 |
 |
| Sorry - was that your face? | Neil has an early attempt |
With still no sign of a Kevin Burton comeback, Alltraders struggled to re-arrange the team to try and plug the worrying goal-leak of the previous games.
It was decided that Tim and Neil were to lead the attack with Barry and Paul to cover the defence. The lesson from last weeks game was to try and give Neil a bit more support as it was woefully lacking last week..
As it turned out, this was a rather ill-tempered game. It didn't get off to the best of starts after Tim Leader caught an opposition defender full in the face with his right foot as he tried to volley a Neil Leppard cross. How he managed to get his feet quite this high so early in the game is a complete mystery - it was even too quick to capture a frame from the video. Needless to say the defender (and referee) were none too pleased at this early act of aggression, even if quite accidental.
|
|
| Sorry - was that your face? | Neil has an early attempt |
The game continued to flip from one end of the pitch to the other. Alltraders seemed to be a bit more organised than of late, and even had a shot on target in the first half. However it was River Plate had had the more aggression and came close to opening the scoring when a clever through pass was met on the overlap by a sprinting striker whose shot was parried out for a corner by Warren Fiveash in goal.
Tim Leader was looking a bit sharper this week giving his marker something to do for a change, often leaving him no option but to cheat and cynically sythe him down on the turn.
 |
 |
Nevertheless, the run of bad luck Alltraders have come to expect this season showed up again with just a minute of the half left. A quick interchange of passing by the opposition found the ball at the feet of an unmarked attacker who seemed for all the world to have strayed into the area. With a quick stab of the right foot, the ball skimmed under Warren Fiveash and into the net. Unfortunately the ref had taken his usual place of somewhere out of eyeshot of the action and allowed the goal to stand to the furious complaints of Neil and Paul just outside the box.
 |
This goal came against the run of play and quite clearly angered Neil who was lucky to escape without a caution. |
| The second half started fairly vigourously, and tempers started to fray in the early evening heat. In one ugly incident Neil Leppard and an opposition defender came to blows just off of the pitch after battling on the ball for around a full minute with arms and legs swinging in all directions. Yet again, the ref decided to allow both players to continue in the game when a red card was the only real option following an incident like this. |  |
 |
From
this point on the game became increasingly physical with tackles flying
in from all angles. Paul Burton had to draw on all his powers of self
control not to react to several clashes from behind, any of which could
have broken his leg.
Amazingly the ref continued to allow this tackles to go un-punished, only adding fuel to an already overheated game.. |
 |
 |
About five minutes into the second half the River Plate pressure payed off, and the familiar site of the ball in the back of the Alltraders net returned as the opposition attacker finished cooly to increase the lead to two.
 |
 |
 |
To add insult to injury, two minutes later Warren lost his bearings and hopped out of his area to concede a penalty. The pictures show that he was sent completely the wrong way as the attcker finished with style.
The pain was not yet over. Before the final whistle blew River Plate finished off the rout with a finely executed fourth goal with Alltraders left in their familiar dissarray.
Yet another bad night for Alltraders. One small crumb of comfort was that they appeared a bit better organised than last week and are starting to show signs that they are on the road to recovery. Although the final score was four - nil, the result didn't match the balance of the play. All Alltraders really need is someone who can finish, and perhaps a defence, or maybe a complete change of players. It is rumoured that Kevin may make his return next week against the '7 guys called Elvis', so we await that game with eager anticipation.
Final score :
Alltraders 0 (0) - (1) 4 River Plate Allstars.
Man of the match - Tim for a sharper performance this week.