Royals Match Report 2004-05

Magpies bow out of cup in Comedy of Errors

Church Stretton 0-5 Ludlow South (Cup 19/12/04)

Magpies were sent reeling out of the Cup by a strong Ludlow South side, after an inept performance saw them punished for mistake after mistake.

Remembering the 0-4 defeat they had been on the receiving end of in their previous encounter, Magpies were determined not to let this happened again - at least before the game kicked off.

As soon as the game started Magpies found themselves under pressure from the Ludlow forwards, with Riley shoring up the defence and on several occasions making decisive tackles, preventing almost certain goals.

Ludlow did not have it all their own way though and on 8 minutes a surging run from defence by Hearle saw him send over a fierce cross which Lewis just failed to steer into the net with his head.

On 12 minutes the deadlock was broken, when Holtz sent a suicidal short goal kick to Brayne. Unfortunately Brayne was marked and the Ludlow striker had the simplest of tasks in accepting his early Christmas present and shooting home, much to the delight of the amazed Ludlow spectators.

This upset Brayne and he walked off the field, to be substituted by Case. Carless-Turland was pushed back into the left back position while Case took his preferred place on the left wing.

Despite this gift of a goal, the Magpies kept their heads up and started to show some spirit. They began to string some passes together and take the game to Ludlow. When Ludlow did press forward Smith and Hearle, although clearly not at their best, were solid in midfield.

When half time came Magpies were only one goal down and definitely still in the game. Manager Smith gave them a stern talking to and tried to instil into his team that they were still in with a chance of producing a huge cup shock.

Ludlow were kicking up the slope in the second half, and if anything this helped their game. Whilst Magpies were struggling to put their passes together, Ludlow were enjoying longer periods of possession. 5 minutes into the second half Ludlow scored their second which was a fine solo effort from their striker. After taking it round both Magpies defenders, he coolly slotted the ball past Holtz in the Magpies goal.

Just 3 minutes later Ludlow made it 0-3, when a peach of a shot from 20 yards rifled into Holt's goal. At this point Groom was introduced for Smith to pair Lewis up front, and Robinson replaced Carless-Turland in defence.

Shortly after this Groom came close with probably Magpies' best chance of the match, when he rose to meet a cross put in by Hearle, but his header went agonisingly just over the bar.

On 15 minutes Ludlow scored their fourth goal, when a throw in from the right hand side found their winger in space and he cut inside Robinson and put the ball passed the diving Holtz.

5 minutes from time Ludlow scored their fifth goal when what should have been a simple save slipped through the hands of Holtz and trickled into the goal.

A poor performance from a team that certainly looked jaded and were not a patch of that, that nearly defeated Church Stretton South two weeks prior. Much work needs to be done to get back on to winning ways, especially if we are to mount a serious challenge for a trophy in the second half of the season.

Team: Cameron Holtz, Simon Riley, Michael Brayne, Joe Hearle, Rory Smith , Harvey Carless-Turland, Tom Lewis.  Subs: Ed Groom, Jack Case, Dominic Robinson.