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Bonus Weeks
losing
their momentum
By Lawrence Mentesh
Sunday the 13th of January brought Toldos Baixa to Albir for
a 12PM Kick-Off. After a disappointing result against FC
Orange on Thursday night Bonus Weeks were looking to get
their Season back on track by taking all 3 points today.
Gary Lane was back in England and Mark Dooley joined the
growing list of injuries, his calf still not right after the
game against FC Orange. Adam Musk returned in goal despite
his hand not being 100% and Rich Billam returned for his
first game after having served his 4 match ban. Toldos Baixa
beat Bonus Weeks 5-1 in the First Phase but Bonus Weeks knew
that the score-line flattered Toldos so they were more than
up for proving who the best Team really was!
They did just that early on by playing some really good
football and they made Toldos look very average indeed. They
were also helped by the early sending off the Toldos No.8
who handled the ball in the Bonus Weeks area, the referee
gave him his yellow for the offence and then gave him his
second yellow straight after for what could only have been
for verbal abuse and dissent.
With such a refreshing change to the normal Bonus Weeks
script, the rest of the first half saw Bonus Weeks
continuing to dominate but somehow they failed to register a
single shot on target, the closest they came was a run on
goal by Adam Wilson after some good work by Dave Mold but
the last defender just managed to get his challenge in
before Adam could pull the trigger.
Toldos themselves, however, did manage to find the target
but their best effort was well saved by Adam Musk to keep
the score at 0-0 going into the break. They also had a
couple of free-kicks on the edge of the area but the Bonus
Weeks defence held tight.
The second half saw Robbie Decsei and John O’Leary replacing
Alan Belshaw and Ross Musk and again Bonus Weeks were
quickest out of the blocks, a great cross from the right by
Rich Billam found Alan Spurgeon running in from the centre
and his cool finish beat the keeper to his left and gave
Alan his well deserved first goal of the Season.
1-0 up and looking really good, Luke Swingler came on for
Lawrence Mentesh, Luke moving to right wing with Adam Wilson
taking over at right back. The momentum was still with Bonus
Weeks and when the Toldos keeper was shown a straight red
for handling outside of his area the game seemed virtually
done and dusted. The resulting free kick by Dave Mold was
well saved by the replacement keeper but Bonus Weeks didn’t
have to wait too much longer to go 2-0 up, a good deep
corner from the right by Adam Wilson found the head of
Robbie Decsei who made sure that his header was out of the
reach of the helpless keeper.
Bonus Weeks came even closer to destroying Toldos by at
least another 4 goals, but a great shot by Alan Spurgeon
came back off the crossbar, a lob of his over the on-rushing
keeper landed just wide of the post, a shot by Robbie Decsei
did exactly the same and a brilliant strike by Adam Wilson
was well saved by the keeper.
However, Bonus Weeks nearly came to rue these misses when
Adam Musk aggravated his bad hand in a challenge and so had
to be replaced in net by Lawrence Mentesh. With Bonus Weeks
struggling to keep their shape for the last 20 minutes
despite being 2 men up, Toldos seemed to get a second wind
and they started to pass the ball about far better than they
had done previously and when a defender trod on the ball
while trying to get out of trouble they seized the
opportunity with both hands, picking up the loose ball first
before squeezing it past the keeper to make it 2-1.
With hints of a disaster on the way, Bonus Weeks just could
not settle and Toldos continued to find space and with
nothing to lose they kept pushing forward but fortunately
their final attacks came to nothing and Bonus Weeks held on
to win 2-1.
A good result, no bookings and 3 much needed points but
Bonus Weeks will need to be more clinical in wrapping the
game up if they hope to avoid losing their momentum in the
last minutes of a game. Fitness may well be the key and they
will have to work harder on this in training to give them
that extra edge.
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Trainer/
Coach