The Challenge Cup, 29 April 2007
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| 29 April 2007 Challenge Cup Photos by Jon White |
If any game this season had to be won, it was this one: United Under 11s playing the Lizards Under 11s for the Challenge Cup. As I told the lads beforehand, losing was not an option.
As a sweetener, it was ‘accidentally’ mentioned during the pre-match briefing that players should make sure their parents knew that they would be paying £5 for every goal scored and £20 for a hat-trick!
Talking of the parents, both teams had excellent and good-humoured support from the boys’ families, that humour being put to the test given the decibel levels of the coaches’ yelling from the sidelines!
Fortunately, and despite our top scorer this season being away, the lads were up to the challenge and played to win from kick-off.
The Lizards were unfortunate to put the ball into their own net early on from a Nick Parker corner, but we were able to show we could score for ourselves, with midfielder Joseph Bush putting one away for our second goal.
After a couple of close calls, Nick scored our third before half time.
Coming out after half time, it was important that we got the first goal or risk losing the advantage and maybe even the match. The revitalised Lizards came very close to scoring and this was a wake-up call to the boys who began an onslaught with good attacking moves from Jack Morris, Henry Leather, Matt Elvin (striking the woodwork), Nick Parker and Joseph Bush before Dan Brindle was rewarded with our fourth goal.
The Lizards never gave up and a nice move in particular was rewarded with a goal from Harrison Cheal-Ferris to make the final score United 4, Lizards 1.
United Captain Jack Morris received the Challenge Cup from the Lizards’ Will Morley; the cup will now spend some time at each player’s house until next April when the Lizards will try to regain the trophy from us.
Click to enlarge photo
