Brentwood Academy – 1 Saffron Walden (4’s) - 3

Wily old fox that Chris Minor. Family event organised to clash with the visit of Saffron Walden 4’s. Before this game Saffron Walden had won all four of their games. The scores 5-1, 10-2, 11-1 & 15-0. Good luck lads let me know how you get on.

This division always seems to throw up a team that take the thing and march through it. In the past Wapping sides have done it, Tower Hamlets did it a few seasons ago and last year it was Waltham Forest. We are only five games in, but Saffron Walden will take some stopping and its short odds that they go through unbeaten. The Academy like to be an attacking side, attack being the best form of defence, but this didn’t feel like the game for allowing the opposition any freedom. Typically, we have made changes when coming up against these teams and today was no different. It was football manager, Rafa Benitez who came up with an amusing metaphor to describe the difficulty of getting the balance of your team right: ‘The ‘short blanket’…if you cover your head, you have your feet cold, but if you cover your feet, you have your head cold.’ The decision is where to put the blanket.

Ian Anderson had the call to make as stand in captain. It was a more defensive shape. Out went the back three, in came a back 4 with a sweeper. Midfield 4 flatter and a front two instructed to do defensive work. The plan was to block gaps, man mark and not get caught out. discipline required.

As was expected Saffron Walden came at us right from the start. Clearly this is a good team, know what they are doing and have a built up a good understanding. But the Academy held firm. As would be repeated throughout the 70 minutes the midfield was disciplined, sticking to positions, good communication and limiting the spaces that Saffron Walden could play into. It was certainly backs to the wall but not really last-ditch stuff. The defence was clearly busy and Boothie in goal had to be alert and dealt with what came at him well, I commented to afterwards that he has really come on this season and is a lot more fleet of foot but the defence in front of him were limiting chances to awkward angles or under extreme duress.

We were quite limited in attack. Reliant initially on Jake Sanders and Max Bakal either holding the ball up and waiting for the cavalry or creating something on their own. Bit of an unfair ask. Max is only a handful of games into his adult hockey career. I did say to him afterwards that apart from the game where we have to play these away everything else this season will much easier than this.

However, against the run of play we took the lead. Winning a short corner (I’m afraid that my memory of the specifics around all four goals in the game is very limited). I do however remember Ian Anderson dispatching a shot low to the keepers right that made a beautiful thumping noise hitting the backboard.

We held the lead for a decent period, but the character of the match didn’t change. Our substitutes of Darshan Gandhi and Frank Edwards gave us injection of energy and I thought gave us more direct running and just something different for Saffron Walden to think about. Credit also to Sam Anderson another impressive performance playing midfield and up front.

They did however get back level before half time. There was a degree of inevitability about the goal, we couldn’t say it wasn’t coming. But still disappointing. Half time mood was positive. Reaffirming all the good things that we were doing. There was plenty of positives. Keep going, the approach was right, no need to change anything.

I won’t dwell too much on the second half. The pattern was the same. Saffron Walden got two goals, we can’t say they weren’t deserved but we battled and stayed in the game. Saffron Walden hit the crossbar with an audacious lob of Boothie from close in, getting the ball up and down in such limited space was impressive. Lovely bit of skill that probably deserved to be a goal. We had a couple of half chances, from short corners came and went. We kept working, we kept our shape and made this game competitive. The feedback from the spectators was that it was a good watch.

Spally was thrown up front for the last ten to see if he could cause a bit of chaos, Rob Sanders dropping back. He got a nice reverse off, but we couldn’t force a breakthrough.

On reflection we’ve probably played the cream of the division and it’s a good challenge to play in a different style and actually appreciate the opposition. Nice learning points for the younger members of the team. Nothing to fear in the reverse fixture later in the season.

Team: Richard Boothe, Fraser McLauchlan, Simon P, Matt Spall, Rob Musk, Ian Anderson, Rob Sanders, Sam Anderson, Gary MacDonnell, Max Bakal, Jake Sanders, Darshan Gandhi, Frank Edwards.

Man of the Match: Fraser McLauchlan. Fraser played in a back four with the experienced Simon Parsons, Rob Musk and Matt Spall. If you did not recognise the youth player and were watching without knowing who was who, you would have picked out Fraser as one of the experienced operators. Won the majority of his battles and as many as anyone else on the pitch, was positionally aware and handy going forward. His pass completion rate and offensive stats again would have been up there with anyone else in the team. A very complete performance.