Risborough Colts - Friendly (09/09/2001)
2001 - 2002 Season, Hithercroft Under 15s



The weather for this pre-season friendly was dry and sunny but rather chilly. From our squad of 17 players only 9 were available and although Steve, the Risborough manager, kindly offered us two of his players from his 14 available our boys decided that they preferred to play short-handed. The Hithercroft linesman was Des Ife.

Three minutes after the start Risborough opened the scoring with a goal by Tom Roper. Seven minutes later Dewayne Dublin equalised for Hithercroft by taking the ball to the side of the goalkeeper and then hitting it into the net. After eighteen minutes David Hill took the ball down the left wing and crossed the ball to Jason Guy who lobbed the ball over the advancing keeper to put Hithercroft ahead 2-1. Three minutes later Jerome Warren took the ball down the opposite wing and crossed it to Dewayne, who then knocked it back across goal for Jerome to nod it into the net to increase Hithercroft’s lead. A couple of minutes later Shahid Ahmed hit the ball upfield from a free kick well within his own half for Dewayne to collect, run on and score again for the visitors. After 32 minutes Risborough’s Ben Moore struck the ball from outside the Hithercroft penalty area and it went through Lee Hudson’s upraised hands to bring the score to 4-2. Then, immediately from the restart, Jason took the ball down the centre of the field and put the ball through the goalkeeper’s legs to restore Hithercroft’s 3-goal lead. Following a Risborough free-kick John Odro scored with a shot into the corner of Hithercroft’s net. Just before half time John took another shot at Hithercroft’s goal and, although Lee managed to get his hand to the ball, it continued towards the goal-line but Jack Fuller rushed back and just managed to clear it short of the line. Hithercroft had most of the play in the first half but were being caught offside time after time.

In the second half Risborough had most of the possession and spent most of the time in Hithercroft’s half, especially in the final quarter of the game as Hithercroft tired. After ten minutes James Messenger scored a great goal for the home team, lobbing the ball over Lee, and then Tom Roper scored his second after twenty-one minutes to level the score at 5-all. Later in the game Jerome went down injured and a Risborough defender sportingly put the ball out of play so that he could receive attention. At the resumption of play Shahid threw the ball back to the Risborough keeper and these actions were indicative of the sporting way in which this game was played. Five minutes from the end Jason took the ball down the wing, turned into the centre and then lobbed the ball over the goalie to put Hithercroft back ahead. One minute later Jason scooped the ball over a Risborough player to Dewayne who then passed the ball to Shahid. As Shahid kicked the ball back towards Dewayne the ball was handled by a Risborough defender in the penalty area and Dewayne scored from the penalty spot. The final whistle brought a good, sporting and exciting game to an end with the visitors winning 7-5.

Quote of the day came from my daughter, Lindsey, who was recording the game on her video camera when she called a free-kick ‘a kind of corner thing’.