2-3W
Goals: McCrossan, Bird, Burkin

MOM Haynes

DOD McCrossan

The mens 2’s dug out a dogged win against Barnes in Chiswick on Saturday afternoon. 
The team welcomed back Aedan McCrossan from a spell at Inverlieth hockey club in Edinburgh as well as fellow Scot and team social secretary Will Sheperdson on his Southgate league debut. Bolstered by the usual faces and the slightly more sallow than usual Ollie Wickham fighting off some gastric issues …often mid game. In short it was a strong Southgate side who lined up at 14:45 by the banks of the river Thames at Duke’s Meadow to get the side off to winning ways.

The first half went by in a blur not just because the hockey was fast and furious but more because the manager and match report author was battling traffic from his game at Indian Gymkhana and missed it. Legend has it that Sim Bird scored magnificently, when asked for comment after the game he replied, ‘that’s my bread and butter’. Barnes showed strong resistance throughout and the half ended honours even at 2-2. Aedan mysteriously scoring our 2nd.

The second half was a frustrating affair, Ollie Wickham looked increasingly wan but despite suffering an excess of noxious gas it proved a sufficiently good tactic for wrong footing the Barnes attackers who failed to convert any remaining PC’s which the 2’s seemed happy to gift at irregular intervals. 
Yet the air was clearer in the Barnes goal and Felly threw a nice aerial ball to Drew who ran really rather fast after it and then took an obscene reverse from the baseline which almost connected Whatley-style (author refers you back to St Albans match report) with the back post, alas he missed. Score remained 2-2.

In hockey it only takes one chance, Barnes missed a lot of theirs, Todd missed one of ours and Felly saved two of theirs like a less tattooed version of Ben Stokes from the goal post. Yet lo Harry Haynes in another MOM performance drove a ball in and won a short- which club top scorer Drew Burkin stood top D for. To quote Alexander Hamilton- he didn’t throw away his shot and nailed it top right as the Southgate bench roared its approval. 3-2.

What followed is probably best not recorded as it wasn’t pretty, but the salient point is that the boys held firm and Veysel was superb in our goal and Barnes came off worse. The 2’s nailed a 3 pointer and they move on to take on Chiswick at home on Saturday afternoon.