HIGHWAYMAN MUGGED BY THE MEDWAY

Old Bordenians Men’s 6s 2 BOEHC Highwaymen 0

All good things come to an end, and so did the Highwaymen’s nice little 7-match unbeaten run (including pre-season) in Sittingbourne, a town in which the visitors have never won a fixture to this day. (And yes, technically the town is next to The Swale in the Thames estuary, not the Medway, but the latter gives a nice bit of alliteration with the word “mugged”, and carries on the Highwaymen them rather nicely).

And “two” was very much the theme of the day, right from the outset and an immaculately observed two-minute silence to commemorate Remembrance Day on the halfway line. The visitors’ apparent difficulty in forming a coherent semi-circle round the centre spot was probably a sign of things to come, as the hosts simply had “too” much organisation, desire and muscle from the outset to win quite comfortably and deservedly on the day. In fairness, it was a gallant performance from the BOEHC men in white, who once again had a large number of talented midfielders available, but no out-and-out forwards at their disposal, other than captain Stephen Gilbert who is only just getting back to full fitness himself. All of which meant that several players were being asked to take on unfamiliar forward roles and play out of position, in particular Jamie Rendell, who acquitted himself well on the left, Sammy Chana, a surprise late inclusion who showed some very nice touches throughout, the team's Kiwi mascot Steve Garth, and Greg Dowse, who came closest to scoring for the Club midway through the second half.

In terms of possession, the midfield quartet of Josh Clark (unlucky when through on goal on a one-on-one in the last minute), Mark Ainley, Richard Cleall, and Ravi Wickramasuriya, actually enjoyed more of the ball than the home side, who tended to rely on long-ball breaks (but not aimless ones) down either flank. However, lots of possession never translated itself into a consistent threat in the home team’s D, and nor could the visitors ever retain the ball for long enough in the final third to build up any sustainable level of pressure on the Old Bordenians’ backline.

The defence welcomed back the inimitable Steve Miller to partner PhilKinch, and for the second week running the back three did not concede a single penalty corner, although this feat was oddly enough matched at the other end of the pitch, which says something about where the majority of this game was played out. Keeper Tom Conway, having only just dried out from his first match earlier in the day, performed admirably, saving well with his feet on a number of occasions, particularly with a first-half one-on-one where he somehow managed to deflect the ball wide off his instep.

But back to the theme of “two’s” … after two minutes’ silence and the visitors managing to struggle to half-time still holding out at 0-0, BOEHC were eventually sunk by two slightly fortuitous goals at either end of the second half, missed Mr. Ainley for two minutes courtesy of a green card offence, and have now slipped from position one to two in the Division 3 table, albeit currently on goal difference only … all of which makes next week-end’s fixture list once again highly interesting: four of the leading five teams are playing each other, and the Highwaymen find themselves in another table-topping clash against leaders Gravesham & Wellcome, this time at home at the graveyard shift pushback time of 4.00 pm, after which the team could find itself first, second, third or even fourth in the rankings, so tight is the pack now.

A third of the league season is now over, so it will be important for the Club to capitalise on the last three games before the Christmas break, as two of these will be at home. So it will be a real question of “Two be or not two be, eh?” (Oh stop it , please …)

Team:
Tom Conway (GK), Tim Walters, Phil Kinch, Steve Miller, Ravi Wickramasuriya, Jamie Rendell, Richard Cleall, Mark Ainley, Sammy Chana, Greg Dowse, Josh Clark, Steve Garth and Stephen Gilbert (C).

Man-of-the-match:
Ravi Wickramasuriya – great as always, and once again took an absolute battering from some highly physical defending along the way. Sadly he never got the chance to get his own back from a short.

Umpires:
Chris Bernard whistled extremely well and handled the expected feistiness and volume levels sympathetically, gently but firmly. OB’s usual umpire was a jolly nice chap too. Whatever rub of the green was going (apart from the card handed out to Mark Ainley), however, was certainly not heading in the direction of the outmuscled hosts, although in truth the result would have been no different anyway.