Poole Town 4 v 1 Taunton Town

A warmer night tonight and so I was down to the basic 7-8 layers.

We arrived later than usual so had to give the bar a miss and head straight for the pitch. I must say, like most grounds I was a little disappointed with the restricted view I had

How Can I see past this?

 

It was at this point I realised I’d forgotten my glasses and once announced I had to look into the pained expressions on my friends’ faces as they realised the awful truth – they were going to have to keep telling me who had the ball and what was going on.

In fairness I went into the changing rooms before the game and asked whether the players wouldn’t mind wearing sandwich boards with their names on, or at the very least celebrate their goals near me. I left as Walker approached me menacingly….

The 12 year old referee started the game a few minutes late and Poole were quickly on the attack.

Preston on the left and Burbidge on the right were giving their right and left backs a torrid time and powerful crosses saw Brooks go close twice – to be fair he deserved the chances after almost being scythed in half after 2 minutes by their no 7

On 20 minutes Burbidge took matters into his own hands by stinging the keeper’s hands from a tight angle but Taunton countered immediately with practically their first attack of the night down the right with a left footed curler just going wide.

It was a rare counter indeed as Poole had wave upon wave of attack with Devlin having 2 crashing shots in 2 minutes that the keeper did well to save.

I do have to mention the keeper at this point. How unlucky it was for him to have just put in for his incapacity benefit claim before the game and the benefit’s officer turning up at the match.

The keeper spotted him in the crowd and so cleverly showed him that when retrieving the ball, he could in fact only travel at 2mph and every time he caught the ball he fell over afterwards. On this performance, the cheque is in the post.

I thought then that Burbidge had got Comic Relief mixed up with Children in Need as he came on to the pitch bandaged up like Pudsey bear but when he came close you could see that he was badly dazed. In my opinion he shouldn’t have been asked to come back on to the pitch and it’s a credit to his bravery that he saw the half out

HT 0-0

Charles came on for Burbidge and for some reason that seemed to knock the stuffing out of Poole. It was almost a complete reversal of the first half as Taunton took hold of the game. This wasn’t meant to happen – I thought they came here for the draw

Their keeper still did want the draw – why doesn’t  Poole have ball boys? That would save all this time wasting nonsense.

After 15 minutes of pressure and several good chances wasted by Taunton, the rest of the team decided the keeper was right and started wasting time by kicking the ball out of the ground.

By the time Brooks fired over on 63 minutes the ball bag only contained a golf ball, a basket ball and Zoe Ball so the RWA chipped in by retrieving and throwing it back

Emerson was really starting to come into the game and it was he who finally unlocked the resolute Taunton defence on 66 minutes.

He ran down the left and crossed into the middle and the ball was met, on the volley, by Charles who put the ball into the far corner 1-0

Two minutes later the ball was played up to Charles again and he was felled inside the penalty area. A pen was duly awarded and Devlin put it away

Never in doubt

Their keeper kept up his slow motion performance even though his team was 2-0 down but the next major action he was involved in was picking the ball out of the net for the third time.

It was a mistake by their number 4 that allowed Cann to rob him of the ball and he hit it with the outstep of his boot into the bottom right corner 3-0

Taunton were looking ragged by now and when Cann was put through, chested the ball down and fired at the keeper, it was inevitable that the ball would fall to a Poole player, which it did and Charles easily knocked into the open goal left by their keeper waiting for his carer to help him to his feet

Taunton, though, had the last say in the game as their 14 ran from the half way line, beating at least 4 defenders with the maziest of runs before slotting home. The best goal of the game, the last kick of the game

Summary – It was all Poole first half but they did have to weather a tough 15 in the second. Once the first went in though, there was only going to be one winner

Star Performer – Devlin – tireless performance picking up the pieces and keeping Poole on the front foot for most of the game