Ramsbury FC win 5-3 away against Lower Stratton FC in a must win game to keep promotion hopes alive!
Team: Ash (GK) Jake Andy James Mike Briz Skip Aaron Zac Jas (C) Nathan Subs: Joe, Harry
If the 6-0 win against Poulton on Saturday was a Carlsberg of a game. The game against Lower Stratton can only be described as a cocktail of lunacy as Ramsbury lurched from their sublime passing football to mental cruelty for those watching. It was a weird game, but, importantly, Ramsbury won and claimed all 3 points to go 3rd in the table!.
Lower Stratton are big team with a couple of players that could compete with Shaq ONeill and their plan of punt it or throw it long and get a big head on it worked brilliantly as they did just that and scored with a header inside 2 minutes to go 1-0 up. Not a good start for Ramsbury!
The referee who can only be described as overly eager (the best I could legally come up with) then sin binned Briz for appealing for a penalty within 5 minutes, for I guess dissent?, and I genuinely thought it was going to be one of those crazy grass roots mid week matches that makes you question your love of football.
However, much to my surprise and Lower Stratton’s, Ramsbury settled down and kept calm and with 10 players scored two rapid goals to make it 2-1! The first was a fantastic win in midfield by Skip out to Zac who then crossed for Jas to score to make it 1-1. Jas then turned provider as Aaron won the second ball and got it to Zac and onto Jas who rinsed the left back and passed for Nathan to slot it. It was quality football that was sharp, incisive and punished a very slow Lower Stratton defence!
Briz came back on and a bit of chaos then resumed (not because of Briz!) with erratic passing and Ramsbury going for the spectacular over the practical and when the ref gave a penalty for what looked like a great bit of defending by Andy we were back to the bat shit crazy match position. This was made worse by Ash saving the penalty (great save by the way!) and the ref deciding to it being taken again because Ash was off his line! A joke really as there was no goal line marked out and Ash had stood still…..and of course Lower Stratton converted the penalty to go 2-2!
I was infuriated and got a telling off, but the team kept calm and played some absolute quality football to go 5-2 up and take Lower Stratton to the cleaners!
First, the midfield got a grip and won the second ball convincingly and got the ball up the pitch to Jas who slotted a superb pass to Nathan to score his second to go 3-2. Then Zac got the ball to Aaron who provided a great ball to Jas who was chopped down and who got up to score a deserved penalty to go 4-2. Finally, Nathan, who alongside Jas was just too much for the Lower Stratton defence, passed a great ball for Aaron to tap in and make it 5-2. We were back to being off the lunacy cocktail and having that Carlsberg moment as the half ended 5-2 after a Brilliant last 20 minutes that even the Moredon FC boys down watching the game clapped as it was that good.
The second half: It happened, it was poor, the opposition scored a scrappy goal to make it 5-3 and Ramsbury were disjointed and missed a hatful of chances. I can’t really add much more than that other than Joe replaced Jake who had a really good game in the first half at left back and Harry game on for Mike who also had a great game and did all that was asked of him.
The second half did not represent the best of Ramsbury in the first half and James got a yellow card for kicking the ball away when in reality he was still contesting and it was in play and again the referee was a bit too eager as the game didn’t merit a yellow as both teams were there to play football and there were few bad challenges.
It just didn’t click in the second half and the score ended 5-3 to Ramsbury.
The highlights were without doubt the last 20 minutes of the first half and if you could bottle that Ramsbury would have won this league. Ash had a solid game with great kicking and a superb penalty save and James and Andy were a good pairing with James strong in the air and Andy superb as the sweeper. Jake and Mike were excellent on the flanks and the midfield of Skip, Briz and Aaron when it clicked was awesome with Skip having one of his best games and a contender for Man of the Match. Zac was quiet and frustrated at times but showed flashes of quality and Jas and Nathan were outstanding with 2 goals each and terrified the Lower Stratton defence. The opposition are a really good bunch and gave their all and played with real humour and a great team spirit.
Overall, an important win and 3 points and a final game against Spectrum on Saturday who are a very decent team. This will decide who promotes to the Prem. Ramsbury will need to be at their very best to win and more Carlsberg than lunacy cocktail please!
Jon
Even though I was an honest bystander watching the game, all that has been reported is a work of pure fiction and not to be given any credibility whatsoever!
