Football: Vanbrugh 1sts 3-0 Langwith 1sts
A bright but cold Sunday afternoon saw the start of the new college football season, with Langwith taking on Vanbrugh down on the 22 acres.
It being the start of the new season, both sides were adjusting to having lost recently graduated players and attempting to integrate freshers into their teams. Because of this, the majority of the game was a scrappy affair with little free-flowing football.
The game began in the same sloppy fashion that would continue throughout, with neither side able to retain the ball for any serious amount of time. There was a shortage of clear-cut opportunities as neither side seemed to have that many ideas up front. Langwith perhaps started the better side, in that they were the only team who could keep the ball for more than 10 seconds, but it was Vanbrugh who had the opening chance, with a long-range free kick striking the wall, before the ball was blazed over the top of the goal from the resulting throw-in.
This seemed to wake Langwith up, and they came close to taking the lead when a dipping volley from the edge of the area by Tom Eskell hit the top of the crossbar, leaving the Vanbrugh keeper completely beaten. Langwith continued to dominate possession, but still lacked cutting edge in attack. They resorted to taking pot-shots from outside the area, a tactic which failed to trouble Wilkinson in the Vanbrugh goal.
Midway through the half, and slightly against the run of play, Vanbrugh snatched the lead when pacy striker Oliver Regan was played in down the inside-left channel by an inch-perfect through-ball and slid it past Langwith keeper Dave Lowe. Within minutes, Vanbrugh had succeeded in stretching their lead to 2-0 when a poor clearance from Langwith left-back David Cox was seized upon by Vanbrugh striker Dan Radford. Radford intercepted the ball 25 yards out and unleashed a powerful shot into the bottom-left corner of the net.
Briefly dispirited at the score-line, Langwith managed to re-compose themselves quickly and dominated the game leading up to half-time. A difficult header from Mikey Cotterill went narrowly over, before Harry Prior was slipped through by midfielder Dan Aked. However, his shot was blocked by the on-rushing keeper. Langwith should have pulled a goal back just before half-time, but Prior somehow managed to nod a free header wide from 3 yards out, leaving the score 2-0 at half-time.
The second half was perhaps even more of a non-event. With Vanbrugh contend to defend their lead and Langwith lacking any cutting edge up front, the game seemed to meander along without much action. With both of their forwards dropping back, Langwith were limited to taking long shots, which failed to trouble the Vanbrugh keeper. Vanbrugh defended brilliantly though, soaking up the pressure and hitting Langwith on the counter-attack numerous times, using the Regan’s speed to great effect. With the Langwith defence unable to cope with his pace and movement, Regan had several opportunities to put the game beyond doubt, but was sorely lacking in composure in front of goal, and regularly blazed his shots over the bar.
Langwith did manage to hit the crossbar again with a thundering header from a corner, but luck did not seem to be on their side. The match effectively ended as a contest soon after, when Langwith conceded an own-goal from a Vanbrugh corner. The Langwith keeper simply palmed the ball in the air before defender Owain Palmer, going for the overhead clearance, succeeded only in hitting the underside of the crossbar and the ball rebounded into the goal.
The result being assured and neither side in peak physical condition, the game wound down slowly to its conclusion. The referee finally blew the whistle to hand Vanbrugh a comprehensive winning start and leave Langwith with a lot of work to do – and sorely in need of striking options.
