A late withdrawal and a change in personnel did not stop us bouncing back to winning ways, as we beat Lubavitch Boys Minyan 8-5. With Darren unfortunately suffering a hamstring injury before the game, Aron moved back into defence, and Mordy started up front.
In the wake of last week’s defeat, a team meeting was held to see if there was anything different we needed to do. And it seemed to work, as an early flowing move, starting with Sruli in goal into the defence and up to Yaakov, ended with Ryan making it 1-0.
Some defending was then required, Sruli pulling off a great save, and Gary getting in the way of shots, before Ryan intercepted a Lubavitch goal-kick, to make it 2-0. Aron also looked comfortable, with some decent runs complementing good interceptions and clearances.
Yaakov scored our third, before Lubavitch pulled one back, but Mordy scored, after Gary found him, to restore our 3-goal cushion. At this point we were defending well and looking for counter-attacking opportunities, but we could not add to the score, and at half-time it remained 4-1.
The second half started with some controversy. Yaakov was through on goal before being pulled back, but somehow the referee decided this was not worthy of a sin-bin.
We were creating the better chances, with some exquisite touches from Ryan, who finished one of these, and when Lubavitch let Yaakov run through unchallenged, it looked game over.
However, a bizarre 5-minute spell, and suddenly it was 6-5, and we were in danger of throwing away all of our hard work. But we settled down and Yaakov won a header to allow Ryan to lift the ball over the goalkeeper, and we then finished the way we had started, Yaakov to Mordy to Ryan, for the final goal.
Sruli and the defence held firm, Sruli in particular having pulled off some great saves during the game, and we could again celebrate 3 points.
With no game next week, we reconvene against Vine Street on the 15th of December. Hopefully Darren should be back by then, in the meantime we wish him a speedy recovery.
Results:
Heaton Park 8-5 Lubavitch Boys Minyan
Windsor Road 2-5 Young Lubavitch
Whitefield 2-1 Vine Street
Shrubs 2-5 Holy Law
Fixtures 8th December:
9pm
Holy Law vs Lubavitch Boys Minyan
Shrubs vs Vine Street