The brave and committed M4s met at what seemed like the middle of the night for the 200 mile round trip to Skegness. The leaden skies and intermittent rain/sleet/hail storms throughout the journey should have been an omen.

South started well with our defence and midfield soaking up all the pressure the home team could throw at us and they were clearly getting frustrated. Unfortunately, the deadlock was broken by an unlucky deflection from keeper Matt Gower's pads into the back of his net. This was shortly followed by a brilliant save on the line by a Shahzad Ali foot…unfortunately, he'd momentarily forgotten that he wasn't playing in goal this week and the resulting penalty flick was easily converted. A further two goals followed from Alford despite some heroic efforts from the defensive line-up of Siddorns, Radford, Thomas and Steed, making the half-time score 4-0.

Following the break, South came out fighting, throwing caution to the wind and pushing defenders forward to try and secure a consolation goal or two. Laurie Ho came closest to scoring when a well constructed series of passes left him in the D with space to strike but the ball bobbled away from him before he could get a shot off. Unfortunately our new found attacking strategy left us vulnerable to the counterattack and the home team were able to grab a further four goals in the second half, making it a round 8-0 final score.

Following very welcome warm showers we all enjoyed chip butties at the Welcome Inn and washed it all down with various burgers, pastries, etc. during the long journey home.