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Courtesy of:- Ray Lo, and the Spurs List.
FA Premier Academy League, Gp.A
Spurs Lodge, Chigwell, Essex
Saturday 16th March 2002, 11am
SPURS v WATFORD
(White/Blue) (Yellow/Red)
4-4-2 4-4-2
0(0) 1(0)
Shwan Jalal 1 Richard Lee
Stephen Kelly 2 Cameron Mawer
Marcel McKie 3 Jack Smith
Mark Hughes 4 Dominic Blizzard
Ronnie Henry(C) 5 Nick Williams
Paul O'Donoghue 6 Jamie Hand
Dean Marney 7 Gary Cohen
Walter Thomas 8 Sam Swannell
John Sutton 9 Jason Norville
Lee Barnard 10 Elliott Godfrey
Mario Noto 11 Leon Fisher
Ben Bowditch 12 Peter Dean
(4)67Mins.
Paul Rutherford 13 Chris Chase
Lee Barnett 14 Joe Hurn
(8)67 Mins.
Nicky Wettner 15
(11)60Mins.
Mark Yeates 16
Scorer - Fisher 14 Mins.
It was a warm sunny morning for a game with most of the victorious Youth
cup side playing the bottom team in group B. Was this an easy game? No this was just
like a traditional Spurs game! A small crowd of less than 50 with some of
the younger schoolboys watching from the sidelines saw a closely fought
game that we did not look like winning. Were our lads tired or not up for it?
Spurs lined up with Henry and O'Donoghue at the back with Kelly on the
right and McKie on the left. In midfield we had Hughes, Thomas and Marney
with Noto wide on the left. From the start Watford closed down the home
side quickly and strongly which stopped any flowing football from our more
talented side.
I won't take anything away from Watford as they played to their
strengths and put in a workman-like performance and deserved to win. The game
started scrappily and did not get any bette. Even the goal was scrappy.
The "Hornets" had a corner on the right which was headed on at the near post
by the lively Norville. Jalal failed to hold the ball and it dropped to
Fisher who put it in off his shin.
I kept expecting Spurs to wake up and take the game by the scruff of the neck, but nothing happened, just flashes
of skill from Noto, Barnard and Marney. Watford almost got a second when
Henry's headed interception hit a post. The second half was much like the
first with Marney almost beating Lee with a cheeky 25 yard lob before
Jalal's airshot allowed Norville to hit high over the bar from less than
10 yards. Watford did get the ball in the net from a free kick 20 yards out.
Having asked the referee for the 10 yards, Hand curled the ball over the wall
while the ref was still sorting the wall out.
The frustration began to grow in the home side with both Noto and Barnard being spoken to by the referee.
Barnard was getting very worked up leading to a few confrontations. Near
the end Henry dived in with studs showing on Mawer in the corner. Despite
Holland making three changes they just could not make any headway. They
were brought down to earth with a bump after the mid-week performance. They
have 3 games left, two of which are against the leaders of groups A and B.
The Youth cup is all they have left to play for.
Ray
Editor's note:- Ray has forgotten to mention the miss that Ronnie Henry made in front of goal from about 6 yards when he should have scored. It was one of those days for the under-19s too!
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