HFC Utd Blues 4 vs 3 Jarrow Ravens

Today was our first match since 20th Dec & it was good to get back into the swing of things.

Jarrow looked to be a much improved team from the one we faced earlier in the season & this made it a good competetive match today. We looked to be playing the better football in the first 15 mins but Jarrow created the better chances. Owen Crossley came closest for us with a header that hit the bar until we took the lead on 20 mins when Matt's free kick was met by Niall who headed into the net 1-0. Ten mins later it was 2-0 & again it was Niall who slotted home when the keeper parried out a shot from Mete 2-0. Jarrow pulled goal back 1 min before half time to make it 2-1. Elliot then made an outstanding goal-line clearance to prevent an equaliser.

A chat with the boys at the break and we changed formation slightly and asked th elads to push up a little further as we were dropping too deep in the firs half.

Alex made a good save when a looping high shot looked as if it was going to creep in just under the bar but Alex tipped it away. We moved Aaron up to a number 10 role and it paid dividends when he beat 3 players before neatly slipping the ball through to James who rounded the keeper and notched his first goal of the game 3-1. We started to look more in control now and had a few more chances before James grabbed his 2nd of the match to make it 4-1 & we all thought that was pretty much "game over" - big mistake to assume !!

Jarrow pulled a goal back on 60 mins when what we thought was a clear offside, wasn't given an their player sped through to score 4-2. A couple of mins later the same player completed his hat-trick with an almost identical goal, this time he was definately on-side. The lad has lots of pace and was Jarrow's main threat all game and credit to him, he took his goals well. The lads held firm to secur the 3pts in what was a really good match.

Man of the match - Sam - a gritty determined performance throughout the full 70 mins - well done.

In Summary - great to get back to playing matches again. I feel we deserved the win howver the lads switched off for the last 10 mins and this nearly proved to be very costly, a lesson to be learned for all of them.