Hat-trick hero Cohen fires Hertswood into dreamland

The hosts doubled their lead after 13 minutes, a poor free-kick was gobbled up by Davis who smashed in an absolute screamer from 25 yards – Redbridge’s keeper had absolutely no chance.

A third goal was bundled in by centre-back Feuer from a Ben Mandel corner to give Hertswood an unassailable lead.

However, as the game approached the end of the first half, Redbridge were given a boost. A sending-off after two poor yellow cards in quick succession should’ve given the away side the advantage, but you wouldn’t have known it on the balance of play. Although Redbridge bundled the ball in a minute later via Nate Kashket, a missed penalty from the Vale on the stroke of half-time meant that we went in at half-time 3-1 up.  

A regroup and chat at the break gave the impetus for an extremely solid second-half performance from Hertswood. Despite being down to 10 men for the entire 45, an exceptionally disciplined defensive display left Schogger with a fairly boring second half in the Vale goal. But they weren’t done yet.

Midway through the second half, Cohen grabbed a goal-of-the season contender, Vale’s fourth and his second of the afternoon. A counter-attack found Josh Gorb on the left, he looked up, played a lofted cross-field box which found Cohen on the right side of the area which he hit first time across the keeper and into the corner, right on the postage stamp. Reminiscent of Kasami vs. Crystal Palace.

As the game drew to a close, Cohen grabbed his 10^th goal of the season and his first hat-trick for the Vale with a well-taken finish after finding himself one-on-one with the keeper.

Jubilant Hertswood joint-manager Jacob Emanuel told JC Sport: "5-1, another scalp and a second successive win. Job’s a good’un."

Redbridge boss Josh Hambling was struggling to come to terms with the full-time score.

"Well what can I say about today?" he told JC Sport. "Firstly this is easily the worst defeat of the season by a country mile.

"It all started off so well; I turned up four minutes late to the required 9.10am meet time only to find every player in the changing rooms getting ready. I thought this is brilliant a perfect start to the day. That's about as positive as it got.

"We started at 10.30 some 30 minutes after the ref blew his whistle as prior to that and going three goals down through some shocking defending and man-marking it was hard to believe I was watching my team.

"The pitch was nothing short of dreadful and didn't suit our game what so ever but eventually we adapted. They had a player sent off for the most stupid handball and a second booking then we grabbed a goal just before half-time through some good pressure.

"Only five minutes later conceding a penalty which Nathan Mehlman produced a fantastic save low to the right corner and rightly a contender for SOTW.

"The half-time teamtalk wasn't difficult, mostly involving a few choice words and staring at players in disbelief. 3-1 down, a man up and with quality in our side winning this was meant to be a piece of cake. It couldn't of been further from the truth.

"We struggled on set-pieces to create anything couldn't get behind them as they sat back and ended up losing the half 2-0 through some counter attacking goals.

"Strangely some of the boys didn't play that terribly we just couldn't find the openings or goals needed. It just wasn't meant to be today simple as that. I've also learnt some interesting things from the game:

- Ben Oldstein can't be lino anymore 

- Scott Oldstein's missus and friends should attend every game to keep me company on the sidelines.

- I'm dropping everyone for next week's game against Raiders other than the keeper as we don't have another.

"Credit to Vale who were actually excellent today even with 10 men it felt like they had more men than us. A special mention to their striker Josh Cohen who scored two fantastic goals and I'm sure will be in then GOTW shortlist.

"I nominate all of Hertswood for TOTW to save Viv a job!

"I can't wait for the revenge game."