OPPOSITION	Welwyn Garden City 3rd XI
VENUE	Away
DATE	29-03-2008
RESULT	Won 7-1

Potters Bar clinch the league title with record win over local rivals

Six goals in blistering first half display seals the championship for Bar

The fixture between Potters Bar and local rivals Welwyn Garden City has produced a series of close, hard-fought matches in recent years. The NE14Hockey East Leagues fixture last Saturday started in the same way.

But after a much-interrupted opening period of play, Potters Bar started using the wide areas to good effect. In the 10th minute it was a run by Ensor up the right wing that resulted in a pin-point cross to Mark Turpin; he turned from 5 yards out and scored to make it 1-0.

After the initial goal, Welwyn immediately started pushing up the pitch, leaving spaces in their defence and within 2 minutes, Potters Bar worked another dangerous break forward, again down the right wing. This time it was Tony Sayers who shot into the top of the Welwyn net, to make it two nil.

Soon the Welwyn defence became dispirited and Potters Bar exploited the gaps, making it 4-0 rapidly through further goals from Turpin and Sayers after good interplay from Chris Chittleborough and Andy Latham.

With 10 minutes to go before half time and Potters Bar in control, the Bar defence got in on the act and right back Rob Donoghue played a series of neat one-twos down the right wing with Ensor and got into space in the Welwyn D. His accurate shot into the bottom corner gave him his first goal for the club in this, his third season, and he was rapidly encircled by the team to congratulate him.

Potters Bar’s 6th goal came from a well-worked short corner which gave Ed Newbery a free shot on goal. The training ground routine came off perfectly and Newbery’s shot found the back-boards for his 16th goal of the season.

Perhaps because they knew half time was approaching, Welwyn woke up at this point and they made some decent attacks on the Potters Bar goal. With regular goalkeeper Jonny Weller out with a hamstring injury, Potters Bar were forced to use their speedy left-winger Andy Stokes between the sticks. Stokes acquitted himself well on a number of occasions in the first half. But, after his team mates shouted to him to allow a long range Welwyn shot from outside the D (which therefore cannot count as a goal) to go out of play, it unfortunately hit the post and bounced back onto the pitch. Stokes was left in no-man’s-land and the advancing Welwyn striker slotted home an easy goal. On the stroke of half time Welwyn were awarded a short corner and Stokes and defender Jon Yates acrobatically kept the shot out.

The second half continued in a similar competitive spirit to the first, but with Bar already so far ahead, the urgency had gone for both sides. Turpin scored the only goal of the half; one of many chances for the Bar forwards. The other notable event was that Chris Edwards took to the field for 10 minutes to bolster his claim for a league winner’s medal.

Next Saturday sees the last matches of the season for Potters Bar, sponsored by Brad-Chem. Now confirmed division 6SW champions, PBHC 1st XI face Vauxhall, and PBHC 2nd XI have a title-deciding fixture against Harpenden to determine which of those two sides will win the 9SW title. Both games take place at Dame Alice Owens School on Saturday afternoon.

Team:

Andy Stokes, Rob Donoghue, Jon Yates, Mark Turpin, Paul Brady, Ed Newbery,
Chris Chittleborough, Tim Bye, Andy Latham, David Ensor, Tony Sayers, Chris Edwards

Alan Field