Men's 3rd XI Vs Ashby 3

A full strength South dented Ashby’s promotion hopes and helped keep them in the fight to stave off relegation with a battling, sometimes lucky, 1-0 win.

Bing threw a surprise by not only announcing the team on Thursday night, he also had 11 players in the line up! What a novel idea! South started well with some good interchanges between Fletcher, Tom and Max leading to some early openings and a flurry of short corners however despite the early pressure it remained 0-0. Slowly Ashby came into the game and created some half chances but with the South defence in a “thou shall not pass” approach, even when they did get into the D, a clever size 14, Craig’s knuckles or good covering from Matt kept them at bay.

With 20 minutes gone South broke quickly, Fletcher slipping it through to Tom, whose shot looked destined for the far corner only for a flying stick save to deny him. However this only delayed the breakthrough by a minute as a well worked short corner was finished by Mike for a deserved lead.

Ashby responded quickly and a failed short corner routine fell kindly to Ashby’s centre forward only for Craig to use his trusty knuckle to punch it around the post!

Half time 1-0.

Ashby started the half with purpose and won numerous short corners however they really were pants at them, even when it looked easier to score than miss, they somehow missed. South took confidence from this and when the opportunity arose South got the ball forward quickly to the front four who’s quick interchanges led to chances for Mike and Max who were to be denied by some excellent goalkeeping.

As the game progressed towards the final ten South were struggling to get out of there own half and it felt as though the pressure would finally lead to an equaliser only for a miraculous goal line clearance from Craig, after some fine footballing skills from Andy had made it harder for Ashby to get the shot away.

With three minutes to go a rare foray into the Ashby half saw Max 1 on 1 with the keeper, only to round him excellently but then see his reverse stick shot roll agonisingly wide. It didn’t matter though as South saw out the final minutes with relative ease as Ashby’s young team bickered at each other as they realised it wasn’t going to be there day. 

Another 3 points in the quest to avoid the drop, the unbeaten run now stretches to 5.  It’s very tight at the bottom, currently we sit above the drop zone on goal difference. Three games to go…