The first notable action of the game saw the deciding of the Lemon-of-the-Match award. During an innocuous passage of play, Matt tripped over and hit the ground, with the ball running free to James ten yards further back. James unleashed one of his hard dragged passes upfield, straight onto the Kern posterior. Whether he was trying to make some kind of point about the size of certain objects or something similar is unknown, but in Matt’s words “He even lifted it a bit to make sure it connected”.

Having composed ourselves from the mirth this incident caused, we scored two goals in quick succession to move into a comfortable lead. The opener came when Rupert worked his way around the outside of the Nomads defence, getting to the byline left of the goal. From there he pulled the ball back to Matt near the top of the circle, who put the chance into the far corner with an accurate flicked shot. Our second came from Jan’s ball in from the right flank, which bounced off a Nomads foot into space near the penalty spot. The Nomads ‘keeper came for it but Tom just got there first with his reverse stick, touching it past the goalie and home.

Towards the end of the first half Tom made it three when he forced in following a goalmouth scramble (OK, so I’ve forgotten exactly how this goal happened, my only mental image of it is something like this). Nomads are enduring a hard campaign during which they are yet to win and have only scored five goals, so the game was essentially settled at this point it was just a question of how many. It would turn out to be a few more, but not as many as we might have hoped.

The next goals also came as a pair, but took nearly 20 minutes of the second period to arrive. Ian fed Tom down the right, who crossed into the circle. A Nomads defender deflected the ball, only for it to fall perfectly for Simon, who put it into the near bottom corner. This was Jelley’s first goal this season, which explains a celebration that appeared slightly over-exuberant for the 4th goal in a simple victory over the bottom side. Though, to be fair, we are talking more Tiger Tim than Marco Tardelli here. Four was quickly five, the chance being created by a good cross-field pass from Neil, out on the left flank, to find Tom lurking unmarked near the right of the circle. Tom’s shot was saved, but Rupert collected the rebound and flicked into the empty net.

We then went onto hiatus again, and it wasn’t until the dying embers of the game that the score was added to. Tom was once again the source, putting a cross-shot in towards the far post with Rob applying the finishing touches by diving to deflect in with his reverse stick. That it had taken nearly 69 minutes for Rob, the top scorer in the club and probably also in this division, to gets his name on the scoresheet during a lop-sided game caused some amusement on the sideline. It was nearly seven straight from push-back as Tom dribbled into the circle and then repeated the trick of aiming for the far post (why did it take us nearly 70 minutes to work this one out, btw?), this time with a clearly deliberate cross that skipped past Rupert’s stick when he had seemed certain to tap in.

Despite the seemingly emphatic win, the team were quite disappointed with their performance. The ball rarely left Nomads half and only entered our circle once, with Steve, guesting for us in goal, not getting a single touch all game. So, nearly constant pressure and only six goals to show for it. We were rather too direct in our approach play, repeatedly attempting to go through the centre of the Nomads team. When we did deign to use width, we scored. With the top of the Division being very tight (one or two points could conceivably cover the top four sides once re-arranged matches have been played), goal difference matters and we missed an opportunity here to builds ours up significantly.

Nerdy Statistics Time

Right, with the mid-season break now upon us (see here), a chance to take stock.

The main headline is that we are top of the league! For now... A surprise defeat for Louth saw us leapfrog them, but whether we eat our turkey as league leaders depends on the outcome of a re-scheduled match, Boston vs Bourne Deeping 4ths, next Saturday. But even if we are not top come the re-start in January, we will be 2nd. Pretty encouraging, either way.

In historical terms, this is as good as it has ever been for South 3rds. The team has never been above Division 5NW, with the previous best record from a 22-game season coming in ’09-’10, W8, D5, L9, GF43, GA39, Pts29, which was enough for 6th spot. Our record so far this season is 9-2-2 51-20 29, so equalling or surpassing all the old marks already. In fact, we matched the previous best for wins and goals scored (8 and 43) after just 11 games...

Finally, 2012 as a calendar year has been a standout one for us. Our overall record from 21 league games and four friendlies is 21-2-2 117-29. We won every game we played from New Year (in fact the winning run dated back to December ’11) until mid-October, a sequence of 15 league matches, 19 overall including friendlies. There are a bunch of club records from all this that will stand for a long while.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to one and all.