Last week, Cambridge South M3s won a 5-0 victory without having to turn up. This week was pretty much the same.

To their credit, Long Sutton trumped Horncastle 2s by at least making the long trip south to Long Road. Their squad had more than a few fresh faces and looked a little more raw than the side we had faced in the tricky away fixture. Although missing a few regulars ourselves, South at least this time had the benefit of starting with a full eleven, not needing double-ups, having no-one yellow carded and no-one deciding to award themselves an early bath after taking a green.

It’s hard to say how the opening exchanges went, as I was still in the changing room getting kitted up after umpiring the previous game. Showing just how high confidence was in the team, captain Ras decided he could even risk starting without me on the pitch. Reckless I know, but he got away with it.

In the end, I jogged out just in time to see South celebrating our opening goal. I didn’t see it go in but apparently Simon Frampton scored it so I reckon with a high degree of certainty it was a tap-in from two feet, possibly poached off a team mate.

The other deduction I made was that Ras had managed to lose the toss yet again, as I found myself making my debut as sweeper looking straight into a blinding low sun. South were having the majority of possession and territory but Long Sutton were looking dangerous on the breaks, with a couple of trickly dribblers benefitting from the South defence being almost unable to see them until they were about five feet away.

But with Doug as impressive as ever in central defence and M3s debutant Chris M joining him in doing a sterling job of closing down Long Sutton’s dangerous midfielders, Long Sutton were limited to occasional threats. Meanwhile South ratcheted up the pressure at the other end. Rob commenced his long sequence of reverse-stick-cross-goal-sweep-shots, with the Sutton keeper repeatedly and enthusiastically throwing himself bodily at the rising balls, in the manner of a heroic squaddie selflessly throwing himself on top of a grenade (only the Sutton keeper didn’t explode).

Eventually the pressure told and a low ball across the face of goal was diverted in by Nathan near the left hand post, despite a desperate lunge by Framps just failing to get a touch.

And that was it at half time. The talk at the interval was about the need to increase the ball speed, move more and call more, to open up the Sutton defence and get the rewards for our possession. It did seem to have some effect and play was noticeably more dynamic when we resumed, the more cohesive team shape no doubt helped by our now being able to see our team mates.

South were sitting high in Long Sutton’s half, the visitors increasingly relying on individual breaks or on speculative long balls towards their attacker who had decided to stand by himself near our D. After five minutes without a touch, he seemed to get bored and jogged slowly back towards the halfway line.

The home team’s greatest opportunities were coming down the right, with strong work from Rasmus (by way of apology for having lost the toss) linking to our very special guest star, Tom Dunn. Tom was causing all sorts of problems as he repeatedly took on the Sutton defence to get dangerous balls into the D. If only he didn’t have school most Saturdays.

Meanwhile, Rob was steadily taking his reverse-stick-shot count into double figures. Guttingly for him, it was Framps who got the next goal with another poacher’s classic before one of Rob’s back-to-goal specials finally avoided the keeper to bring up South’s fourth.

With time running down, Framps sealed his hat trick with, you’ve guessed it, a two foot bobbler. Sutton continued to battle valiantly and came close to getting a consolation at the other end but couldn’t get the final touch.

Next up is the trip to March, with a chance to reverse a defeat from the first half of the season.