14/10/23 : Mens 6 vs Fareham 6

Eager to improve on the previous weeks performance the Lads had one key focus: communication.

 

In the opening 5 minutes the boys were a bit quiet and struggled to find our feet and after scrambling to stop a few worrying Fareham attacks with some excellent saves from Peter in goal including a one handed save in the air based on pure instinct we woke up and started talking.

 

From then on Havant played some of the best hockey I have seen all season. Dean and Gareth comfortably covered their opponents with strong and aggressive tackles. We were trying out a different formation this week with Boppy and Brad both moving to a joint screen which with their combined skills at picking out stray passes and working to mark large sections of the pitch frustrated the Fareham attack.

 

The scoreline does not reflect the work rate of the Havant attack. Wolfy spent the game constantly making runs to clear space for his team mates and simultaneously exhausting the opposite numbers who dared to mark him. We had a number of good attacks in the first half through Steve’s good positioning and distribution and including a reverse shot from Webbie which was unlucky not to find the back of the net after a wonderful connection to the hit.

 

Moving into the second half the boys continued the communication and seemed to even step it up another level with Fareham seeming even more tired their attacks became less structured and long passes often found their way over the baseline for a Havant 16. Taking advantage of this our wingers used their pace to dance around the defence and make numerous dangerous runs down the wings. Owain and Euan constantly pressed the opposition causing multiple mistakes from Fareham allowing Havant multiple opportunities for counter attacks. After a long game of running despite his limited sleep Fareham decided the only way they could stop Guy was to send a ball into his knee forcing him to the bench. Heading into the closing minutes of the game the boys were eager to score. That’s when Theo made an incredible run through the pitch, embarrassing the Fareham defence with ease and only stopped by the goalkeeper who decided to take a nap on top of the ball. Somehow this was given to Fareham and not an automatic short corner and the boys were on the defence again. Will Udy showed his heart with his work rate coming from attack to defence in a flash and marking his players like they owed him money stopped a number of dangerous looks. Anxious to attack again Ed consistently worked to get into space and made himself an option despite being called the f word (soccer) and despite his good link ups with Steve throughout the game was unlucky to not get a result out of it. Coming into the dying embers Ben found himself with a moment to earn DoD and jumped on it with his impression of Bambi on ice much to the amusement of the spectators and his own team. But Brad thankfully worked back to cover this mistake for him seamlessly.

 

Ultimately the boys played an excellent game of team hockey and were unfortunate to only come away with 1 point. But there was certainly a lot of positive to continue into the coming fixtures.