Saturday, 13 March 2010

UNDER 15 MATCH REPORT: LEFC 1 - 2 Heanor Juniors


There is no shame in this result. Once again we took on potential champions Heanor and showed that we are just as good, apart from the getting the points bit.

The first half saw Heanor throw everything they had at our defence and a barrage of long throws, corners and some heavy machine gun fire came our way, but the defence stood firm and even luck went our way on a couple of occasions this week. The centre back partnership of Rhys "The Maniac" Willey and Rob "Big Rob" Giersh were excellent and dominated the Heanor forwards. Another fine performance from Joe Conneally and his lovely hair was close to a man of the match display but that accolade went to the loud, one man cheerleading team of Jubed Rahman who as always left nothing on the pitch. Unfortunately there was little to speak of in way of attacking during the first half except for a superb driving run from Patryk Trebski who struck the ball from 25 yards and saw it narrowly arrow over the bar. At half time it was 0-0.

The second half was very much the same as the first with Emmanuel struggling to show their quality in attacking areas but resolute in defence. It was only in the last 15 minutes when the chances started to come as Heanor began to wobbled under the pressure but sadly by then they were 2-0 ahead after two individual errors allowed them the opportunities that they had been denied during the first half. With 10 minutes remaining however Emmanuel grabbed a lifeline when the referee awarded a penalty for handball and Luke Gee dispatched the spot kick with some vigour. Emmanuel threw everything into the last 10 minutes and came closest to the equaliser through John "BerbaJohn" Parton after a great Baldock cross, but Parton couldn't get anything on the ball. Final score 1-2.

All round it was an excellent display defensively and 2 goals is the lowest amount Heanor have scored in a game this season. The effort and determination was superb and the back four of Jubed, Rhys, Rob and Joe were exceptional along with Taku who played holding midfield brilliantly in the first half .

However, what let us down today was our attacking and we lacked composure and patience in our build up play. There seems to be an urgency in our play sometimes that sees us looking to play round the corner and turn into trouble rather than playing the simple pass, looking for lay offs and working the ball into space. We need to develop a sense of when to be direct and when to slow things down. Sometimes it feels strange to turn away from goal when that's where we want to be heading but very rarely can you do it alone and if you lack support then you have to wait for it and slow down the play in order to keep possession and then attack from a position of strength. Remember..."The key to everything is patience. You get the chicken by hatching the egg, not by smashing it".

So, everybody fought well, gave 100% and we certainly didn't deserve to lose. I'm just not sure we deserved to win either, but we can all be very pleased with the progress we are making. The next 3 fixtures represent "must win" matches against Stretton Eagles and Darley Abbey Colts, but then I never go into a match with anything other than a win on my mind, and I don't expect you do either.

Well Done Emmanuel.

Goals: Gee (pen)
Man of the Match: Jubed



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