Camelford 4 Foxhole 2

[Darin Morse]

Camelford 4 Foxhole 2

Wednesday 26th August 2009

Foxhole slumped to their second successive defeat after a dismal display in the second-half during which, and despite taking the lead on the hour, they ran out of both steam and ideas to finish a well-beaten side. In stark contrast to the visiting strikers, each of whom still await their first goals of the season, Camels' centre-forward Menhinick bagged four inside 35 minutes either side of the break, and generally proved too good for a defence that was offered little protection from midfield.

The first opportunity fell to Menhinick on ten minutes but he pulled his left-footed shot after springing an unconvincing offside trap, before Gusterson fired wide at the near post. Otherwise both teams were only able to offer tame efforts from distance which failed to seriously trouble either keeper in an uninspiring first half, although Foxhole may count themselves unfortunate to trail at the break to Menhinick's direct free-kick after Holland was harshly penalised for leaning on Gusterson.

Kempthorne, an early replacement for Murt, went close to doubling the advantage within five minutes of the restart, his shot being well fielded by Holland to his left. However, four minutes later, Pinhammer's centre was headed home off the underside of the bar by Kenny, before Griffin's fine cross was firmly nodded past Colwill by Rowe to give the Foxes the lead. Reynolds, possibly still smarting from missing an open goal after Holland had parried Menhinick's volley invitingly into his path, was immediately cautioned for dissent, but he needn't have worried as the referee and two neutral officials somehow failed to notice Gusterson's blatant push on Lawrence, allowing Menhinick to convert the subsequent cross from fifteen yards.

Griffin, for kicking the ball away, and Balsdon, for dissent, traded bookings before, during a spell when Camelford may easily have scored on two occasions but for poor finishing, Menhinick completed his hat-trick with nineteen minutes remaining with a near-post header. His fourth, a drive from twelve yards on 77 with unmarked team-mates eagerly queuing up just in case, was well-taken and somehow inevitable; by way of response, Foxhole managed only further yellow cards for Rowe's foul on Palin, and McKellar speaking out of turn, although Coad's booking for playing on after the whistle at least prompted some ironic cheers from the visiting faithful. Rickard's failure to find the net from ten yards at the death, however, merely epitomised the general feeling of despair.

Foxhole (4-4-2): Ryan Holland; Daniel Meens, Dexter Lawrence, Adam Holland, Tony McKellar; Sam Kenny (sub. Chris Grose), Richard Griffin, Mark Rowe, Scott Ansell; Liam Nicholls (sub. Carl Rickard), Ross Pinhammer.

Camelford (3-5-2): Josh Colwill; Alex Boardman, Dan Metherell, Martin Haynes; Rob Hicks, Cameron Palin (sub. Craig Coad), Dan Balsdon, Kevin Murt (sub. Mike Kempthorne), Giles Reynolds; Mark Gusterson, Paul Menhinick.

Referee: Mr Gary Cornish (Wadebridge).

[green&whitebarmyarmy]

my booking (dan balsdon) booking was also for kicking the ball away not dissent, does make a change though!! completely agree with your report, dont no how the ref missed the push for our 3rd goal, i felt in general there were a few strange decisions in a well contested match that never threatened to spill over, did feel we had the better of play in general but at 2-1 we needed something and paul provided it, gus and paul have bin outstanding for us this season

[B Manning]

Just on a technical point in fact kicking the ball away could be considered as dissent as the law states "shows dissent by word or action" or the caution could be issued under " delays the restart of play".

[dave bunt]

Good report Darin I thought lino on changing room side had a nightmare second half

[Adlestrop]

Would you be good enough to enlighten us please Dave.Was he any worse than his colleague?

[kitbag]

Good to see Paul scoring with freedom again,i gave him his senior dedut when i was at wadebridge he has so much natural ability in front of goal.Hopefully he will continue banging in the goals,best of luck Paul