Bottesford Town v Frickley Athletic

Recap

Ken & I have a burning dislike of Summer football – yesterday did nothing to assuage us of that feeling. It’s too hot, pitches are in terrible condition, you get a dust devil at every bounce of the ball & it seems to affect the officials ability to make a straight forward decision

So in the 30+ degree heat yesterday afternoon, our young squad gave it everything – you couldn’t fault their effort but the application of the effort was slightly awry for once

A bit of a pack reshuffle with Varley & Green injured / unavailable – but Leethal Lee Bennett was back from injury & was on the bench

Little to report by way of goal mouth action until a Bottesford throw in seemed to go straight into the nets without touching anyone. The ref apparently did see a touch & awarded a goal, despite our protestations. Either way, we should have defended it better.

Shortly afterwards Keelan Grist with one of his (almost customary) bursts into the box, chopped down, nothing given. A replica of Tuesdays non decision. EITHER Keelan is a diver (he isn’t) & he should be getting booked (he hasn’t) or someone is getting straight forward decisions wrong (you decide)

1 nil half time

Very early in the 2nd half we made things nigh on impossible for ourselves with more poor defending from a fairly innocuous free kick which allowed the home team to take a 2 nil lead without really trying.

However it did provide some sort of trigger reaction for us – Collier had 3 good efforts saved / just wide. Burke set up Grist but he pulled his shot wide. Keita broke well & had his shot saved & the resulting corner was put over by Lewis Binns & then Lewis had a shot saved.

Right on the 90 we had a good break down the left, the ball was played across the box & Charlie Clegg did well to apply a calm finish to the bobbling ball to give us a glimmer of hope.

We huffed & puffed in Fergie Time but we couldn’t get the goal to give us parity – so our unbeaten run in the league was ended & with it our record of clean sheets in the league

Probably the most frustrating aspect of the afternoon was that our usually reliable passing game wasn’t quite up to scratch & our defensive performance (& don’t forget we start defending from the front & we attack from the back) lacked it’s usual security

WEBMASTER MOTM – Murillo had another decent game at the back & Kofi gave us his usual combative performance is defensive midfield. Al Keita had all the tricks & flicks up top but the hard uneven surface didn’t suit his running game. I really like the look of Ben Hall at right back. Lewis Binns gave another excellent performance at centre half but I’m giving the Glitterball to Richard Collier. He got stuck in & was very vocal in a team that was unusually quiet on the pitch

TWITTER POLL MOTM – the one that counts & Lewis wins this by some distance. Tucked in behind him were Rich Collier, Al Keita & Ben Hall. Thank you to everyone who voted

This is what Wayne thought about the afternoon

119 through the gate – with about 50% of those being Frickley supporters, an excellent turn out yet again

So we take our medicine & get ourselves set up for our next game – we are at home to Silsden on Tuesday 16th August, 7:45 kick off. We hope to see lots of you at the game