Diggle FC
Match report for 21/01/12 by Howard Johnson
Diggle A Team 4 vs Meltham A Reserves 5
After a long break following Christmas the Diggle A team were finally back playing a tough fixture against Meltham A Reserves.
Due to some late fitness worries we got changed at Boarshurst and left for Meltham. After a few words by Craig Brown about his missing jersey we went for a warm up. The game started and Diggle put their foot on the ball early stringing several quality passes together.
We got our reward early on in the game with a corner which, somehow, went in off Gareth Lord. A quick second goal came from a huge punt by goalkeeper Pooley which went all the way through to striker Stoney.
Michael Salmon was having a blinder literally, who put him in centre-mid? He looked like a lost child until he eventually found his feet…….. I mean foot. Still to this day we don’t know what happened to his right one.
As the weather conditions were getting worse we knew we had to get hold of the game before facing the wind in 2nd half. We did so with another long punt up to Stoney who rounded the keeper and hit towards goal. His pee roller effort nearly blew backwards away from the goal. Fortunately, Craig Brown entered the fray and powered his way to the ball to stab it home.
As Meltham pushed forward we took advantage and scored our fourth with Kelvin and Mark linking up well. After some good work in defence by Rob Leah, our ever young player/manager proved the critics wrong and stroked home away from the keeper.
With a good lead we started, as is often the case, switching off and Meltham sensing their moment got a goal against the run of play. Our right hand side pushed up midfield and lost the ball. Meltham attacked through their pacey striker going two against one and scored past the advancing Pooley. Again we switched off and a dubious looking offside goal was given by the referee, another goal grabbed against run of play.
At half-time we got in and received a roasting. We didn’t need reminding that the second half would be tough playing against the wind.
We defended for much of the final 45 minutes and rarely got out of our half. All of the back four played like warriors, blocking, sliding, heading everything that came their way only to concede when there was a mix up between Rob and Gaz.
With the game at four each, Diggle continued to defend well until Forbsey took a knock. Scott replaced him. The conditions continued to get worse. There were several occasions when the defenders (Rob and Chainy) couldn’t run against them.
Meltham scored the winner with 10 minutes to go with a wonder-goal that the ever awesome Pooley couldn’t get to. Diggle pushed on but due to the conditions couldn’t get that equalizer. Meltham came close again but a wonder save by Pooley kept the game at 5-4.
All in all a bad game to lose as we played the better football, we just had the weather against us.
Goals: Patterson, Stone, Lord, Brown
