Final Score 5-3 to Stockport……but what a match!!!!

Goals:
Konor 2
Adam 1
Assists:
Cian 1
Ethan 1

In short, this was not only a team performance that we knew was there, but in light of a recent heavy, friendly loss and a tough match last week it was a huge bounce back in a performance sense. A very connected and genuine team performance. No one left anything on the pitch. Dylan and the back four of Dan, Luca, Keaton and Brad are settled and fought hard against a strong and fast team, but one also niggly and dirty often, without punishment from the ref yet again!

Defensive Midfield initially of Cian and Nathan broke up play nicely and spread the ball effectively to create plenty of chances, or put the three attacking midfielders in a position too. Adam too, provided plenty of high pressure and running, which frustrated their team and they fouled and cropped him and tbh all our team with a ration of about one in every hundred fouls given our way LOL.

Whilst Stockport scored first at 35 minutes, we ignored the goal in terms of negative impact mentally and immediately set about finding an equaliser, which we did at 38 minutes, with serious endeavour, with Cian assisting Adam, who tucked it away nicely. From that point on I thought we were the better team, with only fouling stopping us scoring again and a referee giving spurious offside decisions when clearly they were not. Only given, like a lot of decisions when Stockport shouted loudly and kept on shouting. Apologies for sounding Salty, but I think if the ref bothered to cover any ground he would’ve seen lots of things he missed!

The half continued at a pace, with us on top IMHO and we introduced Ethan and Jake for Nathan and Joe. Ethan tucked inside in Nathan’s Defensive Midfielder role and Jake slotted into Joe’s left wing position. Both came in without and effect other than positive and we continued the threat. Half time arrived and we all came in positive, knowing we could certainly take the game with the same concerted effort and not being caught with their long balls.

At the beginning of the second half, both sides started with hunger but we were better and found the net again at 64 mins with a Goal from Konor and a great assist from Ethan. This came from a driving run and some nice one two exchanges. It could well have been an Ethan goal, but he set Konor up instead, which he slotted away confidently. To their credit, Stockport kicked off fast and caught us sleeping, which resulted in an immediate equaliser.

To our credit, we saw that as a red rag and through team endevour and good quality passing, Konor made a driving run, ending in another goal at 69 minutes. Superb!!!

73, 75 and 83 minutes were numbers showing Stockport goals, the first and their equaliser, was after a scramble, we probably should've done better if we are honest, but the next was a screamer from a really strong so handed punch out to clear, following a shot. Unfortunately it fell to a player who really didn’t do much in the game, who swung at the ball, resulting in a shin shot to the top corner !!!! Very unfortunate.

The fourth and fifth goals we were just caught by long balls as a team not deep enough and our closeness to their players and scramble just wasn’t quite there.

Tonnes of positives from today, a number of players had their best showings for us and the team was great. Parents showed great support as always. A brilliant and honest performance, one we should be proud of and we should use this as a springboard against the same team, next week at HOME ! Come on Mossley !!

PS we should have a different referee hopefully lol.