Tividale FC

Report

Midland Football League
Premier Division
Saturday 7th March 2020
Sporting Khalso 0-1 Tividale

Tividale Smash and Grab

There are times in football when you feel that luck is on your side or the stars are aligned for you or just for the sheer amount of effort you put into a performance you deserve something out of it. Well maybe, just maybe this was a mix of all three of them.

With it being three and a half weeks since our last competitive game, the 2-1 win against Selston. A fixture against a side who are not only championship chasing, but who also come into the game on a 7 league match winning streak is not possibly the ideal way to ease yourself back into competitive football.

The only two changes from the Selston game was Jacob Barnes in for Dan Bryson and with Darragh Bustin now a Stourbridge player, Jakob Burroughs was brought into the midfield.

Khalsa as expected where at Tividale from the kick off and after 4 minutes they had their first chance when Josh McKenzie headed a Carlo Franco cross wide. Tividale although on the backfoot had their first chance after 7 minutes when Curtis Cocking shot wide.

With Khalsa asking all the questions Sean Williams found McKenzie in the 20th minute with a neat pass into the striker but his shot was blocked by Barnes. Williams himself had a shot charged down by Brad Welding (making his 100th appearance) on 29 minutes and when Khalsa midfielder Liam Armstrong did get a shot on target 3 minutes later Tividale keeper Adam Harrison was equal to it, turning it around the post.

On 35 minutes Franco’s cross-field ball found Williams who cut in from the left flank but fired his shot into the side netting. Tividale’s second chance of the half came in the 37th minute when Dan Smith’s effort was charged down after some great work down the left from Welding.

Right on the stroke of half time Williams went even closer when he whipped in a cross come shot that came back off Harrison’s cross bar.

Half Time:-Sporting Khalsa 0-0 Tividale

It was business as usual at the start of the second half as Khalsa continued to attack and Tividale continued to defend. McKenzie will feel he should have done better in the 49th minute when from a poor Tividale clearance he had a clear sight on goal but Harrison produced a brilliant save to thwart him. In the 50th minute the visitors had another of their rare attacks when Smith did well to control the ball under pressure from Khalsa centre back Leon Miles, he then laid the ball off to Cocking but he screwed his shot wide.

McKenzie saw another header go wide when he met a Williams cross in the 54th minute and then he had his head in his hands three minutes later as he headed a Lewis Worsey cross against the top of the Tividale bar and over. Khalsa keeper Sam Arnold had his first shot to save in the 65th minute when Tyree Clarke got his shot on target but Arnold had no problems in fielding the shot lacking in power.

On 75 minutes the stars, luck, hard work all came into place when from another Khalsa attack Welding won the ball and broke free swept the ball out to Smith who went on another of his tireless runs, this time though he had a yard on the Khalsa defence and drilled the ball under Arnold and into the back of the net to put the visitors ahead.

Tividale where now going to have to defend for their lives and Khalsa had a great chance to level things up 2 minutes later when skipper Tesfa Robinson headed over a Alex Woodhouse corner. Then Tividale had a massive slice of luck when a Mykel Beckley shot hit the underside of the crossbar, bounced over the goal line and then bounced back out and into play. With the assistant not able to tell if the ball had crossed the line he gave the benefit of the doubt to the visitors.

With the game going into its final few minutes a rodent of the rat variety casually wandered onto the pitch from the opposite side of the pitch to the dugouts and decided to park himself in the centre circle. With his team a goal down with about 5 minutes to go, a visit from Roland was the last thing Khalsa manager Ian Rowe needed and with the referee’s permission he proceeded to gently remove the visitor. In a manoeuvre that would have made David Attenborough proud.

A further 7 minutes was added to the 90 mostly due to the visitor but despite Khalsa’s throwing everything at the Tividale defence they held out for the 3 points.

Although we felt that we got away with one. It was nice to be reminded by both Tividale and Khalsa fan’s that 18 month’s ago the boot was on the opposite foot

Full Time:- Sporting Khalsa 0-1 Tividale

Result: Khalsa 2 Tividale 1 (FA Cup Extra Preliminary Round)