Marlow Youth (03/12/2000)
2000 - 2001 Season, Hithercroft Under 14s



The weather was chilly but sunny and the pitch was wet and muddy. Jonny Bartlett warmed up the Hithercroft boys before the start. A comment from Daniel Birch, an ex-Hithercroft and now Marlow player, that this would be an easy game for Marlow proved to be totally incorrect.

For the first half Hithercroft played downhill but into the sun. Paul Yandell and Jerome Warren combined in a quick passing sequence to provide the ball to Shane Globe to open the scoring for Hithercroft, the ball hitting the Marlow keeper on its way into the net. On Hithercroft's next attack Dewayne Dublin's cross was tipped over Shane's head by the Marlow goalie. Then, just 10 minutes before the break, Philip Lines fired a good volley at the goal to score Hithercroft's second. Then, two minutes later, from a free kick Dewayne scored the visitors' next goal. Marlow were then awarded a corner and in the goalmouth scramble a Hithercroft player unluckily headed the ball into his own net for Marlow's first. But back came Hithercroft again and Dewayne's shot hit the crossbar, ricocheted behind the goal-line and bounced out. The Marlow linesman confirmed this to the referee and so the score stood at 4-1 to Hithercroft at half-time.

Immediately after the restart Marlow's Lee Slaughter scored a fine header from a corner and he then hit a shot over the bar five minutes later. Jerome hit a long ball up to Shane who chipped the ball over the goalkeeper for Hithercroft's fifth. Next, Jerome took the ball himself round the goalie and tapped it into the net. Halfway through the second half he scored again, this time from a tight angle. The Marlow keeper then saved two long shots from Adeel Iqbal and Philip Lines and, ten minutes from the end, Marlow's Chris Taylor scored the third goal for the home team. Jerome wrapped things up with another Hithercroft goal right at the end making the final score 8-3 to Hithercroft.

The back four played extremely well this week, as did all the Hithercroft team. This was a very good result for Hithercroft as they did not have any substitutes because Ruari Kerr, James Moody and Richard Sunderland were sick, injured and unavailable respectively. (In the friendly played earlier this season Marlow had run out 4-1 winners.)