Our first ever meeting with Woodley United Mohawks this morning was an opportunity to continue our good performances of late, and hopefully get a result against a team without a win this season.
Many of the squad keep an eye on the results of our opponents, which is great to see! However in our prematch talk we cautioned against reading too much in to previous results, it can be too easy to underestimate teams that appear, from the table, easy to beat, only to find out that you underperform and give you opponents a much needed boost!

For the first time ever we had a squad of 15 players, which is great, meaning I had to plan for 4 subs for the first time too…that will have meant that some of you had a little less playing time than usual, but for the moment at least, we feel that is better than being ‘rested’.

First Half
The first half started well with some good Falcons possession, it got even better after 6 minutes, Marcus playing a great ball in from the wing to Stanley in the centre, who took a touch, picked his spot, and scored his 4th goal of the season. That’s the second week in a row that Stanley has opened our account both inside 6 minutes, scoring first and early is so important in these games, Happy for you to do this every week ;-) (1-0)

The Mohawks fought back from this early setback and within 5 minutes were level. Working a ball down our right, they lofted in a good cross that was inch perfect for their incoming striker who headed in the equaliser. If I’m being hyper-critical, I would have liked to see us do more to prevent the cross, but really it was a very well worked goal and probably the Mohawk’s move of the match. (1-1)

Invigorated by this, the Mohawks continued to compete however our defence dealt well with their attacks, Frankie, Nathan, Ioan combining intelligently to either marshal the ball to safety or to tackle and win back possession. Archie was alert to any danger and managed his box well. In the first half, there was in intriguing battle between Liam and the Mohawks striker, no 3. By far their most dangerous player, he tried to use his size and speed to put pressure on our defence from long balls from midfield, but Liam took the battle to him. There were shoulder barges and leaning in from both, but Liam won the battle, and when required he was expertly supported by Ioan or Nathan. On the right side, Frankie was combining well with Marcus to take charge of the right wing and the balance of our attacking play came down the right in the first half. It was great to see us using physical, but fair, tactics to great effect and to see that back 4 working so well as a unit. This defence worked so well, that the Mohawks changed their attacking strategy in the second half. Well done!

There were no more goals in the first half. The Falcons had several attempts, Chris, Eadoin, Jack and Marcus going close, but either wide, or with insufficient power to trouble their keeper. Falcons played well in the first half, and were solid, but the coaches felt that we were playing at the pace and tempo dictated by the opposition, reacting to their game, rather than imposing ours. This was the main topic of discussion at half
time. We asked the players to quicken the pace and pass, apply more pressure, and to work harder off the ball in the second half.
As I have said before, it is great to have a team that listens and applies instructions and that can adapt their
game in-match. Today, in the second half, the Falcons went out and did exactly what we asked at half time.

Within 2 minutes of the restart we retook the lead, Stanley finding Chris with a super through ball, which he ran onto and hit a powerful shot past the ‘keeper. (2-1)

Reeling from going behind, the Mohawks got hit again within 90 seconds, in the very next attack. Some quick, intricate passing down the right involving Alastair, Marcus and Cameron saw the ball come to Chris in the middle, he jinked the ball past two defenders and stabbed the ball past the ‘keeper again (3-1) That’s 8 goals in four matches now for Chris.

Our play was much more assertive in the second half. Alastair and Stanley, playing as holding midfielders did a great job of breaking up play in midfield and distributing the ball out to Cameron, Marcus and Jack, Eadoin and Raphael who all had turns at running the wings today. We have been using our width to great effect, especially over the last 3 games in particular. It is no coincidence that we are scoring more too, 12 goals in our last 3 games, compared to 10 in the 5 prior to that.

The next 15 minutes saw the Mohawks try and get back into the game a bit more. After their strategy of playing through-balls to their big no 3 was thwarted in the first half, they tried to play balls over the top of our midfield and defence in the second half. A good idea, except that they hadn’t reckoned on Nathan being underneath practically every single one J . In a similar manner to his performance last week, not only did the
ball over the top get intercepted, it was invariably laid off to another Falcon player to attempt the counter.

Where the Mohawks tried other routes through, Max, Gabriel and Ioan turned them over. Max and Gabriel combined really well with Nathan and Ioan in defence today. With Ioan and Nathan controlling the centre, Max turning over play and getting forward too and Gabriel with his characteristic effective tackling making him so hard to beat. (Although Gabriel was almost tackled by a bee before he came on, me having to remove the insect and it’s stinger from his arm….!)

There was one dangerous moment for the Falcons though and it was the only time in the second half I can recall our defence being caught out, their striker through on goal, took his shot which looked like it was going in the bottom left corner, but Archie, who had not seen much action in the second half, made the save of the game, diving to his right to put the ball out for a corner. Such an important save as the score going back to 3-2 could have re-invigorated the Mohawks and made the last 15 much more nervy.

Our fourth goal came shortly after this. Marcus drifted in from the wing and played a pass across and forward to Jack on the left, who hit a super strike for his second goal of the season - a good reward for all his hard work out on the left wing today (4-1).

The last 15 minutes saw a number of goal attempts for the Falcons, Chris in search of his first hat-trick (it will come!), came close, as did Alastair, Raphael and Eadoin, closest was Stanley whose curling shot came back off the upright with the keeper beaten. But there were to be no more goals and the Falcons saw out the remainder of the match comfortably. FT (4-1).

A solid 1st half and a superb 2nd half saw the Falcons get back to winning ways. All good teams, at every level of the game, are based upon a solid defensive unit, that forms the bedrock upon which a creative midfield and attacking flair can be built, we’ve been developing that well over the last 4 or 5 games and the results are showing. We also learned today, in the second half, that we can decide to impose ourselves on the game, dictate the pace and flow of the game, and that when we do, we saw the impact that it can have.

Let’s take those learnings into next week’s home game against AFC Whitchurch.

COYF!!
Phill

Match details

Match date

Sat 20 Nov 2021

Kickoff

15:00

Team overview