September 29th 2007
St Asaph v Llandudno Junction Reserves.

For our first cup game of the season we were handed an away fixture against St Asaph, with this being the first time we have met it was nice to get a look at the opposition without three points being at stake. With our Captain imposing a fine for anyone who turned up without shaving, most of the lads turned up at the Mally on time and clean shaven which looked very impressive, with the exception of Scott who is growing a beard as he has just been given a part in Emmerdale as Zak Dingle’s long lost brother! As we had a very good win the previous week and a lot of our players back from injuries we had a full squad to pick from apart from Matt who has taken Judith’s place in the squad by going on holiday in the football season! So this week the squad was as follows: -

Mike Hughes
Chris Darbey, Phil Williams, Scott Jones, Sion Watson,
Chris Lloyd, Nathan Watson 1 ©, Danny Parry, James Hobson 1
Bobby Colville and Ross Stevens 3
Ashley Jones on Chris Lloyd
Danny Jones on for Bobby Colville
Mathew Hunt on for Sion Watson
Unused subs Tom Easton and Tom Roberts.

We arrived at St Asaph in glorious sunshine to find a very good pitch but very small facilities; we thought they had forgotten that we were playing 11 a side, as there were only 5 chairs for the lads to sit on. As we had got there with loads of time to spare the lads walked around the pitch like the professionals do, with some making last minute calls to their loved ones or it could have been the bookies, as Peter and I organised the kit and water bottles. St Asaph tried all the tricks in the book to unsettle us, for example the lack of chairs in the changing room to the three changes of kit that they went through before taking to the field.
After a lively warm up we took to the field full of confidence which we had picked up from our last home game, and after only 3 minutes we had the ball in the back of the net, we played some very good football with the ball ending up at Hobbo’s feet who delivered a quality cross into the box which Ross launched himself at and finished with an old school diving header one nil. St Asaph went on the attack down the left hand side and crossed into the box with all our defenders missing it, their number 9 shot low and hard but Mike saved well. Then on 10 minutes the ball was fed to Lloydy who ran down the left crossed into the box to find Ross who controlled the ball in an instant turned and passed to Hobbo who rifled home giving their keeper no chance 2 nil. Again straight from the restart St Asaph attacked our goal, the ball was delivered into the box and found their number 8 who should have scored with a free header but he ballooned it over the bar. We played some very good football and passed the ball very well and made good use of the space that was available and in the 16th minute we were awarded a free kick which Hobbo delivered to find Phil who headed goal wards only for the keeper to make a good save. The lads seemed to be enjoying the game and it wasn’t long before we were 3-0 up through Ross, the ball was played forward from Darbey into the path of Lloydy who crossed to Bobby who passed to Ross for him to bag his second of the game. The quality of our football was a joy to watch but we still gave St Asaph opportunities to get back into the game and when the ball came into our box we couldn’t win a header. Then came the best play of the first half when Sion made a cracking tackle to break up another St Asaph, he instantly released Ross who left their defence for dead rounded the keeper and completed his hatrick 4-0 up excellent football on show and only 23 minutes on the clock. With the right attitude St Asaph again attacked but just was not clinical in front of goal and shot wide. We used the width of the pitch very well and Lloydy was worked very hard up and down the left and was unlucky when he shot wide on the 29th minute. The very impressive Dan Parry crossed the ball from a corner to find Phil again he has been getting on the end of most of our set plays but sadly he just headed over. We controlled a lot of the game with some very good passing and movement and the benefits of training seems to be paying off, although we had a lot of possession St Asaph were not out of the game and in the 39th minute had their best chance but again the number 8 failed to find the target. We played the ball forward to Dan who passed to Nathan who found Bobby with a first time pass who then played a one two with Ross, and then Bobby beat another defender and passed to Ross who shot just wide. Halftime we were 4-0 up and had played the best football to date.

The second half started with St Asaph flying out of the traps and created a very good chance which Mike again was equal to and performed a very fine save, with an obvious kick up the ass at half time St Asaph once again attacked down the left hand side crossed into the box but thankfully the move was wasted with a weak effort which Mike collected easily. On the 50th minute St Asaph had their best chance of the game which we didn’t deal with very well but again St Asaph were let down with their poor finishing. After weathering the St Asaph storm for 10 minutes we started to play a bit, then in the 56th minute we saw the funniest thing in football since Hobbo fell over in the first half, Sion ‘Birthday boy’ Watson ran forward with the ball got into their penalty area and with a two foot shuffle, which he used again in Bangor in the dance off! Beat himself and missed his chance of getting on the score sheet. Now our football was back on and we were back to passing the ball around for fun we were very impressive with the ball and our best passing display resulted in a very good goal from Nathan, the goal stared with the ball being passed around at the back through to midfield then Ross played it to Danny who found Nathan who played it to Booby who returned it to Nathan who bent it round the defenders and into the back of the net 5-0. The lads now relaxed and after giving the ball away in the 65th minute St Asaph who kept going won the ball back and created another chance, only for Mike to save again. We brought on AJ for Lloydy who had ran himself into the ground again, St Asaph played well in phases and attacked down the right hand side but when they crossed into the box there was no one on the end of it and their manager must have been very disappointed with their poor finishing when they had chances. In football as most of you are aware there is no sympathy and in the 73rd minute Nathan got the ball kicked at full force from about a yard right in the spuds which must have hurt, but after some very special water he was back to his feet and playing again. In the 76th minute St Asaph were awarded a free kick which was bent in, Mike punched clear only to find a St Asaph player who shot at goal and Mike saved well. This resulted in Mike throwing the ball out to Mathew who had replaced the Birthday boy who found Bobby with a lovely through ball which Bobby controlled and went on a mazy run which broke down with a good tackle from the last St Asaph defender. The game was won and we introduced Danny for the tiring Bobby who had been struggling with an ankle injury and Danny put himself about a bit and passed to Danny who found Hobbo with an exquisite cross field pass who crossed to Ross and with another header hit the post and was very unlucky not to score.
Final score 5-0 and a very good team performance lots of good football on show hopefully now we can build on this and move forward, this was the best Birthday present I have had in ages thank you.