West Barns 6-2 Belhaven U-12s

As first-time-ever games go, the boys did reasonably well and could have come away with a lot more than merely two good goals. Again, we had never played against West Barns before and were looking forward to the challenge. West Barns is a school of similar size to our own but has football as its main sport so we knew that we would need to perform well.

Have Chelsea spotted this boy, yet?

On a small, sloping pitch we faced uphill in the first half and though we started strongly, and had the best of the posession in the opening exchanges, we were 2-0 down after ten minutes due to two occasions of our defence being out of position, not picking up our men and the goalkeeper not claiming the ball with any real conviction. This was, after all, the first real experience of football most of these boys had ever had and it needed to be remembered that some mistakes were probably to be expected.

Sam is a very accomplished player with a nose for the goal and after eleven minutes reduced the deficit to 2-1 by virtue of a Wills Y. effort falling nicely and Sam finishing beautifully into the bottom corner of the net. Game on.

Typically hard-working Harry

By half-time, however the margin had grown to 4-1 to the hosts as firstly, another defensive error cost us and game West Barns an easy tap in, followed by a sublime piece of skill culminating in an overhead kick which landed in the corner of the goal, which no 'keeper on earth could've stopped. Harry went close and had a shot cleared off the line by a defender's body and shouts for 'handball' and 'penalty' from the visitor's manager were waved away by the referee.

The second half brough better fortune as Wills brought a save from the West Barns 'keeper, and after six minutes, Will P. tucked away a nice move which was followed by a great chance almost immediately by the same player which was saved.

Belhaven then put their best move of the match together which involved Tom and Hamish exchanging superb passes and moving into postions and culminated in a near-miss which would've been no more than Belhaven had deserved, had it gone in. Harry had another decent shot in a striding, powerful midfield performance.

Will P. and Wills Y. combine well.

West Barns were not finished, however, and William D. was needed to pull off a stunning one-handed stop down low to his right as a West Barns rocket seemed destined to nestle in the old onion bag. A flukey lob which bounced off a home player's knee took the score to five and a final soft piece of defending cost Belhaven a sixth goal but these were mere embellishments; West Barns deserved to win, but Belhaven could have prevented three or four of these goals through simple football practise, and this will come with time.

Well played in particular to Harry and to Hamish for his first-half perfromance, I have a feeling that there are good things to come from this side. There is the chance of a rematch at Belhaven later on this year so keep checking the website. Well done, lads.

Nice day for a kickabout in the sun.

William clears well.

A chance flies above the West Barns crossbar.

Combative Harry.

Great through-ball from geordie to Will P.

Rupert contests a challenge.