Season opener - Stallions 4: Eastbourne 3

My first game in goal since the dim, distant tines of 2012 and I end up as Pony. Typical.

I'm not convinced there is huge shame in letting in 3 goals, but when all 3 are scored in pretty much the centre of the goal perhaps it's right to start asking questions.

Still, to begin at the beginning; the Stallions were forewarned that they were stepping up a grade by arriving in our usual piecemeal fashion to find an opposition already kitted up and going through some drills.  It was a gloriously warm afternoon.  Those of us with more years under our belts and still quietly rubbing our summer bellies (some bigger than others) were sure that their warm-up looked more strenuous than we were prepared to be once the game started.  Aaron confirmed the tone by ambling onto the pitch 30 seconds before kick-off, hoofing a ball towards the corner-flag and claiming "that's the warm-up done".

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Eastbourne started marginally the brighter of the teams, stringing some decent attacking moves together.  Some heroic, but unsung, keeping and last-ditch defending managed to keep them at bay for about the first 20 minutes.  Then they struck.  A piercing ball through the attacking left-hand channel set their striker clear - he fired a good low cross across the face of the goal.  Paddy, rather pathetically, failed to cover all three of the players they had queuing up for the tap in.

After that, Lloyd and Heath started to assert themselves in the middle of the park and the Stallions played themselves back into the game  A deserved equaliser arrived after some smart interplay between Lloyd and Bakkie allowed space for the cross to be delivered - Rauru rising majestically to head past an exposed keeper.  The second came from a promising looking Eastbourne attack.  Although Rauru seems hell-bent on denying his brother any credit, it was actually a trademark Tangihaere punt of a clearance that caused panic in the opposition defence and helped set young skyWalker on his way. A very cool run and finish into the bottom corner put the Stallions ahead.

Somewhere in there - in keeping with the free-flowing Stallions philosophy - an interchange between Tangi and Joe resulted in a rather optimistic high bouncing back pass.  As the ball spun wildly off the turf, I realised it was either let it hit my arm or watch it bounce into the net (a trick I was keeping up my sleeve for later).  The indirect free-kick that followed came to nothing.  The opinion that I should probably have been sent off for stopping a certain goal was put down to needless pedantry.

Second half started badly.  We felt really flat and Eastbourne capitalised.  Their strikers were given way too much room on the edge of our area and someone found the space to expertly curl a shot just inside the far post.  So fierce was the effort that my exclamation that it had "gone past me and into the goal" was cut off after the first word.  Momentum on their side, Eastbourne took the lead pretty soon afterwards with a simple header from a corner.  A nice header, but a combination of defenders and keeper maybe could have done better.

The Stallion moment arrived not long afterwards.  Another well weighted through ball found their striker clear on the left.  I came out and got their just after the him.  I didn't really see what happened but apparently the ball (after hitting me - yes, I'm claiming a save) crashed into the crossbar and back out to one of their players.  With the opportunity to pick his spot, a wonderful goal-line header from Tangi kept their lead to one.

After that, there was some handbags.  Poor Heath got bullied by a skinny 16 year old.  The instigator didn't quite get what he deserved - their explanation that "he's only young and small" doesn't really cut it.  If you're old enough to kick someone on the ground you're old enough to suffer the consequences.  Hopefully someone had words with him after.

Still, the whole thing worked to our advantage.  We got angry, they got flustered and it started to show.  Free-kicks were picked up in positions where we could capitalise on Paddy's excellent delivery and our superiority in the air.  First came a flick from Ra into the path of the tireless GI Joe who gleefully tucked it away.  Within moments, we got the lead we weren't to surrender - Lloyd bundling another free kick in with a combination of head, shoulders, knees and toes.

Another "testing" back pass from Joe caused momentary panic when my excellent control again may have resulted the ball hitting my arm.  This one was entirely accidental and the ref made the brave call to pretend he didn't see it.

Nice work Stallies.  A winning start to life in Capital 5 and some optimism for what prove to be a slightly sterner test next week against the whippersnappers of the Accies.

Getting lucky - what does it take to score?

