A blustery breezy Saturday afternoon saw Yateley Men’s 1st XI take on the urban folk of Southampton City. The game started with high intensity, however it was a quiet pitch with the howl of the wind not providing any assistance. This was not conducive to quality hockey, and what followed was 15 mins of poor passing and communication. This ultimately led to an overload in the Yateley D by the Southampton forwards, culminating in a back post tap to start the scoring.

For Yateley, this was a wake up call. With the volume increasing by the boys in red, the screw tightened and the pressure was piled on. Winning a short corner, James Sealey stole away at the back post, putting the ball in the net after some questionable goal line defending by Southampton and levelling the score line at 1-1.

Having gone into half time at 1-1, Yateley went back out, aiming to do the simple things well, utilise the deep pockets of space in the opponents half, and keep getting louder! The pressure was good for the first 10 minutes, but as the half progressed, some relaxed defending allowed a Southampton City player in to D and put the ball past keeper Sammy Welman to take the scoreline to 1-2.

With some resolute defending, with special mention to debutant keeper Sammy for a fantastic near-post save, and some intense play, another short corner was won by Yateley. The first attempt was stopped but Piggy caught the rebound, and sent it into the back netting levelling the scoreline back to 2-2.

Chasing the win, Yateley pushed up to begin camping in the opposition half, and caught on the break, a reverse stick finish saw Southampton climb up to 2-3. But after a short discussion between the umpires, this decision was reversed and the goal was disallowed due to a back-stick in the build up.

With the scoreline back to 2-2, the game resumed with Yateley having used up their ‘get out of jail free’ card. In the closing 10 minutes, another Southampton break put them 3-2 and this time the goal stood. As the clock counted down, a short corner awarded in the last 2 minutes gave a glimmer of hope, won by Joe Edwards making a rare excursion in to the oppositions D. However it could not be converted in to that crucial goal.

With all the stops pulled out, the final whistle was blown and the score line finished at 2-3 to Southampton City. It was a good performance by the Yateley boys, against a Southampton team second in the league - demonstrating that in this league, any team can win it. The Men’s 1st XI go away to Southampton University next week in the hope of claiming three points in one of the last games of the season.