Captains Column

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to Catons Lane for today’s game against fellow promotion chasers Gorleston Town FC.

Our opponents this afternoon are currently two positions above us in the table with only a point separating the sides so it is a vital match if we are to fulfil our serious aspirations for promotion. 

We are now firmly into the business end of the season and every point is vital at this late stage of the campaign.

Throughout the current campaign we have been involved heavily amongst the promotion chasing pack and with five league fixtures to go its imperative we maintain our focus and concentration to give ourselves any chance of clinching premier division football next season. 

Those of you keen enough to study the current league standings will clearly see that we still have a chance of promotion and with games to come against those fellow clubs around us it promises to be an exciting finish to the season. 

Throughout the past few weeks we have enjoyed some successful results both in league and cup action. After dispatching of Halstead Town over the Easter period we let ourselves down by dropping two points against a hard working Stowmarket side. Conceding a goal with only minutes to play gifted our visitors a share of the spoils in a game in which we dominated an hour of play. 

Following the disappointment of the Stowmarket game we bounced back in the best possible way defeating fellow promotion hopefuls Hadleigh United in a very entertaining game here last Saturday. Hadleigh have been on a good run themselves and in the week before us took a point off runaway league leaders Tiptree United so we knew what to expect going into the game.  

As seems to be the story of late, we completely dominated the first half and should have taken a comfortable three or four goal lead in at the interval but failure to convert our chances seemed to have hindered our progress. As the game approached the hour mark the dramatic change in weather conditions didn’t help our cause as we were playing into the strong winds but a clever change of formation from the management team proved to be decisive and we got our foot back on the ball finishing strongly. After playing the holding role in the middle the park and injury time looming I made a rare forage into our opponents half heading straight for goal. Tired legs, toe punt or as the papers said a fantastic individual goal –I personally prefer the latter-I managed to notch my first goal of the season and one of which could not have come at a better time to win us the game. 

The opportunity to retain our South Midlands Floodlit Cup trophy which we won last season presented itself on Tuesday night with Hoddesdon Town the visitors. Hoddesdon are currently second in there domestic league and had won six on the bounce before there visit to Catons Lane. The game started at a very hectic pace with both teams zipping the ball around playing entertaining football for those supporters who had braved the cold conditions. Chance after chance seemed to come our way but yet again the failure to convert allowed our visitors to remain in the tie. Shortly before half time Kieron Badcock produced an excellent penalty save to spare our blushes after our domination. The second half continued much the same as the first and extra time was needed to find a winner. Fair play to Greg Strong whose 25yard free kick was enough to separate the teams on the night. A mouth watering tie against Stansted FC now awaits us!!

Tuesday’s game was extra pleasing for everyone involved as once again we could rely on the strength of our squad and the youngsters coming through to get the result we deserved. The introduction of Spike Bell, Tom Richardson and James Solkhon provided us with plenty of attacking options and bundles of pace which proved very beneficial for us.  

With only weeks remaining it is important we maintain the same approach to games which has stood us in good stead all season. The chance of promotion is still there and with home advantage in three of the fixtures your support is as always very much appreciated. Get behind the team and if we all pull together then by the 3^rd May who knows where we’ll be???????

Thanks for your continued support

All the Best

Tommy

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