CYRIL ANEKSTEIN CUP ROUND TWO
SCRABBLE FC 3 NORTH LONDON RAIDERS B 2
Strikes from Adam Waters, Dan Green and Josh Bharier helped Scrabble FC win a five-goal thriller and exact revenge on a recent league defeat by Raiders B in a thriller.
This game featured a distinct difference of two styles as Raiders "played the long ball over the top, countered Scrabble's neat passing game".
Zak McLeod, Scrabble's influential midfielder and goal-scorer, was forced to leave the field with an ankle injury after just 10 minutes.
However, it was Raiders that led 1-0 with a speculative lob from Nicky Woolf over keeper Ben Law in the Scrabble goal on 15 minutes and he followed this up with a speculative long-range effort on 20 minutes to lead 2-0.
Scrabble were playing the neater football but couldn't make the breakthrough despite going close on several occasions.
They had turned up to the game with a full 16-man squad and began rotating them well and it was left winger Waters who brought them back into the game with a fine individual run into the penalty box. He neatly placed the ball wide of the keeper on 30 to reduce the arrears.
The second half was real end-to-end stuff but Scrabble left it late as Green's pinpoint shot on 60 from 35 yards out wide screamed into the Raiders net to equalise.2-2.
The Scrabble boys now were in the ascendancy and with extra-time looming were unlucky not to take the lead as various efforts went begging, before on 70 minutes Josh Bharier was bundled over in the box and referee Martin Fox had no hesitation in awarding a spot kick. Bharier recovered to take the penalty himself and his powerfully struck spot-kick gave Scrabble the lead at 3-2 for the first time in the game.
Scrabble had now lost centre back Brandon Sassoon to a hamstring pull and were looking to close out the game. In the last 20 minutes Scrabble were rarely troubled but the constant running of Rob Blackman up front gave Raiders a torrid time at the back before the final whistle went to send the Scrabble boys through to the next round.
Scrabble Manager Ray Abrahams: "We showed strength commitment and loads of character today to come back from 2-0 down to win this game.
"All 16 guys did us proud and after losing to Raiders in the first game of the season this has also been mentally a great result for us.Thats three wins on the spin now and our season is up and running.
"I was so proud of the boys today for refusing to accept that the game had gone at 2-0 down and for the way they fought back against a very good Raiders side.
"With 16 top quality players available today we rotated things well and the important thing is that we've won the game and are in the hat for the next round."
NLR joint-manager Jonathan Adelman told JC Sport: "We had a specific game plan, and executed it to perfection for most of the first half, and then forgot about it for the second half!"