So, home stretch, another crucial game coming up playing the 2nd best attack but 3rd worst defence in the league. The Stallions on the other hand have the best defence but the 2nd worst attack.

Granted the last 2 weeks have been on fields not conducive to playing total football, but we still need to score goals. Its been suggested that we should take the field out of play and go route 1. Definitely an option but we've had chances in both the last 2 games to score off crosses and still no result. Couple of things I think we should try to change - and no it has nothing to do with formations!

With the pressure to win I think we've lost one of the things that epitomised the best play of the Stallions - patience. Long range shots, first time passes that aren't on, not looking to pass or receive ball at feet (in midfield), are all examples of lack of patience. Lack of patience also means we become less accurate - shots off target, passes not going where intended, losing the ball in tackles, etc. Bring back patience!

The next thing is create more space. It was noticable against Marist that we were doing a lot of short passes. I think because the ground is so rough we've been playing closer to each other because of the fear that the ball will do a crazy bounce and not go where intended. I remember an occassion in the 2nd half where two players on the edge of the opposition box were passing to each other to try and find space to shoot. The problem was they were too close together so the same defender could shut both of them down. This happened all over the field - we need to keep providing the option to pass but make the run 2 or 3 metres further away. That extra space will give us time.

Last is the increased movement (and penetration). This really relates to strikers and wide midfielders. The image shows passing options (in black) and off the ball movement (in red). In the last few games forward players have tended to run towards the ball carrier to try and receive the ball - movement is important but a run towards the ball carrier condenses the field (see striker run 1). If the striker makes that run, and the cm make their run it results in 4 players being in a very small part of the field. It doesn't stretch the play and makes it easy for the oppo defence.

Run 2 creates more space & gets the ball further forward (movement & penetration). A wide midfielder looking to receive the pass down the line (black dashed line) does the same thing.

These are all things we have done during the season but as the pressure has gone on for results and the grounds have got dodgy we lost some of it. Let's bring it this weekend - patience, space and smart penetrative movement.

A Little Man, A Big Goal - the set up

What better way to fire up the team preseason that photographs of great games past. Thanks Jamie for the photos - great work, and there are some doozies to be released over the next little while, so keep checking in. Great chance for some take the piss caption competition me thinks.

But first, lets sit back and admire. Ben H gets a little bit of abuse on this blog, but how can you argue with the following photographs (split over several parts).

A Litle Man, a Big Goal - The Goal

A Little Man, A Big Goal - the celebration

Hits and Misses

Percentage of goals missed by stallions per player.


Now, this is far from scientific (taken from the finebook), but its stallions hits and misses. Of course it is determined by factors such as how many times people owned up to missed shots, or were pinged by jealous teammates. Surely Jason had 1 shot? Did Gman really have 3? We also didn't fine a couple of times, and there was 1 game where Tristin was not awarded any missed shots - got off lucky - and probably makes his stats look better than Gus's.

Overall, this proves my point - Paddy must be fined for scoring no goals.

Sorry the bottom one has gone bung, but click on either for a larger, cleaner graph.

Golden Boot?

With the unbelievable prospect of a game on Saturday (let's not get too excited just yet) - the question is who will take out the golden boot? Tristin is on 9, Gus on 8 - both totals heavily restricted by cancellations - but still a lot better than Hodges 'winning' tally last year! What was it Ben, 2.5?

I hope that because so many of Tristin's goals were dirty tap ins, shoulder badging, boring ones, that Gus gets his nose ahead. Come on, he scored with his first touch for the Stallions! then got a hatrick - mind you i guess that means he hasn't done jack since. And that goal against StopOut was bs. And the one against Elite now I think about it. And he loses points for his stupid arms-raised-in-the-air celebrations. I've changed my mind - Tristin deserves it. Go Tristin!

Then again, maybe Nick G will make a late run! Sure.

So i believe last year the fine was $5 for anyone who didn't score all season. Those of you in scoring opportunities (Joe, NickW, NickG, Panda, especially Patrick) should be offering a bit more. And as for Robin who played the whole season either upfront or attacking mid and only scored in 1 game (in the Olympic debacle) ...