Deal 0 Ites 0

Deal Town -v- Sheppey United (SCEFL Prem)

Why did nobody tell me how far Deal was ?

Having agreed to drive the 3 Must get here’s set off for the hours drive, en route we were somewhat suprised to hear that the Chairman had taken a wrong turning at Stockbury roundabout and ended up in Darlington !!!! Clearly the Sat Nav in the Chairmans Vauxhall Viva is not up to much.

Anyway an age later we park up, a nice little ground and we’re heartily greeted by the 40 or so other Island mutants.

As the teams came out I was pleased to see the two Pantomime villains lining up in a much changed team which included a new keeper- Dean Highsted and yet another forward Luke Harvey Oswald, surely we must be the only club with more strikers than the Miners, anyway Tom Monty also making his debut two years after his whole body was replaced by pins clips and staples after attempting to leave his car whilst it was still moving, meant that Ites starting eleven contained 6 local lads and T’Bradshaw who is under Island arrest  for only possessing 5 toes per foot.

So to the game, Ites started superbly against a bigger Deal team, puppet master pulling the strings in the midfield ably assisted by Girty and Furious.

Everytime we attacked we looked dangerous, some fine interplay between the Impressive Tom Brunt and Lee Harvey Oswald cut open their defence only to be foiled by a tremendous late tackle from their impressive centre half.

Then on 20 Mins T’ Bradshaw gets the ball on t’right beats two and curls it with his swinger, the keeper, who to be fair could have done with the exercise was rooted to the spot as the ball hit t’bar and rebounded to safety. The various Ites purred with delight, surely they were there for the taking.

Furious George who of late has received worse press than Ian Brady was relishing the battle in midfield, the extra movement of the front 3 providing the perfect outlet for some of the superb balls that he and young Girty were spraying around like a Tomcat on heat.

Then Deal turned up, created a couple of half chances manfully dealt with by the defence superbly marshalled by Ralphy who as we know deals with everything that comes his way, The Deal forward somehow finds himself free on the penalty spot only the keeper to beat but he pulled off a save every bit as good as Jordans on Saturday to keep the scores level at the break.

0-0 HT

At halftime I had a Bovril which along with ringworm and unusual games of hide and seek with ” Uncle Bill” reminded me of my childhood.

2nd half we come out with purpose, Man of the match Huggins finding plenty of room down the left and combining well with the midfield meant we were well on top.

The threesome in the middle were winning most tackles and headers, this was impressive. One such move put Lee Harvey Oswald away who beat the defence but sadly not having the shooting accuracy of his namesake also beat the near post.

Then the Shrewsbury shifter wriggled free of the defence but also put wide of the post, surely it was coming , then another great move LHO gets free and plants it in the net, the adolescent ref who was obviously doing “Grown ups jobs” looked at the Lino who was waving more than Ralphy’s hair in the breeze and promptly disallowed it for offside, Ites protested and at one stage it looked like the ref would take a few names but luckily he wasn’t old enough to have a pen licence yet so we escaped, Deal came into the game with a succession of corners which we dealt with superbly although one such looked to have beaten the keeper but Brunt cleared.

Ernie decides he needs fresh legs but that’s enough about him for now, Remmel replaces the tiring LHO and on comes Timmy for…erm possibly Girty as Ites throw the kitchen sink at them, Timmy finds himself in the area challenging with the keeper who looks like he’d only get off the ground if there was a hovering doughnut, Timmy wins the ball and from the ground puts it in the net. Justice at last …..Nope, again young snotty decides he doesn’t like any nasty icky contact and disallows it.

Their keeper then picks up a lengthy injury which should have given us another 5 minutes but I can only assume the ref had to be in by ten as he cut it short but not before the 3rd sub Tom Loynes nigh on demolished the bar  quicker than the Blackmore family after his corner was returned to him.

Then as Thomas the Tank reached the 90 on the refs watch so it ended, honours even.

0-0 FT

Summary, a brilliant game and a great credit to both sides and a good advert for the SCEFL Very impressed with the keeper and new striker, both fitting in well.

MOM, well obviously Jim Huggins but George and Ian certainly responded to the criticism levelled at them, George shading it for me, Girty improves every game, Brunt and Tom Mont both impressed but on the whole a brilliant team performace.