Letchworth 3rd XI v Potters Bar 1st XI
Saturday 6th March 2010

On paper this looked like it should be an easy game for Potters Bar as they played a Letchworth team who had been in the bottom three all season. However with St Albans Exiles only three points behind Bar in the League no one on the Bar team would be taking the game lightly.

Just as the game was getting going the ball broke to a Letchworth striker who drove straight towards Rob Donoghue at left back. As Rob went to challenge for the ball the Letchworth striker attempted to hit the ball into the D, unfortunately he missed the ball and his follow through caught Rob just above the eye. After a short stoppage that saw Rob taken off to Hospital the game was restarted and Bar began to pile the pressure on Letchworth.

Soon the first goal came, Chris Chittleborough won the ball just outside the D and drove foward skilfully beating two players before passing the ball across the face of the goal for Mark Turpin to tap in at the back post. Bar began to really apply the pressure which was allowing Ed Whybrow to start making his familiar runs from midfield. On one such run straight down the middle of the pitch he saw Turpin making a run across the keeper and crashed the ball into the D leaving Turpin with the simple task of deflecting the ball past the keeper for 2-0.

Straight from the restart Bar pressured the ball all the way back to the right back. As he went to pass the ball across the back Turpin read his intentions and intercepted before rounding the keeper and flicking the ball past the defender on the line. Soon after this Bar were 4-0 ahead as a short corner was put directly into the bottom corner by Whybrow.

At half time the call was for Bar to use the wings more and increase the number of short passes rather than always looking for the killer ball straight away. Letchworth came out in the second half with a renewed sense of optimism but almost inevitably it was Bar who scored next. As they had done all day Owen Hughes and Ben Graham won the ball off the Letchworth attack and launched Whybrow on the counter. He had Miles Tomkins and Dave Fennell on either side of him and as he drew the last defender he slipped the ball to Fennell who beat the on coming keeper for his second goal in two weeks.

The rest of the second half was very broken up and it seemed as though it was just a matter of how many Bar would score on the break as Letchworth committed more and more players forward looking for a goal. Bar’s next goal came from some neat inter play down the left between Charlie Irish and Dave Fennell. Fennell played the ball into the middle for Whybrow who swept it out to Tomkins on the left who drew the keeper before slipping it to Turpin to tap into an empty goal for his 4th and Bar’s best of the game

The final goal of the game was a familiar format as Whybrow played the ball into the D for Turpin who was again in front of the keeper. Instead of deflecting it, he decided to control it and wait for the keeper to go down before flicking it. The icing on the cake for Bar was the sight of the injured Rob Donoghue returning from Hospital with just a couple of stitches above his eye and no real damage. We all wish him well especially with the title decider against St Albans Exiles next week.

by Mark Turpin