Well, we won. 4-3. After a disappointing loss in the first game between these two sides at the start of the season this was a welcome result. But South’s second men did their best to snatch a draw from the jaws of victory and could (and maybe should) have won this game by seven goals instead of one.

With the unusual luxury of multiple subs and the captain acting as manager from the sidelines, South started this game in positive form with some nice pass and move hockey. This was quickly rewarded with pressure on the St Ives goal. Unfortunately Rob B decided to “test the goalkeepers judgement of angles”, this apparently involves bouncing the ball off the pads three times in a row then rolling it wide of the goal. This pattern was repeated again shortly afterwards. In fact the story of the half was one of lots of pressure but good saves or the ball not quite falling to convert this into goals. Even when the goal did come it bounced around off goal keeper and defenders' blocks before being prodded in by Tim.

St. Ives did have some pressure but never looked that threatening from open play though they sent a shot whistling past the post on occasion. Richard should have doubled the lead shortly before the half when Rob was fouled getting past the keeper; the umpire blew for a short corner just as the ball reached the end of Richard’s stick in front of an open goal. Half-time South 1-0 up and feeling more goals and the game were there for the taking.

In the second half the game began to open up as South's younger and more mobile midfield began to find more spaces between the St Ives lines, with charging runs from Richard, Tom W, Mariano and Tim all driving into the D. The finishing got more clinical with Richard getting his just reward popping in the second goal.

Unfortunately this lead was short lived as St. Ives came straight back, won a short corner and converted it via a slip back to the injector. Undaunted South kept pushing and were rewarded when Dave M thundered a ball into the D from near the halfway line and the Ives keeper tapped it out to Nish who couldn't believe his luck and tapped it in with aplomb. 3-1 with 15 minutes left.

Shortly after Tim decided to ignore the captain/managers half-time edict of “pass don’t run with it”. However since he hit an unstoppable shot into the bottom left corner from the top of the circle even Ron was forced to admit it wasn’t always a bad thing to do! 4-1 up, 10 minutes to go.

Maybe the thoughts of “how many?” had got South slightly excited at this point. Maybe the novelty of having subs had finally confused everyone too much about their positions but suddenly St. Ives found that they could get the ball to players on the wings who couldn’t have been more alone if they were Ricky Ponting at an Ashes victory parade. An opportunity they didn’t spurn as a cross was tapped in at the back post to make it 4-2, five mnutes to play. Repeating the same formula a couple more times suddenly it felt a little nervous for South as they came under more sustained pressure than they had at any early point. St Ives converted this to a short, though the final whistle blowing before it was taken meant the result wasn’t in doubt, but it was converted to give the visitors extra consolation.