Letchworth V 2 – 1 Hertford VI

Seven changes from last week’s team, but we are all getting to know each other and we settled quickly. Good to have Andy Benson back, along with Richard Churchill and Luke Godwin, all for their first outing of the season, and Rob Furse helping out in goal.

We need to feel a little disappointed that we came away without a point at least. We had a good squad and played a lot of good hockey, we had long periods of domination, but we weren’t the critical first touch in the Letchworth D and their deep-lying back 4 (often 6 or 7) regularly crowded us out whenever we got close to goal.

We were well the better side in the first quarter without really testing their keeper, but always vulnerable to breaks, and a nicely worked short corner sent us behind. Letchworth grew on confidence and the game flowed evenly. Our best chance came from a keepers error after a determined dog fight in their D, but we watched the ball squirm slowly along the goal line and there was nobody there to push it home. Just before half time Letchworth broke in numbers again against a stretched defence, we missed a succession of opportunities to clear the ball and ended up two down.

After the break we again got the upper hand, making outstanding use of our width and pace, imaginative (even audacious) lateral passing across the pitch and a smart mix of short and long balls. However, we still struggled to get anything on target, and our only reward came from Dave Harding’s first time strike from a short corner. We threw everything at them in the last ten, but there was always a forest of Letchworth sticks between us and the goal.

Thanks go to guest keeper Rob Furse, who had few saves to make but was regularly fast off his line to clear balls that got behind our defence, and also to Luke Godwin who gave us much of the drive and urgency we produced in the 2nd half.

Despite the frustrating result, the game was played in the usual good spirit we expect from the lower Letchworth teams, and we have again shown that we can play a good standard of hockey. The missing bits will come right if we stick at it.