Aldershot & Farnham men’s 1st team fell to a 3-2 defeat at home to Winchester 2’s, a set-back with other teams around them at the bottom of the table picking up points.

As so often has been the case this season, A&F were slow to start, and it really hurt them in this fixture. From the pushback, Winchester attacked down the right, A&F didn’t apply any real pressure to stop a cross coming in from the right and the ball was picked up at the near post by Stuart Swift and lifted into the net.

After five minutes A&F were 2-0 down, two quite fortunate deflections on the way through presented Dan Allen with an easy chance but A&F were far too slow to react and press the Winchester attack.

This left an uphill battle, but A&F did finally spring into life. Charlie Johnson’s firm strike was well saved by the Winchester goalkeeper whilst Ian Metcalfe missed narrowly wide of each post, firstly with a reverse volley after a lifted ball into the ‘D and then with a short corner deflection.

Charlie Johnson’s effervescent endeavours in the attacking third were causing headaches for the Winchester defence and a cynical foul on him saw the awarding of a penalty stroke. A decision that seemed quite harsh given the distance to the goal, but Metcalfe stepped up to tuck it away.

James Huggins was then desperately unlucky not to equalise with a short corner drag as the postman made an excellent save.
With Winchester attacking down the right again, Max Long conceded a short corner. He was given a green card for dissent, which was then upgraded to yellow for a further display of petulance. The corner was hammered home by Allen.

Ed Rushmere at sweeper was doing a tremendous job for A&F picking up so much ball and enabling positive play out of defence, with even a heavy blow to his ankle not stopping him. He was the games standout player.

Just before half time Winchester received two yellow cards, both for dissent but A&F were unable to take advantage of this numerical advantage either side of the break and didn’t really show enough urgency to.

Back to eleven a-side the game settled more, and Winchester did a good job of managing their lead. Midway through the half a move down the right, through Huggins, Metcalfe and Groves saw Charlie Johnson collect the ball on the right side of the circle and play neat ball across goal to younger brother Harry for a simple tap in.

A&F were not able to create enough as the game wore on, and Winchester didn’t threaten too much either, although Mark Edgley did have to be on his guard and slide with his pads to clear a ball into the ‘D that was inexplicably left by the defence despite a forward lurking to finish.