Cheshire FA Minor Cup, Round 4 (13th December 2009)
Waverton Scorers (seasons total in brackets)
Alex Wilkinson - 2 (5)
Matt Sheen - 1 (25)
MoM Awards
Coach's - Alex Wilkinson
Supporters - Ollie Tyler
Report
At the third time of asking Waverton finally got to play their fourth round tie against Ridgewood Rangers in the Cheshire FA Minor Cup. It was a hard fought game, against a good side, but Waverton scored a winner in the last minute of full time to progress through to the next round. It was a victory the team deserved on the overall run of play, and this now puts them through to the Quarter Finals, to be played sometime in January.
Waverton started the game brighter than the opposition, and had most of the early possession, restricting Ridgewood to the occasional breakaway, although they did look dangerous when this happened with strength and pace up front. The Wasps got the lead their pressure deserved, after about ten minutes, when Matt Sheen latched on to a good ball over the top from Alex Wilkinson and calmly slotted it past the keeper. For the next ten minutes they dominated the game, with good passing throughout the team, but unfortunately never quite made this pressure tell, missing several good chances to double their lead. Inevitably the team came to regret these misses as Ridgewood started to come back into the game and exert some pressure of their own, and they equalised after half an hour, with another strong pacy run from their key striker finished off with a good strike into the corner. For the final five minutes of the half Ridgewood then dominated, pushing hard to take the lead, but the Wasps defence stood firm with some really solid goalkeeping from Ollie dealing with any danger.
Having weathered the storm before half time the Wasps had regrouped after the break and were firmly back on top again in the opening exchanges of the second half. They soon took a deserved lead (for the second time) as Alex Wilkinson connected with a Robbie Foster corner, and despite a defender's effort to block it the ball spun over the line. Just like the first half this led to a long period of Waverton dominance, but again they failed to capitalise on it and missed a number of good opportunities to take a two goal lead. With five minutes to go the team again paid the price for not putting the game beyond reach when they could, with Ridgewood getting on the end of a long flat throw to score an opportunist equaliser.
So many times this season though Waverton have shown they have the character to fight back from setbacks, and they did so yet again. Just after the goal Ridgewood broke away with a good chance to take an undeserved lead, but through a combination of a last gasp tackle from Jordan Coxall and more brave goalkeeping from Ollie the danger passed, and the Wasps were then the ones pushing forward for a winner, to prevent the game going into extra time. In the very last minute they succeeded. As Sam Jones floated a ball over the top from a deep free kick the Ridgewood defence ran out too late to play Waverton offside (with the referee perfectly in line to judge) and the ball dropped to Alex Wilkinson who stayed calm to slot the ball into the corner for the winner. After calmly playing out the two minutes of additional time, Waverton were celebrating a close victory which, on the run of play, they probably should have made easier for themselves.
All the teams left in at this stage will be strong, but if the Wasps continue to play with this much character they shouldn't be worried about facing any opposition in the Quarter Finals.
(Dream Team to be updated over the next few days)
No comments:
Post a Comment