Doncaster M2s 2 - 0 Durham City M1s

We began this Saturday’s journey to Doncaster by arriving super early and watching the ladies’ match before ours. Vaguely familiar faces were on the pitch, and Matt Coe, rather than Iain, was the sheepish man. Another familiar face soon greeted us. Seth ‘Judas’ Price came and said hello in his ubiquitously lovely manner before the mind games started. We were asked to produce a totally irrelevant copy of a teamsheet, someone came into our changing room looking for a hockey stick (Duncan helpfully offered his), and the match was delayed due to slow water cannons. Finally, we got on and surveyed the Donny team. They were markedly different to the bare XI who came to us.

We immediately looked off the pace and Donny looked dangerous. They crowded round our ‘D’ and transferred the ball quickly and sharply. Some good defending kept them at bay, but we consistently failed to make passes and successfully build from the back. There were far too many double-turnovers. A large Donny crowd added to our woes. They weren’t rude or particularly hostile; it was just a bit embarrassing. Eventually, Donny crept ahead with a rebounded goal from the right of the ‘D.’ 1-0. We did have some good passages of play. One memorable one involved a series of high-intensity passes around the back and the ball eventually ending up with Duncan, who stormed forward and found our front-line, but to no greater result than a long-corner. It was a very frustrating half.

Things only got more frustrating. We spent most of the second-half camped around our ‘D’ staving off Donny attacks. They scored a second soon enough. Who else but Seth? Our man in Donny forgot he was supposed to be helping us and poked in a scrappy short-corner. 2-0. Donny had a lot of short-corners in this half, including one they dictated to the umpire. One culminated in a diving save to the top-right from Coe. Rob maintains that it was going wide. His mum Mandy was watching, so perhaps someone – Iain? – should ask her? The Donny crowd were quite amusing, jeering Matt Kettley as he took his green-card for some tackling (‘he’s just being dramatic’ our skipper proclaimed as he chopped down his man for the fourth time) and strangely praising Duncan for his tackling. We pushed forward to get a goal back, but the only result was a flurry of Donny counter-attacks. None resulted in a third goal, though, and the game ended 2-0.

MoM: Matt Coe (save)

DoD: Dragon (pushing his head against the railing in a suspicious manner)

#AllAboardThePotteryBus #AlrightBigUn #MyDadThinksI’mPlymButMyMatesCallMeDragon

And a bonus one from training:

#VoldemortAndTheDwarf:1amSetAtFabios