Easton Monday 3 - 0 Axa Vets

  

[20 Apr : Axa Sun Life]

The starting line up meant the team had to do without their regular, reliable and influential wing men. Jones was recovering from an international training injury and Newby was on holiday. And to cap it off player manager Yarrow was off getting married.

The game started with early pressure from the Monday. Pete Stillman recalls "Getting my head to an AXA clearance early on and breaking a tooth – that'll teach me to head the ball with my mouth open."

Eventually the Blues got the breakthrough their dominance deserved when Charlton ghosted to the byline, cut in and unleashed a lovely right footed shot that pinged off the near post into the far corner (with hardly any back lift!).

The goal prompted Axa to send on their ringers. DNA tests may prove inconclusive, but I suspect that at least one of them (the good one) was definitely not the offspring of a Vets player.

Nobody can seem to remember the second goal Easton. So you scored it this is a fine example of how you missed the opportunity to submit it to legend.... forever.

edit:Did Sheri put you up to this? I can clearly remember the bit where Ben Adams pulled the ball back from the byline for me to slot home. Cheers, Stu.

The third was recalled by several contributors to this report. After a lovely passing move, Adams turned away from his defender and had his shot well saved by the Axa keeper, the ball fell kindly to Chris who struck a superb volley into an empty net from 10 yards. "Great technique" agreed Francis and Rance who felt that had the ball fallen to them, the traffic making its way to Cribbs Causeway may have been in danger.

Adams was again thwarted by a spectacular save from the Axa keeper after a Charlton through ball which Francis described as 'move of the season.' After turning his man superbly inside the box and striking the ball with venom, the keeper finger-tipped it clear.

For their part Axa didn't really come up with any decent efforts on goal – Lee had a very quiet game apart from one punch which nearly reached the halfway line (and had their striker checking to see if his head was still attached).

Ford and Berridge proved themselves as more than decent cover for the missing wingmen. Berridge managed to play the whole game on the left while using his left foot for purely standing purposes.

Ford even proved himself handy with the handbags after their no.6 having already tried his best to remove both Stillman's kneecaps made the foolish error of squaring up to him. The ref insisted they kissed and made up. The no.6 cussed under his breath and Ben 'Rocky' Ford tormented and teased him with his nifty footwork.

Charlton regretfully recalls that he was '...absolutely knackered for the whole second half'. Which along with the substitution of Purnell for Adams may have been for the reason the Monday failed to add to the score in the second half.

A fairly innocuous challenge ten yards outside the Axa penalty area gave Mondays a direct free kick within Rance territory. Captain Francis however had other ideas and pulled rank, which coincided with the kick itself...... rank! Rance, of course, pointed this out to his captain explaining fully how he would have scored had he been given the opportunity. Francis was obviously worried that Rance was in the right as he failed on more than one occasion to pass the ball to Rance when was in a good shooting position.

Francis finally laid the ball back into the path of Rance who pulled it onto his left foot and with minimal back lift fired an unstoppable drive beyond the Axa keeper. Unfortunately the crossbar had other ideas and pushed it away for a goal kick. It was the closest he's come to scoring for a couple of seasons (apart from corners).

Brian continued to challenge Francis as Gob-of-the-match by getting on the ref's case about disallowing Charlton's 10-yards-offside hat-trick goal because it took a deflection on the way though.

Matt continued to crunch through the back of the ringers's legs every 5 minutes. Molter beside him had his usual tidy game limiting their strikers to not a lot. Teague carried out his usual ankle biting performance to perfection.

A very professional performance and well deserved victory (and clean sheet) over what has been difficult opposition in the past. And considering the team was without two or three first team choices...things were looking good for the run-in.

Apparently Francis had a few choice words about Colonel poncing about with the camera, but we'll see who has the last laugh at the end of season party.