back to win themselves a short corner. The back 5 could then only stand and watch as the ball was dragged firmly into the roof of the net. 1-1.
The heroes edged the rest of a dis-jointed first half, and went back ahead through Goalman once more. With a brace bagged, the Putney public-relations man decided to spend the rest of the match pursuing aggressive hat-trick-avoidance; a tactic that nearly rewarded him with this week's DotD. We were still riding our luck at the back though, and talk at half time was that we needed to take more care in possession, and be more ruthless against a tiring opposition.
The jelly babies did their job, as we came out and dominated the second half, with Lawrence capping a fine 3s debut with a goal. The game looked won at 3-1, but a moment of madness gave Addiscombe's 'rotund' opposition striker a sniff of the ball 25 yards from goal.
Spencer Harlequins 2 Cheam Hunters 0
With just three players from last week's win over Leatherhead, and a few more from the win over Sunbury & Walton, this was always going to be tricky, writes Scott Ferguson
A shortage of keepers in the other teams made our captain don the pads for the first time since 2002, and then was plenty of work from the outset as defensive cohesion was noticeably missing from the visitors. The shot-stopping instincts were all there but a little bit of rust coming off the line amid a sea of unmarked players led to a two-goal deficit towards the end of the first half.
Easing the pressure at the back wasn't helped by a midfield unable to provide an outlet off 16s, and any semblance of fancy stuff in the centre of pitch was attacked in numbers by opposition tacklers, often resulting in a sloppy turnover. Spencer didn't have any stars in their line-up but they were solid and hard to get past - reverting to previous weeks' game plan of passing and making the ball do the work should have been the way to counter it.
Shots on goals for the Hunters were limited, the ball just wasn't getting through which led to Derry dropping back to help shore up the defence. The second half saw sustained pressure on the defence, not helped by umpires who'd found a rule book without the third man & obstruction rules in it, but both nets went unbreached and the final score ended up 2-0.
Honourable mentions to Dan Pearson, Nathan Thomas-Steer and Joe Bradley, but the deciding vote for the man-of-the-match went to Charlie Weston.
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