20 Oct 2013 - FC Chippenham (H)

With our scheduled opponents Stratton Youth in Gloucester Cup action we arranged a friendly vs. Division 2 league leaders F.C Chippenham who have won 4 from 4 this season.

It also gave the boys another chance to experience the Bassett "bobble" as the game was played at Rylands Way.

We told the lads that although it was a friendly we wanted them to treat it as a League or Cup game as we were sure that Chippenham would be tough opposition.

The rain luckily stayed away & both teams tried to get the ball down & play football from the back to the delight of the watching crowd.

Our lads started the game well & we created several good chances with Tom, Joe, Lewis, Jamie & Dan all going close & we also found the Chippenham goalie in inspired form as he made 2 outstanding saves.

Conor's handling was good in difficult conditions & our defence was well marshalled by the returning Ed & Ben in the middle & both George & Callum at full backs, who also wasted no time in turning defence into attack when possible.

It looked like the half was going to end goaless but once again our habit of conceding goals late in the first half came back to haunt us as we missed 2 tackles & the very bright Chippenham forward scored from close range as a result.

Half Time 0-1.

The 2nd half started with Chippenham looking comfortable & as with the first half, when we got into good scoring positions the final ball or shot wasn't good enough to beat the outstanding Chippenham keeper.

We moved the lads around to make sure they all had a good amount of match time & they all approached their different positions & formations with their usual positive approach.

Following another good save from the goalie from Joe's header we managed to score our equaliser when Tom's corner was volleyed home from 10 yards by Euan into the bottom corner of the goal.

The lads seemed to relax with the goal & we soon went in front when great movement from Charlie saw his header from Callum's free kick fly past the keeper & although a defender thought he cleared it off the line the well positioned referee awarded the goal.

The last 10 minutes saw Dan replace Ed at centre half & together with Josh they looked very comfortable, which again shows the versatility within the squad as Chippenham went all out for a leveller.

With time nearly up Charlie reacted to a bouncing ball in the box & scored his 2nd goal of the game to give the boys a hard fought victory over a very good Chippenham team.

Player of the Match- Once again there was several good performances from the lads but today's award goes to Charlie Emmerson who as well as scoring 2 good goals looked to play the easy ball all game.

Match squad- Conor Chivers, George Staten, Ben Croydon, Ed Fish(Capt), Callum Bridges, Joe Fenton, Euan Burke, Jamie Byrom, Lewis Cholod, Daniel Hulse, Charlie Emmerson, Josh Curtis & Tom Miller.

Last modified on Monday 22nd June 2015 at 23:39