PETER MORRISON TROPHY ROUND TWO
NORSTAR LONDON RAIDERS A 9 LONDON HAROLDEANS 1

Norstar London Raiders booked their place in the last 16 of the Peter Morrison Trophy with an emphatic 9-1 win over London Haroldeans.

Josh Green opened the scoring early on, with David Dinkin doubling the lead soon after before some uncharacteristically calamitous defending by home side saw Haroldeans pull a goal back with a perfectly executed bicycle kick from Marcus Mann from the edge of the area into an unguarded net.

Matt Stock scored a third to make it 3-1 at the break and whilst Raiders weren’t exactly cruising, there seemed little way back for the visiting side.

Despite their spirited first half performance, the floodgates soon opened with Stock grabbing his second after being released one-on-one and seconds later Dinkin added a fifth. Green then grabbed the sixth goal with a tap-in at the back post.

Jonny Blain was then released into the action, playing his first game since hobbling off on the opening day of the season and the Raiders stalwart wasted no time in finding his scoring touch adding both the seventh and eighth goal of the game with a thunderous finish and deft header demonstrating he has most of the attributes to succeed at any level.

Despite a lame attempt at adding to his outstanding free-kick scoring record, manager Phil Peters completed the rout with a fine finish from the corner of the box after a beautiful layoff from former gaffer Rob Richman during a 10-minute cameo.

Peters was satisfied with his side’s performance but made clear that there is room for improvement. He told JC Sport: "The result looks very one-sided an ultimately it was, but Haroldeans pushed us very hard in the first half and we didn’t raise our game or make it out of first gear.

"We definitely improved in the second half with Jonny Kay pulling all the strings in the middle of midfield and the goals being shared around by our attackers and we’re delighted to still be competing in all three competitions."