27th Oct 2018 Mens 3rd v Boston Spa 2(Home) 8 - 1 win
It may seem strange for the goalkeeper to win man of the match in an 8-1 thumping, but this was the proverbial game of two halves. We started strongly (for a change) with Josh Caldwell drag flicking our first penalty corner (becoming something of a routine). But 15 minutes in we again took our foot off the gas and Boston Spa came back into it, equalising off a sloppily awarded short corner with an equally sloppily defended goal. They then got on top and Josh Hughes pulled off a great double save from a short, a diving save to his right with his stick and then scrambled across goal to clear a beautiful cross from the Boston Spa forward lurking at the far post. At the other end the Boston Spa keeper was in equally inspired form, tipping over a vicious reverse stick shot from Braithwaite.
At half time we decided to switch to 3 up front remembering how we had pinned Boston Spa back when we were attacking early in the game. This seemed to do the trick and we dominated from then on. After another couple of brilliant saves by the Boston Spa keeper he then completely misjudged a great cross by Young, gifting a goal to Braithwaite. Cussons junior then monopolised on some sleepy defending to put us 3-1 up. Boston Spa seemed to lose faith at this point and allowed us to dominate them with Higgitt adding two more and Cussons senior scoring a second half hat-trick.
Man of the match could have gone to any one of a number of players. Joe Cussons for his constant harassing of the defence, Ian Cussons for showing everyone how to fight (for the ball that is), Josh Caldwell and Tom Young for about 3 assists each or Joe Braithwaite on an impressive debut. But in the end, despite the result, we realised that it was Josh Hughes who kept us in it in the first half.