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Old Salesians |
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Carshalton 3rd XI |
3 | Dave Robins 2, Andrew Smith |
SAL – 19th October 2002
This was an absolutely remarkable result for Graham Polley's men. After 30 minutes Cars trailed 0-2 and were being comprehensively outplayed in every department. Keeper Danny Garcia stopped three one-on-ones before Cars escaped to half time just 2-0 down. Cue lots of deep breaths and head scratching. This Cars 3rd XI side had been out muscled before but never absolutely outplayed. With no subs to bring on it was left to Sven Polley to make some tactical changes. The central midfield pair were asked to press further up the pitch and the keeper was instructed to boot it extremely long, where Dave Robins, Ryan Polley and Gary Cummings would battle for scraps from an impressive Salesians back line.Within ten minutes, the ploy paid off. A push in the back in the box allowed Dave Robins to step up and smoothly stroke the penalty home. Ten minutes later Gareth Banton beat two men down the right wing and cutting in from the bye line played Robbo in for his second of the match. Cars were ecstatic and Salesians could not believe that we'd come back into the match. With Mark Lowther and Dave Jenvey now taking control of the centre of the park, it was Cars making the running. But the home side were still dangerous, forcing three fine saves from Danny in the Cars goal. With the clock running down we'd have settled for 2-2 and Matthew Huffer and Dick Polley were taking great delight in humping the ball into the gardens adjacent to the pitch.
With 8 minutes left on the clock Andrew 'Smudger' Smith foraged forward from left back; cutting inside his man and beating another he let one fly with his right foot from 30 yards. The ball sailed into the top right hand corner and he disappaered under a pile of Carshalton shirts. At half time we'd have taken no more humiliation but an incredibly gutsy performance leaves the 3s with a credible 7 points from 4 games in a very tight division.
Matt Huffer
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