On a beautiful spring like afternoon these two teams from different sides of North Berks League Division Four split served up an exciting, open, competitive contest that had five goals, a penalty, disallowed goals, a last minute equaliser, extra time, a dismissal and an outfield player putting on the keeper’s jersey to keep goal. Not bad for one afternoon’s entertainment.

Marcham Reserves are going great guns in Division Four West and were first out of the blocks after three minutes when their top scorer Pat Clark challenged well for the ball on the edge of the area, shot under pressure from a defender only for Roland Pacey to pull off a fine save. East Hendred Reserves are performing equally as well in Division Four East and it wasn’t long before they were making chances of their own, the best in the early stages falling to Simon Burgoyne on 12 minutes, but he shot tamely straight at the keeper after cutting in from the left.

Marcham then started to take control of the match and went close to opening the scoring when Stuart Armstrong thundered a 20 yard free-kick against the cross-bar on 19 minutes. Twenty six minutes in Leighton Jackson thought he’d scored with a first time shot past the keeper only to be ruled out for offside. Simon Ward hit a spectacular half-volley just after the half hour mark which flew just over the bar, but Marcham were unable to make their dominance pay and the two sides went in at half time level.

As is the way in most matches when one side doesn’t make the most of their chances, the other side go up the other end and score. And Hendred did just that within a minute of the re-start after Marcham failed to deal with a corner. The ball eventually fell to Gary Belcher standing near the penalty spot and he fired it past the keeper to score. And Hendred should have doubled their lead on 52 minutes when the usually clinical Tyrone McGill was clean through with time on his side. Unfortunately he curled his shot wide of the right hand post.

Five minutes later Marcham were awarded a vigorously disputed spot kick and Pat Clark stepped up to drive the ball home from 12 yards. Hendred thought they had regained the lead on 68 minutes when Marcham failed to deal with yet another corner, but McGill was adjudged to have fouled the keeper when he bundled the ball over from close range. Neither side created much for the next 15 minutes or so until Simon Ward hit a hopeful ball forward out of the Marcham defence which Stuart Armstrong latched on to clean through versus the keeper who he shot past from 20 yards to give Marcham the lead for the first time in the match.

And that seemed to be that except Hendred were awarded another corner in injury time which Marcham struggled to deal with yet again conceding another corner. This time their inability to deal with corners proved costly as after a couple of defensive headers failed to clear the ball Vinnie Cooper looped a header of his own into the back of the net to take the game into extra time.

Hendred had the first clear chance of extra time when good work by Jack Hendy down the right wing led to him crossing low to Tom Hendy on the penalty spot, but he dragged his shot wide of the right hand post. Two minutes later Marcham had a clear chance of their own as Wes Coster delivered a high ball into the box which was headed on by Armstrong into the path of the onrushing Pat Clark, but he fired his shot on the run wide of the left hand post.

The decisive goal was scored ten minutes into the first period of extra time when Armstrong fed Pat Clark down the right flank. His low cross across the face of the goal was turned behind for a corner by Simon Burgoyne just as Wes Coster was about to pounce. Matty Wall delivered the resultant corner into the six yard area where Pacey could only palm the ball to the feet of Matty Piper 10 yards from goal. Piper smashed the ball instinctively into the back of the net.

East Hendred’s Chris Slevin saw red soon after for foul and abusive language to virtually hand the tie to Marcham, although they had to hold on for the last six minutes of the match with player/manager Tristan Barrett between the sticks after Pete Fox sustained a nasty ligament injury. All in all this was a thoroughly enjoyable semi-final, and the two sides must do it all again next week as they face each other in the League Cup semi final. I, for one, cannot wait.

Author: Phil Annets

Last changed:  25/02/12 17:26