St Austell 2 Foxhole 3

[Darin Morse]

St Austell 2 Foxhole 3

Saturday 15th September 2007

It was tough going at first and hardly a feast of football but Foxhole eventually secured their second win of the campaign against mediocre St Austell. The home team had the best of the first half, with Tom Ball lobbing wide early on and the pony-tailed Pope firing just over, while Hutchings should have converted Friendship's telling cross. For their part, Foxhole were struggling to string two passes together, although the return of both Warne and Dillon to central midfield at least promised greater balance, stability and creativity.

For the second successive week, the Foxes opened the scoring against the run of play when, after some clever feet from Hill, Warne placed his shot into the corner on 33 minutes. However, Town equalised within seconds when Claridge's whipped cross from the bottom touchline deceived Holland and thundered into the top corner. Hill restored the lead on 38, volleying into an unguarded net after Raven could only tamely punch away Ames' cross.

The second period was a tale of Foxhole dominance and dreadful finishing by Griffin which nearly proved costly. The marine found himself through on goal at least five times but somehow only required Raven to save one scuffed effort, while the others sailed off target. With 12 minutes remaining, Claridge incredibly repeated his earlier exploits with another centre that dipped under the bar for a barely deserved leveller, before Hill made it 3-2 on 81 from the edge of the box.

Foxhole (3-5-2): Ryan Holland 5; Mark Rowe 6, David Grose 6, Richard Fairclough 6; Adam Rowe 6 (sub. Andrew May 5), Richard Griffin 6, Jason Warne 6, Jeff Dillon 6, Colin Morris 5 (sub. Matthew Lean 5); Liam Ames 6 (sub. Liam Nicholls 5), Scott Hill 6.

St Austell (3-5-2): Steve Raven; Dave Hooper, Glen Patterson (sub. Jack Mewton), Mark Claridge; Neil Slateford, Kyle Friendship, Harry Pope, Karl Cocks, Dan Ball; Tom Ball, Phil Hutchings.

Referee: Mr Tony Allen (Bodmin) 7.