February 2011 Match Reports

Sunday 20th February 2011

League Cup Round Three, Warbank Social

Croydon Independiente B 3 - 2 Banter Central FC
  Wilkes, O.G.

Banter: Tyler; Boma, Doc, Tino; Ridders, Fintan (Vidic, 117), Gillardino, Wilkes (Goody, 70), Cling; Baird, Wommy

It was Croydon Indpendiente B and not Banter Central who took their place in the quarter finals of the league cup.

When you spend two hours trying to do something, you hope you can get what you want at the end of it. In fact, when you put in an extra half an hour to anything – when you normally wouldn’t – you definitely expect to find the rewards. Unfortunately though, extra time was Banter’s heartbreak for the second time this season.

A later kick off than usual, Banter watched on as two teams before them managed to cut into an already battered pitch. The conditions were an absolute dog and even the referee warned that if it gets much worse, or even just rains, then it could well be abandoned.

But it was Banter who began the brightest in difficult conditions and had the majority of the play in the first half. Baird and Wommy got in behind the Independiente back line on several occasions, but the final ball was just lacking. Gill was managing to mix his passes short and long and he was setting his team mates free as often as possible in all directions. In fact, Banter’s centre of midfield had things well drilled for the opening 45 minutes.

Indy opened the scoring though and from obvious circumstances. A floated cross was met by the home side’s skipper who was left free by Tino and finished well on the slide.

Banter had several long throw ins to deal with and concentration, along with determination, was at a premium as their lines were cleared every time – on at least two occasions from Boma who rose and met the ball superbly. It appeared as though Banter would go in a goal down at the break, despite multiple corners of their own and holding most of the possession, but a ball over the back line troubled the goalkeeper, who could only flap at it as Wilkes reacted by far the quickest to follow up and scramble it in from a yard out. It was a scrappy goal, but a routine pick up for the goalkeeper had Wilkes not bothered to gamble. That left things at 1-1 going into the break.

The second half was scrappier and understandably so as the grass remaining became mud and the mud remaining became like glue. It meant long balls and set pieces were a good bet for goals.

Tyler’s goal though was largely untested during the second half. Banter reduced their opponents to speculative efforts for the most part, as a couple of shots flew past his post which he let go. He did though make one stunning reflex save from the angle at his near post, which he tipped onto the bar and away. But the little man, who other teams want to say they must pressure, had a comfortable afternoon.

Which meant it was Banter squandering the chances to kill the game off. The ball dropped in the area for a shot a couple of times but was waster when Banter players wanted to switch it onto their favoured foot instead of having a go and several corners went begging, too. Goody replaced Wilkes with around 20 minutes of regulation time remaining.

Banter had three glorious chances, none of which came from a set piece. Baird out paced the back line and ran through and on the angle with Cling in support, he fizzed a cross in, which a defender snapped at as it went agonisingly wide of his goalkeeper and post. It made Baird scream uncontrollably. Wommy was set through twice by Cling for a one on one, but the goalkeeper stood tall and managed to get both shots to safety. A flurry of free kicks and corners were hit into the box but none of them connected with any conviction. Extra time it was.

Independiente got in early to kill the tie off, another corner, another lapse in concentration from Tino as a header flew in at the near post. A simple piece of movement yielded a simple goal and from a defensive point of view, very cheap indeed.

With Banter pushing higher and higher up the field, Indy broke quickly after a misplaced pass from Ridley and the centre forward who’d been reduced to diving all game was chopped down in the area by a Doc-Tino sandwich. Doc had marked the number nine out of the game up to that point and even asked, following another tumble without contact, “is that three, now?”. Cling was right to ask: “is three the number of dives or your mark for him, out of ten?”. With not a hint of irony, the little number nine responded on behalf of Doc: “that’s the number of times I’ve done it.” Either way, this was the fourth, but this time it was a penalty and correctly awarded. The kick was confident put away as the home side found themselves 3-1 up.

But Banter didn’t give in and rather than laying down to get opened up like some cheap hooker, the away side plugged away to get back into it. The goal that looked to do that came from a good delivery by Ridley at a corner, a front post run by Fintan, which he flicked on the turn wonderfully to hit the crossbar – only for an Indy defender to get a touch and send it into their own goal.

It left a full 15 minutes for Banter to throw the kitchen sink at, which included flooding the box with ten Banter players, putting Tino up front and with three minutes remaining, bringing on Vidic to get on a high ball. But it wasn’t to be and Croydon Indy B went through after the full 120 minutes.

Man of the match: Jonny Gill. Not quite the conditions for Gilly to thread pass after pass, but he managed it where he could and his distribution to his forwards was also excellent. He got stuck in and mixed his passing up well. Unlucky not to do better with a shot drilled from the edge of the area, too. First, a thanks to the opposition again. If they do read this, I'd like to say that they’re a credit to the league and good bunch of lads who played the game in exactly the right manner. We wish them the best going forward this season, particularly in the next round. Was it the worst pitch we’ve played on? Expect that to be summed up on a page near here very soon. A valiant effort from us, I thought we tried hard for it and carried it all the way through to the end which was good. 3-1 would’ve been unfair. I said before the game that in these kind of conditions, set pieces could decide it. Directly or otherwise, all five goals came this way. Which is so utterly disappointing for us to concede like this. It doesn’t matter how good – or bad – you think you are aerially, if you leave your man, he’ll probably score. And so, in our last six games: Carlton scored once. The goal came from an unmarked corner. Kurdish scored twice. One goal came from a corner, when we didn’t clear our lines. Salley scored once. The goal was fortunate and the build up took a deflection, but came from an unmarked player following a set piece. Barracuda scored once. It was perhaps the flukiest goal ever. We’ll leave that game. Madras scored twice. One goal came from a free header at a corner. Indy scored three times. Two corners, one penalty. If you weren’t counting, that’s ten goals conceded, seven of which came from a set play or loose marking. Some teams win trophies just from being that good at defending and attacking them. At this level, it makes all the difference. Annoying then, when on the face of it, we have what appears to be players who are normally so good in the air, normally so good at marking and, in open play at least, extremely organised and well positioned. Concentration and “chancing it” is a big thing, though. We do all the hard bits, like not let teams get through or get easy chances in
  open play and we keep the ball very well as a team. And then we let the flight of a ball catch us out. The same goes for attacking them. We stand around hoping for it to drop on our mullets and pray one of the opposition won’t challenge us, way too often. More often than not, there is nothing clever about our movement and frustratingly, when we encourage each other at training to do it, it works – but never lasts. The biggest shame is we could’ve won and did put in a good shift, reducing them to few chances. So let’s not get away from that too much
  because I believe it to be a genuinely decent effort. But that’s why it’s disappointing and worth pointing out the fine lines in all this. In all of the above games in 2011, we’ve reduced the opposition in all of them to, again, very few opportunities. Which means we’re getting there, we’re making progress, but we just need to iron out the creases (quite an easy one, I’m loathed to say). Over 90 minutes, the only team to beat us since October is Barracuda. Now that I will take.Selsdon have caught their games up and now sit third, with us in fourth. Our game against them – and the one’s we have in hand over others – are going to be so important. Two home games, firstly Woodmansterne – a side we’ve always had a tough time against and encountered close contests. The game in September was taken to the final five minutes, you may recall. Then we face Santos, giving us two big tests. We’ve been terrific this year, lets go and take what we deserve.