Courtesy of:- Ray Lo, and the Spurs List

        FA Premier Academy U-18 League
	Spurs Lodge, Chigwell, Essex
        Saturday 16th October 2004, 11am k.o.

	SPURS    V   READING TOWN
   (White/Blue)	    (Blue/White/White)
        4-5-1	     4-4-2

	0(0)	    2(2)

 Tommy Forecast  1 Ben Hamer
 Chris Riley	 2 Curtis Osano
 Mark Wright	 3 Darren Stapleton
 Stuart Lewis	 4 John Mullins
 Leigh Mills	 5 Curtis Ujah
 Charlie Lee(C)	 6 Peter Castle
 Andy Barcham	 7 Simon Cox
Brian Mascarenhas8 Ryan Catney
Simon Dawkins	 9 Scott Rendell
Jack Maghoma	10 Pierre Joseph-Dubois
Charlie Daniels	11 Scott Davies

Danny Stevens	12 Liam Marum
(8)46              (10)62
Scott Thyer	14 Stephen Brown
                   (11)75
Cluade Seanla	15	
(9)65              (5)46 Mins.
Richard Heller	16
(11)75
John Kyriacou
Nathan Peprah

Scorers - Cox 6, Castle 22

Bookings - Stapleton 80(late) 84?

The team lined up with Lee and Mills at the back with Riley on the right and Wright on the left. Lewis was in the centre of midfield with Maghoma on his left and Mascarenhas on his right with Daniels wide on the left and Barcham wide on the right with the job of getting up to support the lone Dawkins. Reading came with a big team, physically, with probably five six footers and another on the bench.

Spurs kicked off the first half attacking the South end, and had a couple of early efforts before the visitors had their first attack. They played a diagonal ball from the right which Mills did well to reach, but only headed out to Cox who lifted the ball over the stranded Forecast from outside the box. A class finish. Spurs were knocked out of their stride and Reading were encouraged to play the ball about which they did well giving the home side a bit of a runaround in the middle.

Despite the extra man, Spurs were not winning enough of the ball in the middle third with Dawkins doing good work harassing up front and the back line holding up well we were missing O'Hara in the centre. Charlie Daniels who usually provides a good outlet on the left was not getting away as he came up against a brick wall in Osano, all six foot of him.

After 22 minutes Reading won a corner on the right and pushed their big players forward. Mills headed out to Daniels who had no one upfield to play it to and as he hesitated he lost the ball which was picked up by Castle who advanced to the edge of the box and hit a powerful rising shot which beat Forecast's flying arm. Holland pushed Barcham more up to partner Dawkins but the damage had been done and despite a few chances from Andy we were not breaking them down.

The second half began with Danny Stevens on in place of Mascarenhas as the home side tried to retrieve the situation. The extra determination showed when Dawkins clashed with the 15 on the touch line when both players threw punches at each other. The Ref gave them a lecture but did not show a card. Reading had the ball in the net again when Cox put in a cross only for it to be ruled out due to an offside. Both sides made further changes without the balance changing much until the final quarter of an hour when Spurs began to pressure the visitors. Barcham and Stevens had easy efforts saved and Lewis spurned a simple chance. Stapleton was booked twice in the space of five minutes to leave the Royals with ten men for the last ten minutes of play. The home side nearly pulled a goal back but it finished with victory to the visitors.

Spurs did not play that badly but they were not finding their passes and losing the ball too easily. They were missing the likes of O'Hara and Price who can pass accurately over short and long distances which Barcham and Dawkins would thrive on. As the club still do not supply teamsheets I used an inside source for the list of players. Next week the Youth team are away to Wimbledon before entertaining Bristol City on 30th October. Before that I will be at Stevenage to see the Reserves take on Portsmouth (Ed:25th October) after they make a trip to Coventry where Rohan Ricketts may be in the home side.

© Ray Lo

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