Headstocks — Tue 11 May 2010

Match report

Half time: 1 – 0

Samba penultimate game was against a Headstocks side currently above Samba, but whom Samba could still overtake, providing they claimed all three points. G.Taylor was missing so Gibbons paired Archer and Brewer upfront in a 4-4-2 formation with Hill returning in midfield and Misiuda at right back. The pitch was nothing short of dire and a sharp contrast to Saturday's game. Kicking down the slope Headstocks grabbed the initiative and Samba struggled to get beyond the half way line. It was mid-way through the half however before Nicholls was seriously tested. The referee played a decent advantage for the home side following a foul in midfield, and when the player got 25yds out, he hit a dipping shot which looked destined to loop over Nicholls until he touched it onto the crossbar. If that save was good, the next time Nicholls was called upon, he excelled. A Headstocks runner from their right arrived into the box to meet a bouncing ball and directed his header towards goal, Nicholls tipped the ball onto the underside of the bar and it bounced on the line and out, before Francis headed behind for a corner. As the half progressed Samba improved and were starting to play some football in their opponents half. However, when they took the lead you would be hard pressed to say it was deserved. Wilkinson launched a free-kick into the box and as the keeper hesitated, the Headstocks man could only flick his header over the top of the keeper into the empty net. Some would say it was the expertly flighted free-kick which caused the panic, it certainly wasn't Samba players attacking the ball, but fluke or otherwise, (and if I was a betting man I'd say the former), Samba had the lead. Samba came off at half-time thankful of a lead and thinking that with the slope in their favour they had done the hard part of the job.

Whilst Samba had shown some improvement towards the end of the first half, their performance overall had been poor. The 2nd half should have seen a marked improvement but for the first 20-25mins the game just drifted without much happening. Then Samba got really poor. Gibbons was forced to switch to 3-5-2 following a couple of injury forced substitutions and Headstocks started to work the Samba backline and Nicholls in goal. The chances wer coming on a regular basis. One shot was dragged wide across the goal, whilst the home team also had a goal disallowed for offside. When their winger missed the goal completely when clean through Samba thought it might be their day. There were spells of good defending from Samba and they dug in, but they gave an immaculate lesson in how to put pressure on yourself by giving the ball away in poor areas, time and again. In the end Headstocks weren't good enough to take advantage, and Samba departed the field a little sheepish but with 3 more points in the bag.