31st Oct 2020 Mens 2nd v Boston Spa 1s(Home) 3 - 0 win
Ben Rhydding men’s 2nd team entertained a Boston Spa side looking to pull off another shock result like a few weeks earlier when they managed to get a draw against Rhydding. Things were definitely different this time round with Rhydding must stronger with returning personnel Mitchell and Foster to name a few.
Rhydding started strongly, controlling the game through the midfield, popping the ball in and out, and making the Boston Spa players run out of position. After a few squandered chances, Rhydding were awarded a penalty corner and, with a call from the bench, the ball was slipped to Mitchell who calmly flicked the ball past the stranded keeper to put the home team 1-0 up.
After a strong opening 20 minutes, the game then got a bit scrappy with Rhydding searching for a second goal. There was a flurry of cards for Boston Spa and Rhydding, most noticeably for Foster. Chasing down a speedy winger, having done all the hard work in catching him, he went for the spectacular diving
tackle and completely miss timed it getting all of the player and nothing of the ball. He didn’t even look at the umpire and went straight to the sin bin dugout only to be surprised that he had only got a 2 minute rest instead of 5.
In the second half Rhydding showed their class and, back to full strength, controlled the game once again with Mitchell and man of the match Horsman using patience and strength at the back and drawing a foul. With Foster's quick thinking, an early pass was put in to Matthews who drove into the circle to
unleash a fantastic reverse stick shot across the keeper into the corner to put Rhydding 2-0 up.
With Boston Spa realising they were not going to crack this Rhydding team they reverted to just trying to hurt some of the younger Rhydding players who, to their credit, did not react and played their game instead, creating chance and after chance. After a string of penalty corners, Rhydding injected the ball out to Foster's open stick who the played a lovely reverse pass to Mitchell who, once again, flicked the ball passed the keeper to make it 3-0.
This takes Rhydding's unbeaten run to 4 out of 4 games and, due to the latest Covid announcement of a national lockdown, the lads will have to wait until December at the earliest to try to continue their run.