Hythe & Dibden Reserves 1-3 Sholing Reserves
Scorers : Terry New, Tobi Adenkule, Macaully Smith
Date : 16 August 2014 - Pre-season Friendly
Team : Lee Webber, Jacob Joseph, Owen Roundell, Dan Miller, Kane Crisp, Jess Walklin, Macaully Smith (captain), Coby Wilson, Cain Prentice, Tobi Adenkule, Terry New. Subs all used : Michael Bada, Callum Parker, Rhys Ferguson, Dan Dove, Mcaulie Stubbs.
We played our last pre-season friendly on Saturday v Hythe and Dibden who had a good season last year in the Wyvern league.
The game started slowly with little fluency on a difficult surface. As the half progressed we hadnt really troubled the opposing keeper until
Terry New quickly latched onto a pass from Cain Prentice and chipped the advancing keeper with a cool finish on 32 minutes.
With Dan Miller looking very assured at the back, captain Macaully Smith increasing his influence on the game and with the selfless
running of fit again Cain Prentice we started to take control of the game and came in 1-0 up at half time.
With Michael Bada, Mcaulie Stubbs and Callum Parker entering the fray at half time we continued controlling the game without taking chances and Hythe, slightly against the run of play, equalised on 55 minutes from a long range free kick. This appeared to motivate the boys to increase a gear or two and we looked a lot more dangerous and sharper in general play after this point particularly Michael Bada on the left hand side.
It was no real surprise when Tobi Adenkule ran onto an excellent pass from midfield by Callum Parker to slot the ball under the advancing keeper on 65 minutes to give us a 2-1 lead. This was quickly increased to 3-1 on 75 minutes when a strong powerful run and shot from Cain Prentice was saved and parried by the Hythe keeper only for Macaully Smith to pounce and tap in the rebound from 6 yards.
Hythe did have a couple of decent chances however we comfortably won the game 3-1 to conclude our pre-season programme.
Having played 7 reserve team pre-season friendlies, winning 5, drawing 1 and losing 1, we are definitely ready to start our season on Wednesday when we entertain Winchester City in our first league game with a 7.45 pm kick off at the Silverlake Arena.
"Whilst attempting to emulate the great success of the reserve side over the last few seasons our main objective remains in working closely with our youth team and helping to develop young players into the reserves and ultimately into the first team whilst also working closely with the first team when players need minutes on the pitch for various reasons before going back into the first team squad."
"We have assembled a large squad of young players for this season who will compete in the Wyvern League and 4 cup competitions and we are all looking forward to another very successful season for our reserve team." - Mark Stupple