New-look Saltash throw opportunity away

Western League premier division

Oldland Abbotonians 3 Saltash United 2

A new era at Saltash – with new management and a whole new team – began with defeat at premier division new boys Oldland after the Ashes had worked their way into a winning position.

Having fallen behind to a 22^nd minute goal, Saltash equalised on the stroke of half-time through Kieran O’Melia, who then fired them ahead five minutes into the second half.

But Oldland took advantage of some sloppy defending to score twice in eight minutes around the hour mark and held on for victory despite being reduced to 10 men for the last 10 minutes by a sin binning.

All of which left new manager Macca Brown to say: “We shouldn’t have lost the game. We are disappointed but we only have ourselves to blame, and it’s the age old story of what happens in both boxes, but collectively we lost the game when we shouldn’t have. 

“The back five will probably look at the game and say we created five or six clear opportunities to score and put the game to be bed.

“And the forwards will probably look at it and say we’ve scored two away from home yet we’ve lost the game to three really bad goals – and they’d both be right.”

Brown described it as a typical first game of the season, frantic in places which the Ashes expected, but he felt they did really well in the first half to take the sting out of the game.

He said: “Kieran and Jordan (Ewing) both had really good chances before we conceded from a free kick, but the reaction was fantastic and Kieran scored a superbly worked equaliser which we took into half time.

“In the second half Oldland were more of a threat. I felt we dominated much of the first half but they always looked dangerous on the transition when they were quite direct and tested us in behind.

“But at the start of the second half against the wind they did work the ball out to their right winger a few times who was causing us lots of problems with his pace. But once we went 2-1 up for us we really needed to manage the moment better.

“You have to dial everything up after going ahead, especially away from home as there’s always going to be a reaction, but we didn’t do that from a defensive point of view.

“We had a couple of great chances to take the game away, JT (Josh Toulson) should have scored from a few yards out but we weren’t clinical enough. And then the ball came into our box far too easily and we didn’t defend the box well enough.

“It is just moments in the game, but it is in those moments where you need to be impeccable because that’s how you win games, and to go from 2-1 to 3-2 in the space of 10 minutes was incredibly frustrating.

“However, we obviously won’t get carried away and the beauty of this time of year is that you get a chance to go again a few days later, and hopefully we respond at home on Tuesday night versus Helston.”

Ashes fans are going to have to be patient this season. Not one player is left from the team which finished runners-up last season and Brown has brought in many of the players who featured with him at Millbrook last season.

Saturday’s starting XI included seven former Millbrook players, with another two on the bench and one unavailable (Laurence Murray). Brown has gone with his tried and trusted and will build from there.

They will settle and in Reece Thomson and Jordan Ewing up front they will score goals. But it’s likely to be a rollercoaster ride.

Saltash: J Mead-Crebbin, T Love-Holmes, E Wright (J Foster 70), J Wood (H Bunning 83), B Goulding (S Cox 73), R Hamilton, K O’Melia, T Huyton, J Ewing, R Thomson, J Toulson (J Preece 63).

Sub not used: N Crump.

Referee: Darren Gay.

Big opening day crowd, red cards galore and a bullet from a legend

Western League premier division

St Blazey 1 Shepton Mallet 1

Blaise Park was a picture on Saturday as St Blazey welcomed in a new era at the club.

There were queues to get in, and once you made your way through the gates you were greeted by a magnificent looking pitch.

The scene was set for the Green & Blacks’ first match at Step 5 level after winning the South West Peninsula League title last season.

And although the quality of the football was often lacking, the 90 minutes provided plenty of talking points to keep the 305 crowd, the best in the premier league on opening day, entertained.

For me, the drama started with the announcement that the referee was Shaun Edge. I’ve never been a fan of Mr Edge’s style of officiating, but as it was a new season I promised myself I would give him a clean slate.

This came in useful when the ref produced three red cards in two minutes after an incident-free opening half hour, with partisan supporters of both sides quickly venting their anger at the official.

In my opinion, he got two of the three red cards correct. And there was a case for supporting his decision for the third.

The big flashpoint happened close to the home dugout when Shepton Mallet winger Jack Newman tried to retrieve the ball from the sidelines, believing it was his team’s throw-in.

St Blazey coach Brad Richardson was in his path and appeared to block his way; Newman reacted angrily and grabbed Richardson by the throat, with the Blazey man retaliating in a similar way.

A melee broke out involving players and coaches from both sides, which was quickly broken up, as the ref and linesman discussed what had happened.

Apparently, based on his assistant’s account, the ref sent off Newman and Richardson. And I think they were the correct decisions.

Eventually play restarted and within a minute, St Blazey striker Luke Cloke went in late on Shepton Mallet’s Will Banks, near the halfway line.

This time the ref took no time in whipping out his red card, to the astonishment of Cloke and the home supporters.

There was nothing malicious in Cloke’s challenge, in my view, but there was no question it was late and high, and some refs will see that as a sending off offence; others might have felt yellow would have sufficed.

Cloke’s departure probably affected the outcome of the game because you could have pictured last season’s prolific top scorer putting one or two chances away as the match progressed.

The best opportunities came from fierce low crosses from the right delivered by Will Tinsley which nobody could quite finish off, although sub Matt Lloyd came desperately close on a couple of occasions.

St Blazey’s other main threat came from dead ball situations and it was from one of them that they eventually broke the deadlock after 61 minutes.

Tinsley, who will not look out of place at this higher level of football, produced a perfect cross from a corner on the left and evergreen centre half Martin Giles met it with a bullet header which produced a loud cheer from the home fans behind the goal.

The response from the visitors was strong and they were level in the 73rd minute through Harry Rutty, although Blazey keeper Shaun Semmens felt he had been impeded when going for a cross from the initial cross from the left.

Both sides had chances to turn a point into three but on balance a draw was probably the fairest outcome.

St Blazey: S Semmens, W Tinsley, R Ward, A Dilley (I Mccue 73), J Cooper, M Giles, K Bishop, J Smale, L Cloke, C Merrin (M Lloyd 34), J Bowker (CJ Pritchard 46).

St Blazey Star Man: Martin Giles – brilliant at the back, scorer with a fantastic header.

Opening day at Blaise Park.