“Some good, can come out of Chippenham!”

To quote Dan Crossman, “No good ever comes out of Chippenham” – until that is, last Saturday, when the 2’s achieved an excellent 4-1 win away from home. This was sweet revenge from the last game of last season that saw us lose 1-0 as Chippenham B were spurred on by a large alcohol-fuelled crowd, that help them avoid relegation. Mark Salvidge bore the full brunt of the crowd’s attention last year, and this time he was a well deserved “Man of the Match”.

After Chris and Rich Newton had gone though the “friendly ritual” of saying hello to their former Chippenham team mates, the game finally got underway. Marlborough soon got into their rhythm and dominated the possession and territory with Justin Metcalfe and Charlie Hawley making penetrating runs. However, once again this season, against the run of play, and out of nowhere Chippenham broke quickly with a long ball through the middle and the striker put it away confidently. 1-0 nil down. It was not the first time we have gone a goal down and pulled back to win this season.

So now to the Marlborough goals, most of which were scored from less than 3 feet!

1-1. We were 1-0 nil down for some time, despite many short corners (more of which later) Marlborough drew level. Following a good passage of play, the ball was fired into the D, bounced through a pile of players and Justin Metcalfe was perfectly positioned at the back post to prod home from 3 feet. Our tails were up!

1-2. Marlborough starting to pass the ball around with confidence, swinging the ball from left to right and back again then pushing forward quickly. It was from another dominating passage of play that the ball pinged around the D, and the ball popped out to Chris Newton who fired home confidently into an empty goal from .........2 feet! Chris had clearly found his range, which can be the only explanation for the way in which he turned and sprinted away in a highly excited state waving his arms and stick in the air, demonstrating speeds not yet seen this year!

Just before half time Andy Davidson, had to go off for a few minutes, for being weak ! He was hit on the forehead by Keith Radnedge’s very solid stick; which had to be fair to Keith, was yanked violently upwards by their big oaf of a centre forward! At half time our leader, Ed Watson, gave his usual words of wisdom and told us all to get back to moving the ball quickly and stop trying the “killer pass” - we did all seem to have too much time on the ball and ended up picking the wrong option - get back to doing the basics well.

1-3 “Goal of the Day” was scored by Charlie Hawley. Yet again he made another surging run into the D, this was followed by 3 attempts at goal and he eventually fell to the ground! All was not lost, with Charlie lying on the ground he still managed to find the skill and determination to make a fourth attempt, his most difficult, a reverse stick prone strike through a melee of players and smack against the back board. Great goal – straight out the manual !

1-4 “Shortest Goal of the Day” was scored by Nat Clarke (poacher extraordinaire!). For the record, we DID score from a short corner (more later). Andy D told Nat to get on the far post and don’t hang back. The ball slipped left to Justin who fired it at goal, only for the ball to squirt under the keeper and Nat was on hand to give it a gentle prod home from about 6 inches – followed by a sheepish grin – another game another goal !

So that was the goals, but does not tell the full story. The following are also worthy of note:

* Umpires often get some stick, but last Saturday we definitely experienced the best umpire of the season so far. A young guy (who actually was the key playmaker in our 1-0 defeat last year). He was decisive, fair, he did not miss a thing and had the courage to send off home players!

* Rich Newton screaming wildly for the last two minutes at our bench, trying to get everyone’s attention – was he going mad, NO ! He was the only one to have spotted that Chippenham had 12 players on the pitch (clearly an accident and nothing subversive) - this was clearly a sign of Marlborough dominance and Rich having so much time on his hands to start counting players !

* Short Corners are not our strength, so much so that we spent a lot of time practising them last week at training and came up with 4-5 really good routines. What a waste of time ! Our short corners were best summed up at the very end of the first half (time was up), the whole team surged forward and our leader Captain Ed Watson took over injection duties (don’t have both your injectors off the pitch at the same time!). We were ready, 10 men round the D, poised to take advantage and score another goal, when Ed gave the perfect demonstration of a ”6 inch injection”! The ball dribbled forward before he nonchalantly flicked it away to end the half – last heard uttering the words “I used to be good at injecting!" Based on this performance, I suggest we keep the short corner practise for the “Wellington Arms”!

Finally, I started and I will finish with Dan Crossman and Mark Salvidge. Dan is now almost of the belief that some good can come out of Chippenham!

Finally our Marlborough News Online Man of Match is Mark Salvidge. A much happier game than last year and he was utterly dependable in defence, breaking up many of their attacks and surging forward to bring a strong attacking element to our game today.