Weekly Hockey Roundup – Mens’ Teams (14th of February)

This was posted by Lincoln Hockey Club prior to the creation of Lindum Hockey Club

Last Week’s Results

Team	Opposition	Location	Result
Mens 1st Team	Airedale 1	Home	Won 3 – 1
Mens 2nd Team	Sheffield University Bankers 6	Home	Won 2 -0
Mens 3rd Team	Brigg 4	Away	Lost 5 – 3
Mens 4th Team	Slazengers	Away	Drew 0 – 0

1st Team Match Report

Will the real Lincoln Mens 1s please stand up? After the abject performances of the last few weeks, finally a win. That the victory was over league leaders Airedale was something of a massive boost to the team and just goes to show how good we can really be. Perhaps the greatest mystery second to Lincoln’s indifferent form must be how ordinary Airedale were. Perhaps the early start of 12pm didn’t help as both sides started cautiously. Airedale scored first after a succession of short corners, one of which found Jimmy Hillsmith’s stick to deflect a route one shot over a prostrate Alan Sanderson. Usually Lincoln’s heads would drop but not on this occasion. With Hillsmith doing the midfield running, ably assisted by James Coffey, the home side slowly fought their way back into the game. Indeed the latter was playing out of his skin and fully deserved his man of the match award. Playing with the confidence to match his skills, he ran the opposition ragged with his full repertoire of tricks. He claimed a goal of sorts with a short corner drag flick which was going a country mile wide of the left post only for the post defender to deflect it into the goal. Said defender is still wondering why he tried to stop the ball when it was going so far off the mark.

Coffey then turned provider on another short corner by finding Hillsmith at the far post for a clever deflection. Airedale seemed to crumble under the pressure and resorted to the long ball game which were easily picked off by Rob Seeley and Geoff Ngao venturing out of their half. There did follow 20 minutes of squeaky bum time when Lincoln could easily have given up the lead. But with “O Captain, My Captain” Sadler marshalling the midfield and Sanderson imperious in goal, any attack came to nothing. “O Captain, My Captain” Sadler finally finished the game off with 5 minutes left by cleaning up a messy short corner.

The final score of 3-1 perhaps flattered Airedale when you consider the amount of chances that went Lincoln’s way, some a result of poor finishing or too much time on the ball, one to reflect on in training. But let’s not allow that to get in the way of a fantastic all round performance from each and every player. Well done all, this game goes to show what can really be achieved if we all pull together.

Man of the Mach: James Coffey. His best game yet and ran rings around the Airedale defence.

Dick of the Day: Alan Sanderson. In trying to return the ball to the other end of the pitch, somehow managed to hoof the ball clean out the ground.

2nd Team Match Report

Dear Reader, for those of you who look forward to the weekly thoughts and musings from Alex (second team skipper), I can only apologise for his absence this week. Here goes with the second team match report…

One of my favourite programs as a child was the A-team (look it up kids – the series not the film) – a highlight of the week. The whole family sat down to eat a Findus product and oven chips as we waited for our weekly dose of action, humour and car chases. A key part of every week was when Hannibal Smith (the leader of this renegade band) would utter his catch phrase ‘I love it when a plan comes together.’ This week our Hannibal was absent but his plan wasn’t. Hastily written on the back of a piece of A4 paper, Hannibal made sure his trusted lieutenants were aware of the plan.

With BA Baracus (aka Ben) back from his rather horrible injury, Face (Craig wouldn’t let anyone else be Face!) and Howling Mad Murdoch (pick any of the younger players) ready for action, we welcomed the Bankers from Sheffield for a top of the table clash and delivered the plan – part of which was fuelling Kev W with pain killers after he had been assaulted at Chapeltown last week.

In the first half, a combination of controlled passing, movement off the ball and hard running was evident throughout the Lincoln team. Everyone worked for each other, tracked back to make tackles, mark players and keep the Bankers from creating any clear cut scoring opportunities. At the other end of the pitch, with Kev N leading the line, Lincoln created some super openings but lacked a little composure in-front of goal. One mazy run from a Nelson (I never know which one is which) brought a fine save from the Banker’s keeper. At half time the game was goalless but we knew we had the edge.

Cue the theme tune, shut the doors of cave/garage/workshop, refine the plan and burst out of said cave/garage/workshop ready to battle the bad guys.

The second half started with Lincoln completely dominating the game. Our passing and movement – especially from the outstanding Louie – was wonderful to watch. This led to a series of short corners, where a smart interchange in the D led to a shot on goal blocked by a Banker’s body on the line. Up stepped BA (Ben), to dispatch the resulting flick – I’m sure he uttered the words ‘I pity the fool’ on his way back to our half. Lincoln quickly organised themselves to be more compact , expecting an onslaught from the table topping Bankers, but in the next passage of play, Harry was released on the right, drove into the D and squared the ball to Face (Craig) who swept the ball high into the net. As with the real A-team the bad guys had been beaten.

It really was an impressive performance from the whole team and a well deserved win. Top of the league, still unbeaten this season and a dominant performance.

Cut to Hannibal (aka Alex), as he lights a cigar (don’t smoke kids it’s bad for you!) and mutters the immortal line ‘I love it when a plan comes together’.

MOM: Louie (no vote this week but an acting Captain decision)
DOD: Not applicable…

3rd Team Match Report

Playing at Brigg is a good fixture for us being closer to home than many of our away games (unless you count Yarborough as an away game, because it does feel like it sometimes). Anyway our team was fairly well balanced, obviously not looking anything like our previous teams from previous weeks, due to the endless shuffling of players around the squads, (must be a nightmare for Billy to sort out, so hats of to him), any way back to the game. It was fairly evenly matched, and play went quickly from one end to the other. The defence holding and giving it to the forwards who just to make things fair gave it to their defence who in turn gave it to their forwards etc etc etc.

To cut a long story short we only just lost but not without some good play and commitment all round. It was good to have Lewis and Andrew in the team, let’s hope we see more of them. A Special mention goes to Paul who battled throughout the match, showing excellent commitment, and was therefore given the Captains MOM. It was also worth thanking Chris and Arthur for playing even though they were off doing some controlled falling down a snow clad mountain abroad the following day, happy après Ski.