Soham And Witham Draw Again

The two sides met each in the reverse fixture on the opening day of the season when they held each other to a goal less draw at the Lane.
Following the departure of Lewis McDonald, and with both Joe Tennent and Lewis Endacott unavailable, the Greens were forced to shuffle the side around with player-manager Rob Mason returning to the side along with Jonny Hall and Dan Hobbs, whilst there was a debut for recent signing Saul Williams.

From the start, this was a fairly evenly matched game, with play regularly switching ends, although clear chances were limited during the opening forty-five minutes as Anderson and Hobbs both fired over from the edge of the area, whilst Kemp placed low at Conroy. It was the visitors that came closest to opening the scoring midway through the half however captain Swinton could only head behind from Hall’s freekick. Before the break Monsheju shot straight at Conroy, and Kaye fired wide from Mason’s ball across the area, whilst the Greens had a penalty appeal turned down after Mulready appeared to be pushed in the area deep into stoppage time.

The game continued in the same manner after the interval until the 65th minute when Soham took the lead when Williams collected the ball on the half way line, delivering an angled ball towards the edge of the area where Ramadan laid it back for Jon Kaye to fire a shot wide of Paine into the top corner of the net for his first club goal. Moments later with the next attack, Witham also had a strong appeal for a penalty waived away for handball before the hosts equalised in the 75th minute when sub Ryan Imbert headed home Hayes’ left sided freekick. A couple of minute later Williams carried the ball forward playing in Mulready, who from outside the area fired a shot at goal which Paine pushed upwards with the ball twice bouncing on the roof of the bar before landing in the keeper’s hands. Both sides could have won the game in stoppage time, however Green headed behind from Hayes’ freekick, before the ball was played up field where Jaydon Charles collected it inside the area, where he spun Paine who was off his line to get in a shot at goal, only for a covering defender to clear off the line.

The result sees Soham collect only their second point of the year as the winless run stretches to ten games.

Soham Town Rangers
N. Conroy, S. Williams, J. Hall, R. Horne, S. Swinton, J. Mochalski, J. Kaye, D. Hobbs, R. Mason (J. Charles 78), S. Mulready, C. Ramadan (J. Carden 78)
Unused: C. Russell, L. Groves

Witham Town
R. Paine, A. Anderson, T. Hayes, L. Payne (N. Korenteng 75), J. Regis, D. Green, L. Mallett (R. Imbert 62), J. Watson, T. Monsheju, M. Bedford (R. Charles 62), S. Kemp
Unused: T. Robinson, L. Akins

Score: (0-0) 1-1

Goals
STRFC: J. Kaye (65)
WTFC: R. Imbert (75)

Yellow Cards
STRFC: J. Mochalsi (73), D. Hobbs (89)
WTFC: L. Payne (26), T. Hayes (55)

Attendance: 73