After last weekend's disappointments South 2nd XI travelled to St Neots keen to get back to winning ways. Things did not start well as problems on the A14 led to a huge traffic jam on the A428 and the team all arrived 15 minutes late for the pushback so it was straight onto the pitch and into play. Fortunately even this delay was not enough for St Neots and the home side started the game with only 10 players for the first few minutes.

South took full advantage of this and moved the ball about well from the off. The wide midfielders, Kev Rowland and Bhav Virdi were given ample space to exploit the channels and early pressure was rewarded after only 5 minutes when a superb cross in from the left by Dave Aston was expertly touched in by Ali Ward, darting in behind his marker on the right hand post.

If that was a good goal it was followed only a few minutes later by an equally great finish. Ali this time was the provider, receiving the ball from Dave Aston at the top of the D, turning and then putting in a great flick to the top right hand corner which was parried out by the St Neots keeper but only as far as Rob Barton lurking a few metres out who was able to turn it back just inside the post.

At two nil things were looking good and South could relax and play some expansive hockey. However St Neots had other ideas and over the rest of the first half they dragged themselves back into the match, stretching play and making a number of breaks through the middle to connect up with their 2 strikers. The central defence of Nick Bristowe and Dave Monck held firm and the only scares for South (not counting the threat from one player to Nick that he would “get his throat slit”) were a number of short corners won by St Neots but the few efforts not charged down by George Wych were mopped up by keeper Ben Buckley who had another exemplary game.

The half time talk was all about passing the ball out to the flanks, making use of the available space and not trying to run single-handedly through the whole defence. This is still an area where South need to improve, especially in the final third of the pitch, and there is no doubt that, with a little more emphasis on the pass-and-move game, South's superior skills and energy could have put the game to bed. However, it was St Neots who upped their game early in the second half and pressed forward with urgency. A number of short corners were forced in quick succession and eventually a good strike found its way into the goal.

For a period now it was all hands to the pump with the defence under the cosh but South withstood the pressure and built a number of attacks themselves; Manu Bhardwaj in particular linked up well with the evergreen Kev who once again was full of running right through the match and up front Rob and Ali forced some good saves from the home keeper. At times it was real end-to-end counter attacking hockey with chances coming and going for both side but South held onto their one goal lead and fully deserved the 3 points albeit that they had made it unnecessarily hard for themselves.

The match was not without controversy with a few niggles on both sides. In addition to the “throat-slitting” incident, a number of other St Neots players got a little heated and, not to be outdone, Bhav (who could probably get into an argument in an empty room) nearly got himself carded for a running battle with a couple of St Neots players. Finally right at the death St Neots made a vociferous claim for a short corner which was denied by the umpires, as a consequence of which the St Neots player refused to shake hands at the end of the match.

Fortunately however, the rest of the St Neots team did not hold any grudges. Due to Dave Aston's girlfriend dragging him away on holiday straight after the match (for which she earned herself a Lemon of the Match vote), there were not enough cars to transport the team back to Cambridge and Manu and Jack were very kindly given a lift back by one of the opposition!