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<>The
last fixture before the Christmas break saw Havant travel
to oxford to play bottom of the league Rover oxford.
It is a pleasure after the last few weeks to
deliver a match report that reads well in terms of the score but will
not read
well in terms of the overall performance.
Being totally biased one would say well that doesn’t
really matter but
on a professional position yes this is true but it was probably the
worst performance of the season so far. Difficult
to understand how we could have played in such a way and score 2 well
crafted
goals and yet on other weeks we play so well and are not successful in
front of
goal. Not really able to put my finger
on it for this fixture and it was also evident that Rover Oxford’s
position in
the league was not relative to their standard of play.
The
game started very slow and scrappy. We did
make some early ventures into the
Rover D but they did not really cause much concern and it was very
evident that
Rover had in their possession a very good keeper. Rover
themselves had a number of
opportunities to score but some solid defensive work from our back four
kept
them at bay. Watching the game presented
to the onlooker the obvious fact that neither side had domination of
the
midfield and progression into the final third was lacking.
Towards the end of the first period Havant
gained a number of short corners. Jo
faulkner slipped a well paced ball into the path of Janie Greenham for
her to
strike first time and hit the back board.
Sam stares could have made it two moments later but
was denied by the
left hand post after what was the best move of the match.
The key was simple first time passing without
players either delaying or deciding to fiddle with the ball.
<>The
second phase saw pretty much the same manner of play
but it was actually Rover that began to create more opportunities. Again solid positive defending kept them at
an arm’s length and as they committed further the inevitable breakaway
goal
came as Sam Stares got on the end of a superb cross.
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“Good to go into the Christmas interval with 3 points
and
we now look forward to the second round of fixtures.
Our aim must be to focus on being a bit more
instinctive in front of goal and to maximise our opportunities to gain
full
points for our opposition”.
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Cleave Faulkner
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