Spalding came to LR after the league recently announced that 4 teams would be relegated from East Division 1 North. With the 1's only 3 points clear of a relegation spot, the game against Spalding became even more important. This became even trickier when we lost Tim in the warm up, after a stray ball deflected up and hit him in the face. Luckily, Tim took it like a champ and Addenbrookes did a good job patching him up (we also definitely haven't watched the Veo footage on repeat since). Get well soon Timothy!

The game started quickly with South on top, winning a couple of early short corners. The game then started to open up a bit before South won a free hit just outside of the D. This was taken quickly and a low driven pass was fired across from the baseline that was deflected high into the corner from Connor.

The rest of the half was more even with Spalding playing very direct and looking for long aerials out of defence, looking most dangerous from their own short corners. it stayed 1-0 at HT, with Max making a couple of good saves for South.

The second half continued in the same fashion as the first until Spalding won a penalty stroke after a short corner was flicked into a body on the goal line. Max got down well to block the flick but while getting up, inadvertently the ball had just about rolled across the line.

South created lots of chances from open play, including a good effort from a cutback from the p spot that drew a smart save and Connor who took the ball past the keeper but couldn’t lift it above the diving keeper. Another effort was fired across the Spalding goal line and was just missing a final tap in.

Despite a lot of South territory and possession, Spalding won a short corner near the end of the game and put it away to take the lead 2-1. Ed got a late green card for chopping down one of their players and there was no time for an equaliser.