After the thrills and spills of the previous two weekends, South put in a workmanlike performance against St Ives 3rds at Hinchingbrooke School to gain their first league victory of 2004. Matt Murray, Vincent Korstanje and Jan Brynjolffssen, the latter two making their first-team league debuts, replaced Messrs Garrett, Sprawson and Benedikz on the right as South once again had to cover for multiple absences.

It was Murray, purposeful as ever in the front row, who was quickest to make his mark when creating space for Sanjay Agarwala to shoot after a fifth minute penalty corner won through the efforts of a keen-looking Matt Readman. Agarwala shot wide on this occasion but, five minutes later, Readman made a second aggressive run up the inside right channel before finding Rob Barton, who had earlier caused consternation in the St Ives defence with his well-practised reverse hit. Here, Barton held it up teasingly and then laid off a wide pass to the hard-running Korstanje, who finished the move well by beating the young St Ives keeper with a perfectly-timed strike.

South generally retained good control over the next quarter of an hour, with Action Man Readman influential in most areas of the field and the Agarwala brothers prominent both on the left and further in. St Ives's only short corner of the half fizzled out quickly and the defence was not unduly troubled, with the perennially efficient Jim Thorpe very much his perennially efficient self and Jan Brynjolffssen playing a sound positional game on the right.

A rare foray upfield by Thorpe resulted in a South short after thirty-two minutes and, after taking an accurate feed from Chris Graveling, Vijay Agarwala delivered a beautifully camouflaged switch pass to Matt Murray, who made good use of the time and space available to pick his spot and make it 2-0. Brynjolffssen then snuffed out a dangerous attack by astutely covering on the left and putting in a deft reverse-stick tackle as a St Ives forward teed it up in the D. However, despite powerful runs from Korstanje and Murray, there was no further scoring before half-time.

South upped the pace immediately on the restart, with Readman working a neat one-two with Brynjolffssen and Vijay Agarwala spreading the ball around confidently and Barton unleashed a salvo of shots and deflections which the St Ives defence did well to keep out. Sanjay Agarwala then beat two men comfortably on the left before discovering he'd overrun the (admittedly rather faint) sideline by at least six feet. When another sublime run took him several yards into touch, Master of Symmetries Jim Thorpe was prompted to offer the timeless advice: "Make for the middle of the field, Sanj, it's safer there!"

By way of example, the avuncular sweeper immediately intercepted a dangerous pass and set off on a dead straight run upfield, tanking on until glory beckoned near the edge of the opposition D. Sadly, Thorpe's name was not to appear on the scoresheet this time, but South kept the pressure up and St Ives' willingness to get forward, though occasionally allowing them to put some awkward crosses in, frequently left gaps in the midfield which Readman, Graveling and the Agarwalas were quick to exploit.

South's third short of the game came after fifty-two minutes when, after a saving tackle by the gritty Keith Simpson in the left corner, Vijay Agarwala and Readman swiftly funnelled a move out to Murray on the right. This time, Agarwala elected to strike and, though the ball refused to sit up nicely and was going wide, Korstanje made a valiant effort to tip it in and only just failed. Thorpe then put in a crunching tackle to break up a St Ives attack before setting in train an excellent five man move full of simple passes and good support work. After more tricks of the trade from the elusive Readman, who gave several opponents the slip with his characteristic corkscrew cut-and-run, St Ives managed to rag the play into the South D and gain a short by "persuading" Graveling to overbalance and lie on the ball. The resulting clean strike was well saved by keeper Steve Parker and, though the ball agonisingly ran clear, St Ives missed the opportunity to bring the game back within reach by following up wide.

At the other end, Murray put a switched short just past the left hand post with a neat first-timer and then Korstanje and Murray set Graveling up for a bullet-like drag-flick which was unluckily prevented from arriving at its deserved destination by a defender's shoulder. With ten minutes to go, Sanjay Agarwala came off worst in a clash of heads with a St Ives defender and "blood replacement" Kevin Pride - who had come to umpire but found himself surplus to requirements - seized his chance and donned a green shirt before haring off up the left wing.

South kept their two goal lead intact through super defensive work by Simpson - stick low in the tackle as demonstrated in the Rob Sprawson Coaching Video - and almost scored when Pride latched onto a cross from Readman after excellent approach play by Korstanje. Barton, running tirelessly as usual, then got in a hard reverse-stick shot at short range before Pride stole the show on sixty-seven minutes, accepting a switch from Vijay Agarwala at South's sixth penalty corner and belting a cracker straight past the St Ives goalie. The gamekeeper-turned-poacher then completed a highly entertaining cameo by putting in a magnificent fifty yard run into the left corner in anticipation of another defence-splitting pass. The final whistle slightly spoiled the party but there was no doubting the day belonged to the Pride of Cambridge South.