DUNDONALD CHASE F.C.
NEWS ARCHIVE

08 September 2002 - friendly v. NC Royals (at Beddington Park)

NC Royals 5
DCFC 1
Simon

Left: Gunes (on the ground) gets his first taste of mens football. Right: Ed says 'Form a circle and watch my silky skills'.

It's good having these pre-season friendlies. A chance to iron out those problems. After today's performance, we know that we need at least a couple more friendlies, before we are ready to start our league campaign at the end of the month.

Lateness was the number one problem today. Without mentioning any names, we had to start with EIGHT men, amazingly we were 1-1 by the time we had the full eleven. How is it that teams always seem to do better when they're short of the full eleven ?

Judging by the first-half performance, there's no way we would have contemplated losing this match by the margin that we did. For the latter part of the first half, we kept good possession, knocking the ball around nicely, although we didn't create many 'real' chances, the lack of an out and out forward being the main problem - come back Glenn and Nick ! The real problem though, was the non-existent defending in the second half. Royals must have felt dejavu, as they found the same sort of space and non-existent marking that they enjoyed in the 6-0 thrashing last season. Once they scored their second, numbers three, four and five followed with ease. Chara had a good night at the shed last night, the effects of which he could still feel today, as he wasn't able to pull off those heart stopping saves, we've all grown to take for granted.

It was only a friendly after all, so maybe the fact that we were without 2 defenders, a couple of midfielder's, an out and out striker and a fit goalkeeper can be overlooked, but time is running out!