Posted by Claire on September 6, 2007, 9:24 am Chesham United (0)2 Oxford City picked up three points with a battling performance in their opening league game of the season. A young City side featuring many newcomers to this level, twice saw their lead pegged back but had the character and determination to keep playing to the end. The game took a while to settle down and there were few chances before City went ahead just before the half-hour. A long pass by Zac Lafford found Simon Reeves, whose cross looked to have evaded everyone, but Jon Gotch showed great perseverance to retrieve the ball and cross for Corey Forbes to glance home. City held on to the break, but a defensive error gave Chesham an easy equalizer from four yards ten minutes after half-time. Nine minutes later City were back in front. Richard Norris might well have been given offside had the Chesham goalkeeper not chosen to play the ball; his attempt to dribble round Norris saw the ball rebound to Forbes, who showed great composure and technique to stroke the ball into the net from 35 yards out. Chesham battled back again and were on level terms within 3 minutes, when a corner was headed in. City continued to attack and took the lead for the third time when Richard Norris, having been set up by the magnificent Forbes, slotted home coolly from the corner of the 18-yard box. Chesham tried to retrieve the situation during the thirteen minutes of injury time but did not test City’s impressive skipper Alex Williams. Indeed, it was City who should have added to their lead, spurning three chances when one-on-one with the keeper. The unpredictable Richard Higgs was particularly unlucky to see his shot beat the keeper and rocket back off the post. This was a battling performance in all areas of the field from City. It was particularly encouraging to see the whole team pass the ball crisply and work hard for each other. Team: Alex Williams (capt) – Kyle Harris, Rhys Denton, Zac Lafford (sub Kallum Conlon 68), Lewis Colwell – Simon Reeves (sub Andrew Smith h-t), Ashley Jones, Laurence El-Kassir, Jon Gotch (sub Richard Higgs 63 min) – Corey Forbes, Richard Norris
Allied Counties Youth League Premier Division Monday 3rd September 2007
Oxford City (1)3 (Corey Forbes 27, 64, Richard Norris 87)
Unused subs: Tom Holmes, Dominic Bruno
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