Mendip Broadwalk 4 Wrington Redhill 3
This was an incredible game of football to say the least, serving up a feast of goals, ultimately with Wrington Redhill emerging without the points they deserved for their tremendous efforts.
The management team of Leigh White, Sam Clements and Mark Brown had to re-draw their plans for this fixture away to the undefeated League leaders Mendip Broadwalk with late pullouts of players for various reasons. This resulted in White stepping back in to partner Dan Ferguson at the heart of the defence, Rhys Farmer taking the right back role and moving usual occupant Josh Pitt into midfield, and George Fake leading the front line.
From the start Wrington Redhill got into a good attacking rhythm with positivity in getting their hosts on the back foot with quick movement forward. Pitt with his mobility in midfield was a constant threat with his runs using Fake as link, holding the ball up well and playing in wide men Joe Creese and Reece Ferguson-Obamwonyi who were tormenting the Mendip back line with their pace and skills. Ollie Clements and Ryan Pugh worked hard to protect the back line including Jordon Bonner coping with any of Mendip’s foray forward.
Nearing the half hour mark from a clever pass from Ferguson-Obamwonyi Creese raced into the penalty area and skipping round keeper Lewis Coombes was brought down, and a penalty awarded. As cool as you like Fake dispatched the spot kick past Coombes for a 1-0 lead. It got better as half time approached when the lively Creese again raced onto a Ferguson-Obamwonyi pass and this time made no mistake in finding the net to go into the break at 2-0, a fair reflection on the game at this stage.
As you would expect from a strong side like Mendip Broadwalk, they came out at the restart determined to get back into the game and penned their visitors in their own half for lengthy periods cutting off the supply to the threats to their defence. Remarkably Wrington Redhill increased their lead as excellent Creese scored a superb solo goal, picking up the ball in his own half and running through the Mendip defence finished with a well struck shot into the net and with about 20 minutes left an unexpected victory looked on the cards.
Mendip Broadwalk had other ideas and with the introduction of all their five substitutes upped their pressure even more. White and Ferguson were working like Trojans to keep them out and frustrating their opponents when suddenly the game was changed on its head in the remaining minutes of the game extended by no less than 18 minutes by the referee for so called stoppages of play!
A number of defensive challenges were being penalised with free kicks and from one, a diagonal ball from just outside of the box eluded Matt Hill and Mendip’s leading scorer Dylan Whittle nipped in at the far post and headed into the net.
This goal spurred the hosts on even more and it got worse for Wrington Redhill just a few minutes later. A penalty was conceded when Fake handled the ball on the line sending the ball over the bar. The confident Whittle duly dispatched his strike past Hill with more unrelenting pressure to follow. To add to the visitor’s woes Fake was shown a red card for the infringement and now down to 10 players it was backs to the wall for his team mates to try and hold on at 3-2. They also lost Rhys Farmer through injury which didn’t help the cause with Matt Walsh replacing him and soon followed by fellow substitutes Ethan Johnson and Ethan Williams, but the fresh legs could not stop the wave of attacks.
The half continued for an age and eventually Mendip, deep into added time delivered two knockout blows to claim the spoils as substitute Joseph Pratt levelled and a tremendous strike from 30 yards by Connor Biggins broke Wrington Redhill’s hearts, as it flew past Hill to clinch victory with the last kick of the game.
How on earth the referee found such a long extension to normal time will remain a mystery as there were no undue delays that you find in a normal game.
Despite this hard to take defeat the team showed they can compete with the top teams in the division and the result may well have been different had all 11 players been present to the end. If they show such commitment as shown in this hard fought contest for the rest of the season, they will win more games than they will lose and reach a comfortable league position. Nonetheless this was a tough defeat to take for their efforts.
Team:
Goalkeeper: Matt Hill
Defence: Rhys Farmer, Dan Ferguson, Leigh White, Jordon Bonner
Midfield: Ryan Pugh, Ollie Clements, Josh Pitt
Forwards: Reece Ferguson-Obamwonyi, George Fake, Joe Creese
Substitutes: Matt Walsh (for Rhys Farmer), Ethan Johnson (for Ryan Pugh), Ethan Williams (for Josh Pitt)