Sporting Athletic vs. Padiham Saints
Sporting 3-1 Padiham
Goalscorer: Tyrone Grant
Man of the Match: Nathan Crabtree
Well, even if we didn't take any points there was certainly a lot of positives to take from this match, we outplayed Sporting for most of the game and were unlucky not to have finished with a result.
We went behind fairly early in the game after a Sporting player got behind our defense and cut back the ball to a teammate who tapped into an open goal. But we did well to get through the first half not conceding again, playing against a strong wind we were finding it difficult at times to clear our lines. To the lads credit they played some outstanding football and created a few opportunities with Dillon, Fletch and Tyrone all going close.
In the second half we were on top for the most part, and got a more than deserved equalizer when Ty finished past the Sporting keeper one-on-one. We continued to play some good football, and managed to get behind their full-backs plenty of times, but unfortunately couldn't get our noses in front. We were punished in the last ten minutes with two fairly dubious goals, one as a result of a foul throw and another from a cross which had actually gone out of play. These things happen though, and you just have to take it on the chin and focus on the positives.
I can see that everything seems to be slowly clicking into place, we are starting to move the ball better than before and are looking better going forward, but we need to remember there are much better teams in the league than Sporting Athletic, and we will have to improve even more before we will be able to match them, so don't let results like this discourage you.
Goalscorer: Tyrone Grant
Man of the Match: Nathan Crabtree
Well, even if we didn't take any points there was certainly a lot of positives to take from this match, we outplayed Sporting for most of the game and were unlucky not to have finished with a result.
We went behind fairly early in the game after a Sporting player got behind our defense and cut back the ball to a teammate who tapped into an open goal. But we did well to get through the first half not conceding again, playing against a strong wind we were finding it difficult at times to clear our lines. To the lads credit they played some outstanding football and created a few opportunities with Dillon, Fletch and Tyrone all going close.
In the second half we were on top for the most part, and got a more than deserved equalizer when Ty finished past the Sporting keeper one-on-one. We continued to play some good football, and managed to get behind their full-backs plenty of times, but unfortunately couldn't get our noses in front. We were punished in the last ten minutes with two fairly dubious goals, one as a result of a foul throw and another from a cross which had actually gone out of play. These things happen though, and you just have to take it on the chin and focus on the positives.
I can see that everything seems to be slowly clicking into place, we are starting to move the ball better than before and are looking better going forward, but we need to remember there are much better teams in the league than Sporting Athletic, and we will have to improve even more before we will be able to match them, so don't let results like this discourage you.