Cold Harbour FC 2 - 1 Camden FC
18 February 2007 - Report by Paul O'Brien
CAMDEN KNOCKED OUT OF CUP!!
Starting Lineup: Goalie Paul, Gravy Neil, Ashley, Dave Lee, Dan Ahern, Paul, Lee Burge, Searley, Martin Layle, Benneth, Little Chris Subs: Matt Prentice, Kev Barnes, Danny Marchant, Ginge
Finally, a chance to get rid of the kit which had been resting in my room for nearly a month, what with a weeks break followed by a game called off after I took the massive bag home from the North Heath game. Next opponents up in the money-spinning cup run are Division 1 outfit Cold Harbour, who romped 5-1 past Camden senior division-mates Dartford Celtic in their run. A tough game expected, especially as we had Captain fantastic Matt Jackson (Ian Catt) with a toe injury on the treatment table instead on central defence, with defensive centre midfielder and aerial ball-winner Kaan sunning himself and his loose shoulder in Egypt with the dodgy cab drivers. I hope they were having a good time. A bacon-roll errand from substitute Ginge brought some insider information as the groundsman had never seen the opponents lose, and predicted the little striker would score about 6 goals.
And it showed really, as Camden didn’t muster a meaningful 1st half shot while their midfield supplied long balls to their pacey littl’un, with a lack of finishing finesse to his game to match the movement, which was indeed very good. Goalie Paul came out to greet him on a number of occasions and claimed well. Amongst the first half onslaught from Cold Harbour there were goalmouth scrambles and bumbled clearances, lots of goalmouth action, but they didn’t really seem to have an edge to their attacks, especially down their left flank where they were enjoying lots of space while our midfield was unbalanced to allow for a different system played with 3 centre backs and a ‘wing back’ or the right midfielder playing effectively right back while a sweeper patrolled the back.
Despite the bombardment I wasn’t personally surprised to come in 0-0 at half time, their wingers weren’t cutting enough.
Once they switched, the left winger – cum – right winger went in for a few handbags with Martin Layle. Martin, re-nicknamed ‘Dwayne’ by Lee Searle in another mistaken attempt to get Laurence’s attention against North Heath in the last game, seemed to have raised his arms. He thought differently and voices were raised, squares were upped, right in front of the Camden faithful. This is ML’s second such spat in 2 games. Just before half time Dan Ahern completely wiped out their little man up front just outside our box with a tackle that probably detached his legs from the rest of his body. When a free kick was given but no booking awarded, Dan Ahern looked on in disbelief and shouted “You’re havin a fuckin laugh ref” as it seemed he wanted to be in that notebook of the man in black and if a foul this bad wouldn’t work, maybe dissent would do the trick.
Second half. Still 0-0 and a long cross-field ball comes my way, which I decide to head out. The ball dropped lower than the head level and in order to not get in that ‘not quite header, not quite kick, look like a mong and end up handballing it’ position I committed to the header decision, which meant I ended up stooping so low as if to be knighted. “Arise, Sir Paul”. It didn’t even hit my head, it hit my knee as I stooped, but the ball went away anyway and I looked regal.
But then a ball from midfield met a late run from their winger (the one that had a piece of Dwayne earlier) who finished in off the near post to put them 1-0 up. In the following few minutes I went in for a 50/50 header, which I won, but we both ended up on our arses. He was on his for longer than I was on mine, so they got the drop ball kick to their keeper for some reason.
Little chris ran onto a through ball, took it past a defender and then got bundled over by 2 Cold Harbour players in the box before the onrushing keeper could join them, won a penalty. In the absence of normaly penalty misser Kaan, Benneth stepped up and took one which their keeper may have saved had he dived the right way, for it was low and not very hard. I gave Ben the opportunity to write down his own accound of this penalty so his words could be in the match report, and he wrote “Ben scored rubbish penalty cos he was knackerd from fucking Pauls NAN”. That’s the last time he gets a cameo sub-column in my match report. Anyways, 1-1.
With 15 minutes to go their little striker was again on the end of a bouncing ball forward over the defence, but this time he managed to lob it in the goal as opposed to over the onrushing goalkeeper Paul and the crossbar. 2-1 Camden, time to ring the changes as Paul, Loul and Lee Burge made way for Matty Prentice, Gambling Kev and Danny Marchant. The latter of these had an interesting passage of play with Navy Neil, as he misjudged the run of the ball, fell over, and Navy Neil cleared the ball straight into his back before he too fell over.
One of their full backs tried a clearance, which went straight into Ben’s bollocks and a loud noise which caused all onlookers to flinch and gasp in sympathy pain. But Ben carried on running to get the ball unscathed like an Ironman! Then he ruined it by revealing he had not been hit there at all and his hand was in the way, so there was an infringement that went unnoticed instead
Full time, 2-1 and Camden exit the cup. I think I’ve done well to stretch the game to 2 pages really, there was very little in the way of comedy moments and not much controversy either.
I have yet to be told to whom the Warmlake sports-sponsored Man of the Match goes to, but special mention to Goalkeeper Paul for frequent bravery and one or two nice saves as well.