Nick Stern saluted striker Mark Smith after a virtuoso performance inspired promotion hopefuls L'Equipe to victory in a seven-goal thriller in the MGBSFL Division Two.
Bilbaum forged ahead before Smith equalised, scoring from the edge of the box, but this was only the tip of the iceberg.
The visitors took the lead for the second time before the moment of the game which will go down in history as "one of the greatest goals seen in west Hendon, potentially North West London," according to L'Equipe boss Nick Stern.
Smith picked the ball up at the in the centre circle, picked his head up to see no one free so harboured his inner Lionel Messi, took it round one man, nutmegged a second, put a third on his back and he still wasn’t in the box and the ball had not been more than a millimetre away from his foot. A shot was definitely on now but mark was not done. He took it past their centre half, cut back to embarrass the other centre half, dodged an attempt to hack him down in the box before one final dummy/ cut back/Cruyff turn and then slotted the ball past the keeper. The Bilbaum manager was applauding, think the ref may even had stopped as he was in shock before Mark was engulfed by his teammates. "Again you will never see a goal like it, and I have been in Jewish football for 20 years!"
However what was the only doubt was whether the winning goal was even better. Bilbaum went ahead for the third time, making it 3-2, before James Mandell, Mendel to his friends, got in the act with a brilliant finish off his own. Mendel disposed their right back showing strength beyond his small frame, he cut into the box and slammed the ball past the keeper at the near post. Mendel was swarmed by his team-mates and it was fully deserved from a great performance.
It was 3-3 and L'Equipe were now on the up but once again it took a moment of pure brilliance to win the game. A quick break saw the ball go from Jeremy Newton to Smith on the edge on the box. Once again he "did his best Lionel Messi/ Thierry Henry impression" beat two men, looked up and curled the ball into the bottom corner and L'Equipe were ahead.
Great defence and battling quality from Mark Singer and Jules along with some good saves from stand-in second half keeper James Bell saw L'Equipe over the line to another victory.
L'Equipe boss Nick Stern told JC Sport; What a great result again for L'Equipe, and though it wasn’t our best performance the result is all that counts and it keeps the momentum going.
"However, the only way to sum up the game was a pure master class in finishing from Mark Smith. You will never see or read about a better hat-trick than the one occurred on Sunday morning, summed up by the referee who has been referring for over 20 years but described Mark’s goal as the best goal he has ever seen!
"As a manager it was an absolute joy to watch Marks goals but also big credit to James Mendel who had one of his best performances in a L'Equipe shirt.
"I will say one final thing that if Marks goal/ goals do not get goal of the week/ month and season it will be a travesty!"
