Argonauts FC

DATE 13th Mar 05
OPPOSITION Team Bristol Res
GROUND Home
On a fine morning in Severn Beach, with a light wind and a mild temperature, Argonauts Reserves were rampant in demolishing Team Bristol Reserves, 12-2.

The pre-match warm-up lasted slightly (about 30 minutes) longer than planned as Team Bristol turned up late, but this only helped to focus the minds of the Argonauts' players. Within about 20 seconds of kick-off Locker capitalized on a defensive error by their keeper and looped the ball in from 35 yards! 1-0

The team sensed another easy game after the 6-0 and 2-0 victories in the double header last week. It was soon 2-0 as a cross from Locker was let through the keeper's legs and the ball crept over the line. Team Bristol then tried to make a fist of it and started to foray into the Argonauts' half, winning some free-kicks and corners in the process. From one of these corners, Bromley rose well to head clear and from the resultant breakaway, the ball found its way to Jay on the right who sent in a delightful ball, which was hit first time into the top corner by Bromley who had sprinted all the way from his own goal-line. 3-0



Now, things started to tick a little better and the fourth was not long in coming. One of the Argonauts' many corners resulted in the ball falling to Bromley on the byline, who pulled it back for Terry to smash home from 1 yard. 4-0
The fifth came soon after when Asensio made himself some room at the far post and nonchalantly fired the ball into the bottom corner. 5-0 and Jose Cooke was visibly appreciating the sexy football on display from the sidelines!
Then came a minor blip, when a clearing header from Bromley fell to Holbrook, who hitherto had been enjoying a solid game on the left. He miscontrolled it and the resultant cross fell to their No. 9 who fired the ball past the hapless Jazz in goal. 5-1



It was uncharacteristic of the solid back 3 of Bromley, Palmer and Rich Scott to let in a goal, but nobody's perfect, eh?
Team Bristol may then have been hoping for a minor miracle, but the Argonauts weren't going to do "a Redfield" and let a 5-1 lead slip. Jay soon made it 6-1 with a crashing shot into the far side of the goal and simple header from Bromley after a defensive mix-up on a corner made it 7-1.

As half-time approached, the game's first (and only) moment of controversy came when a skillfully hooked shot by Matt Scott was rudely punched off the line by a Team Bristol defender. Referee Tom Clark felt he had no choice but to send the player off despite fierce protestations by their no. 11 and captain, who complained that they were already 7-1 down, so why make it worse? He was then ordered to be substituted to avoid being sent off himself. The next problem for the Argo's was who should take the penalty. Matt Scott wanted it as it was his shot that was going in, but there were 2 players on hat-tricks - Locker and Bromley. Captain Palmer decided central defender Bromley should take it just to rub the salt in Team Bristol's wounds. Bromley firmly slotted the ball into the bottom right-hand corner of the goal to complete his hat-trick to the sound of absolutely no applause bar his own cheers. Preen took a good photo of this too. 8-1

The half-time whistle blew soon after to a chorus of boos from the away end.

HT: Argonauts Reserves 8 Team Bristol Reserves 1

Argo's were walking it and the second half was always going to be a pedestrian affair. Sensing this, Jose Cooke tried to stir up some enthusiasm with some encouraging half-time words, but it seemed as those words had fallen on deaf ears as just under 10 minutes into the second half an innocuous looking free kick from their no. 9 flew into the far corner of the net. 8-2
It should be mentioned that Asensio and Bromley were taken off 5 minutes earlier and so had no blame for the goal whatsoever. There was a question mark over legality of the goal anyway, as many of the Argonauts players claimed that 3 Team Bristol players obscured Jazz's view from offside positions.

Anyway, with Team Bristol now "back in the game", the Argo's wanted a few more to stamp their authority on the game. Goals duly followed, the first coming from a well-won Locker header to complete his hat-trick. 9-2
With incessant Argonauts pressure, double figures had to come soon and the honor of the first player to score the Argonauts 10th goal in a single match fell to Holbrook*, who worked his way into the box from the left and smashed the ball into the roof of the net from a tight angle. 10-2


Team Bristol tactically switched to a 7-0-3 system, which did them no favours. The next goal to come was a fantastic goal from Finch who stole in between their defenders and lobbed a cheeky chip over the keeper's head to make it 11-2.
Jay, who had been a thorn in the Team Bristol defense all day then made it 12-2 with a smashing shot after a decent pull-back from Locker.
With about 25 minutes to go and Team Bristol pretty much given up, we may have hoped for a few more goals, but unfortunately the team's shooting boots must have deserted them (how's that for a mixed metaphor?) and 12 was all we could muster.


FT: Argonauts Reserves 12 Team Bristol Reserves 2

Commenting after the game, Jose Cooke said "At the end of the day, the lads put in 110% and although it was a game of two halves, we can still be happy as Larry that we managed to stick 12 in the onion bag"

Team Bristol didn't really have anything to say.

After another crushing victory and no defeats in the league since November 11th, Argonauts Reserves have their sights firmly set on promotion and you can follow it all at www.argonautsfc.co.uk!

The Game Ended Up 12-2
Goal Scored by: Ashley Lock (3), Ross Holbrook, Keith Bromley (3), Ross Terry, Ian Jay (2), Paul Asensio, Andrew Finch
Man Of The Match: Ian Jay
Starting Line Up:


*I'm not actually sure whether it was Finch who got the 10th and Holbrook who got the 11th or vice versa. Also, I'm not sure if Ross Terry got the 4th and Paul Asensio got the 5th or the other way around.

Man of the match voted for by the players.