| HARPENDEN:
4
WISBECH TOWN: 5
18.11.2006
After last weeks draw with table toppers
Wapping, Harpenden entered the game in confident mood ready to
consolidate their third place position in the league. Unfortunately
the visitors came determined to push Harpenden all the way with
their brand of direct aggressive hockey.
The game started perfectly for Harpenden who were
1-0 up in 3 minutes with a fine finish from Todd Baines playing
in a wide right role for the first time this season. Two minutes
later David Jeffrey increased the lead as he finished of an excellent
team move after good work from Kavannagh and Baines leading to
Russell Timms to cross the ball to the far post. Perhaps the ease
at which the lead came led to Harpenden’s relaxing and allowing
Wisbech back in to the game. Firstly a mix-up in defence led to
two Wisbech players put through on goal and a simple one two gave
them a goal back. Only minutes later Wisbech’s centre forward
ran through the defence and his flick at goal hit Tom Bunbury’s
body and the ensuing penalty flick was comfortably dispatched.
At 2-2 after only 15 minutes the game continued
to be played at a frantic pace and Harpenden re-took the lead
when Todd Baines scored his second of the match with a fine strike
in to the top corner from the top of the D. Wisbech however were
straight back into the game when a short-corner strike rebounded
to another attacker who forced the ball through Clarke to equalise.
Goal keeper Alan Clark took aversion to what he saw as players
fouling him while he was on the ground and his strong remonstrations
lead to a green and then yellow card. On came super junior Matthew
Beggs in goal who pulled of two great saves before another short-corner
gave Wisbech a 4-3 lead.
With sloppy stick tackles going in all over the
pitch it was only a matter of time before the umpires had to revert
to sin binning players. The visitors were next to see the Yellow
Card and went down to 10 men after a player did an agricultural
challenge on Tom Kavanagh. 10 men soon became 9 when another foul
challenge resulted in another yellow. The rest of the 1st half
were played with both parties short of players and Wisbech managed
to keep their goal advantage.
If the first half was frenetic then all hell broke
loose in the second half. With both teams back to full strength,
Harpenden thought they were back in the game when Russell Timms
smashed home and the umpire signalled a goal. However following
protests from the Wisbech defence, the umpire conferred with his
colleague to see if the goal should stand. Unfortunately for Harpenden,
the goal was ruled out as it was believed that the ball had struck
the crossbar – when in fact it hit the upright supporting
the net, a yard over the goal line! (If the ball had hit the cross
bar wouldn’t you expect to see Harpenden players pounce
to knock it over the line)
Harpenden felt extremely aggrieved, and for the
second time in the game Harpenden’s discipline let them
down and a yellow card was shown to Timms for protesting when
asking the umpire why the goal was disallowed. This was then upgraded
to a red when walking off the pitch the Wisbech players mocking
and laughing he shouted back “Bunch of cheats”. This
was probably the key turning point in the game, with Harpenden
denied the equaliser which surely they would have gone on from
to take the win. Instead, they were stilled left with the deficit
and minus a player to do it.
Despite being down a man, Harpenden to continued
to push hard to search out the win. It wasn’t long before
Wisbech capitalised and broke into the Harpenden circle. One on
one with centre back Tom Bunbury, there was a noise of stick on
stick at the top of the circle, which the umpire duly punished
with a penalty stroke. This was coolly dispatched to take the
score to 5-3.
At this point in the proceedings the game had
almost entirely disintegrated, with almost every tackle being
punished with a card or a strong talking to by the umpires as
they grappled to stay in control of the game. Both sides ended
up with 10 players on the pitch when another agricultural challenge
resulting in the Wisbech seeing red. Spencer Mabanga soon joined
the growing crowd standing in the corner with a yellow card after
an innocuous challenge deep in the Wisbech half. To Harpenden’s
credit they continued to fight until the end and skipper Emes
pulled back a goal to make the score 4-5.
All in all there, were 6 yellow cards (at the
last count!!), and 2 reds, with equal numbers each side. The performance
was the probably the worst Harpenden have produced this season
and was defensively the worst for 3 years. The poor discipline
also disappointed skipper Emes who said after the game “scoring
4 goals and losing at home is undeniably disappointing and the
discipline shown today was not what we at Harpenden pride ourselves
on. Clearly I am extremely disappointed with the way Wisbech came
to play today’s game, and it’s very disappointing
to see such a usually disciplined Harpenden side be so easily
dragged down by an aggressive opposition. We should know better!”
Harpenden face another tough game next week when Bishops Stortford
visit the Brache Arena.
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