Men's 3rd XI Vs NTU 3rd XI

Match report 24/10/2020
Nottingham Trent NTU 3’s - 5 vs South Nottingham HC 3’s - 2

VC Elliot Dixon reporting:

South arrived at Clifton campus bright and early for an 11am pushback and proceeded with a warm up, vice captain Elliot Dixon was sporting one of the brand new Grays SNHC playing shirts, however it was very tucked into shorts ala “Simon Cowell” - an early DoD awarded. The game started  as expected with NTU being very well drilled and passing the ball crisply at speed. But as ever South’s defenders Brian Blackmore, Leon Pinkney, Mark Roe and Craig Lawson soaked up the pressure, then, against the run of play, South broke throught centre of the pitch thanks to a powerful clearance and the bouncy pitch, a couple of lovely 1-2’s between Elliot D and Skipper Stuart “Grozzy” Croston saw the ball pop up nicely for Grozzy to slot past the sprawling keeper 0-1. A few minutes later South were 2-0 up, a lovely move down the left involving the tireless Alex Butler and the silky skills of Hamza Adamjee allowed Gary Pickering  to fire in a powerful reverse sweep cross straight to Grozzy at the top of the D to slot it top right in off the post on the reverse sweep 0-2.  NTU were shell shocked and came back into the game strongly scoring 2 quick fire goals before halftime, 2-2 at the whistle. 
 South came back out after halftime and struggled to match NTU’s intensity, giving away a few penalty corners which the students put away - 3-2. 
South did not give up and created chances to draw level again, Ellz was put through, one on one with the keeper but a lack of fitness and composure let him down but the chances were still coming. NTU went on to score another 2 well drilled goals for the game to end 5-2.  The positives for the game: We are the first team to upset NTU’s “clean sheet” record and we are starting to play more as a unit. Everybody put a shift in today, it was a tough game for young Arthur to make his 3’s debut, he, along with a lot of us were run ragged for the first 20 mins due to the oppositions relentless movement off the ball, but he dug deep and grew into the game making some great runs down the right! Some excellent saves by Tommy Hall in between the sticks kept the score line down, while some lovely stick work by Chris Cotterill almost unlocked the NTU defence a few times. Great effort from all involved!