Report

Games against Barnes are keenly fought affairs and this was no different but in contrast to past draws we should consider ourselves unlucky having been 4-2 up with a few minutes remaining. Once again Greening was absent through injury so Dan Madden donned the gloves, other stalwart absentees Jaap, Lovell, Jones, Rhone meant we had an unbalanced side and had to play a 3-4-3 formation. In the early disarray Barnes scored, practically walking through the defence after Liam gave the ball away in midfield. 0-1 down. We started to settle an a mistake by Barnes gifted the ball to Luke W who hit the top corner from outside the area, great finish 1-1. The Griffin soon went ahead when Mads laid the ball off to Mark who nutmegged Barnes’ Jermaine before slotting it in the corner. 2-1 but again another mistake as Barnes’ midfielder hit a speculative shot that dipped over Dan in goal. The game started to get a bit niggly but mainly due to a lot of unnecessary back chat and nonsense which the Ref struggled to cope with. HT. 2-2.

The second half was a decent games with both sides on all-out attack but the Griffin back three of Liam, Casey and Eoin were playing well and protecting Dan in goal. The Griffin took the lead once again with a great goal from Eoin who rose ridiculously high to meet Luke’s corner and power a headed into the top corner. 3-2 and the Griffin were in the ascendancy. Manager Oz gave a run out  to Jose and Matt for the final 15 mins of the game and it had an good affect when Jose went on a run down the right and was brought down for a penalty. Luke BS made no mistake from the kick smashing it into the left corner. 4-2 up with a 5 mins remaining but the Griffin retreated into their half and invited waves of attacks from Barnes. A moment of confusion between Dan in goal and Liam allowed Barnes’ forward in for a simple tap in. 4-3 and in the last moment of the game there was a goal mouth scramble, someone fell over and the Ref shouted ‘no penalty’ only then to give it under Barnes protestations. Barnes equalised and the game was over. FT. 4-4.

MOM: tough call a we played really well for the majority of the game but gave away poor goals through individual errors. Mark looked threatening every time he went forward and scored a good goal in the first half but should have added more!