Ridware Swifts vs Gresley Rovers
Ridware Swifts 1 - 4 Gresley Rovers
Scorers: Venning, Smith 2, o.g.
Team: Stu Haywood, Danny Gee, Ben Kinson, Tom Gregory, Gaz Jones(c), Olly Baum, Tom Fletcher, Mark Shorthouse, Nath Venning, Chris Smith, Paul Morton. Subs: Rich Hanslow, Karl Whymark, Tom Allan
Played Ridware in the League Cup today, and after thumping them 8-2 in the league last week, I think the lads thought it was going to be easy? We went 1-0 up on five minutes when Nath Venning met a Chris Smith corner to head in. However the next 40 minutes proved to be a little more difficult than I think we ever imagined, because on 7 minutes we lost Paul Morton to a ankle injury so we swapped him for Rich Hanslow, and to be honest we didn't play well at all. So it was no surprise when Ridware drew level on 25 minutes when they equalised. It was one of those games, which fortunately we don't get often, when I was wishing for half time!
So at half time, Ivor and myself, asked players to raise their hands if they thought they could do better and honesty showed because there was more hands raised than not! So we said go out second half and improve and show what we can do?
To be fair the lads raised there game, and didn't look the same team, as in the first half. However it took a bit of pure magic to break the deadlock, and this came from a wonder goal from Chris Smith, when he scored from the narrowest of angles to make it 2-1.Chris then made it 3-1 when he again put the ball in the net and from a cross of his a defender scored an own goal to make it 4-1.
With a tough game next week, and because we had a comfortable lead, we swapped Mark Shorthouse for Tom Allan with 30 minutes left. Again with 15 minutes left, we swapped Nath Venning for Karl Whymark, and 4-1 it stayed.
Today we learned that we cannot take teams for granted and that we need to sometimes dig deep if we want to win. To be fair to all of you the improvement second half showed true guts and commitment and made Ivor and me really proud because we're now in the semi-final. Thought that the improvement second half was great and again deserves a special mention to great performances from Gaz and Chris but you all deserve a pat on the back. However, although the opposition shouldn't pick mom, because it was a cup game they gave it to Stu Haywood.
Mom: Stu Haywood, at 2-1 he made some absolute vital saves, and kept us in the game at times, today he showed just how good he is and thoroughly deserved mom, well done Stuey.
