Winstanley 3 v Billinge U13’s 2
Tuesday night’s are obviously not a good night for us.
Following an excellent performance on Sunday we turned in another lacklustre display and if you didn’t know better you would think the boys had never played together before.
Winstanley opened the scoring early in the half from a direct free kick. Whilst this should have been a wake up call it proved not too be as we remained quiet and often second best to a determined Winstanley side.
Despite hitting the bar on two occasions and with numerous opportunities to create clear goal scoring chances we never really looked convincing in front of goal often blazing high and wide and when on target with no real power to trouble the keeper. This is perhaps reflective of our year as we remain one of the lowest scoring teams in the league.
With the Winstanley keeper much the busier of the two we had at least half dozen corners and free kicks delivered into their penalty box and despite our height advantage made little attempt to force a goal allowing the ball to drift harmlessly away.
Winstanley were not so forgiving with their second goal coming mid way through the half again from a corner which for the umpteenth game this season we offered no challenge with their player rising in the centre of the penalty area to power an excellent header into the goal.
HT 0 – 2
I an attempt to try and wake the boys up changes were made including some positional. We started the second half much better almost creating a chance to pull a goal back in the first few minutes. However from a long clearance by the Winstanley keeper we allowed the ball to sail over the back four and with their forward already on the move anticipating this he was clear through to make it three.
At long last we seemed to show some determination and following a good passage of football a defence splitting through ball allowed Luke to calmly lob the advancing keeper.
We now reverted to three up front and following further pressure on the Winstanley goal James popped up to add a second and give us real belief that we could snatch a point.
Despite our pressure we were unable to force the equaliser with determined defending from Winstanley ensuring they took the three points.
Another disappointing performance to add to our ever increasing collection!