Fate...what a wicked and playful mistress she is…!

We were drawn for our first game of the Knock-Out cup against Wirral Rangers who we played in the final of the Presidents cup last year and beat soundly.

A check over last years stats revealed they were to be no push over having lost and drawn against them last year as well in the league.

We made a good start and we were soon rewarded when Mr Versatile, Sean Ratchford, scored his second of the season. Sean hit a speculative effort from distance which took a wicked bounce to confuse the goalkeeper and dropped into the far corner.

Wirral quickly equalised after some rare confusion in our defence and for a period thereafter we were under pressure and looking the most likely to concede. However keeper Luke Dixon stood up to the onslaught staunchly with a combination of some good saves and tremendous anticiption.

A quick breakaway put us back in the driving seat. A smart ball out of defence gave Sean Griffiths a one on one with their last defender. He cleverly lifted the ball over and past the onrushing defender and then surprisingly hit an early shot from distance which the goalie looked to have covered. However a lucky bounce (perhaps hitting  the same divot as Ratch’s earlier effort) deceived the goalie and put us back in the lead.

Wirral then showed great spirit and mounted another comeback to draw level at 2-2 and take us shakily up to half time.

In the first half Wirral had dished out some vicious tackles on the boys and this treatment continued in the second half with some particularly nasty tackles on Harry Cumming and Jake Jones. This lead to the removal of one of their players and the ref stopping the game to speak to the opposition about their behaviour.

Unpeturbed,  this served to act as an incentive to the Eagles. They reacted in the proper fashion and instead of retaliating, they were driven on to a stirring second half performance. 

Sean Griffiths crashed his second into the top corner following good work from a Harry Cumming, who put in another tireless display and Jack Larsen, who had covered so much ground to provide both defensive cover and lend support to the attack.

Then, from yet another of Jake Jones probing corners, Sean G was on hand again to poke home from close range to grab his first hat-trick of the season.

Unfortunately Wirral were still not finished and began putting us under further pressure. They were held at bay by strong defensive work from Josh Saunders who has been near un-beatable this season and his partner Ben  Mitchell. He demonstrated great strength and trade mark tough tackling,  which combined with some lung busting work from the midfield quartet  and  the lightning quick reflexes of Luke enabled us to keep them at bay.

Disappointingly, they eventually did break through from a free kick to make the score 4-3 which ensured a twitchy final few moments.

The boys then showed great composure to steady the ship and soon surged back forward. Sean G had a great opportunity to kill the game off but remarkably, after rounding the goalie and only 8 yards out with an empty net beckoning, somehow managed to roll the ball wide. But he made amends second later when he smashed the ball into the top corner following slack defensive work by Wirral, to claim his forth and our fifth to finally put the tie to bed.

So… yet another excellent performance under very difficult circumstances from the boys. It’s fair to say they were given their toughest game of the season but they responded in excellent fashion to show the mental and physical strength to take a deserved place in the next round of the cup. 

MOM: Sean Griffiths

Match Report - Alan Griffiths (Eagles Coach)

Following a good start to the season the pressure was on to see if we could carry last weeks form forward. Robbed of Sean Stenhouse and Luke Dixon we were down to a bare minimum 7, but I had every confidence in the boys.

Once again the boys started strong, taking the game to Upton from the first minute, creating chance after chance. And it wasn’t long before Jake Jones opened up the scoring with another clean strike to put the ball in the back of the net, following fine football from his team-mates.

Jack Larsen popped up shortly after in typical poacher fashion to ’lash’ the ball home from oh, at least a good yard out to give us a deserved 2-0 lead.

We played the rest of the half out well in control. Ben Mitchell and Josh Saunders in defence were troubled rarely but when a threat arose great positioning and rapidly improving communication between the two quickly dealt with the situation.

The second half began in a similar fashion with the Eagles on the front foot. Harry Cumming drove the play forward from midfield and provided a number of excellent passes to create good opportunities. One of these passes freed Sean Griffiths to lay on the ball to Jack Larsen. He again had found a wonderful position at the back post and did what Jack does best and popped it calmly home.

We were well in control now and it wasn’t long before the final nail was hammered into the rapidly closing lid of Upton’s coffin. Again incisive passing freed Jake who smashed the ball home clinically to cap a fine all round personal performance. Special mention should be made that Jake had produced a string of quality corners all afternoon, thankfully nullifying my gripe from last week.

We had a further number of opportunities to add to that tally but profligacy in front of goal by Sean Griffiths, who, other than that, had displayed excellent forward play in leading the line all through the match, ensured that the score stayed the same.

For all our dominance we had a late scare when Rangers came close. Both Josh and Ben went to block possibly Upton’s only shot and deflected the ball. Sean Ratchford, who up until that point, had been able to have a very quiet game deputising for Luke, showed great levels of concentration and dived spectacularly to tip an awkward bouncing ball onto the bar and out for a corner ensuring us a second clean sheet on the run.

It was another fine victory by the boys who again demonstrated fantastic teamwork and some wonderful passing. They attack as a team and defend as a team and work so hard for each other.  As a manager it’s great to see. Keep up the good work boys.

MOM: Jack Larsen

Match Report - Alan Griffiths (Eagles Coach)

This was a disappointing result for the boys on Saturday. They did everything that they possibly could to try and score an equalizer, but it just was, not to be.

Our striker, Steven Lynch, had numerous opportunities to score, but the post denied him twice. He also hit the bar three times, but it was one of the games were it did, not matter what we did it was just not going to happen for the boys.

We also had a couple of long range shots from our full backs Joe Salusbury, and Ethan Forster. They can both hit the ball very hard, but it went wide, or the opponents keeper got a hand to it.

Ridgewood's two goals were scored in the first half of the game. The first was well taken, with our keeper managing to get a hand to the ball, but it just sneaked over the line. 

The second was sheer luck. A corner was taken from the left hand side. The ball managed to swing in close to the upright and, with no player managing to get a final touch, the ball ended up in the back of the net.

At half time, all I could say to the players was to keep trying, and hopefully we could turn the game around. We did manage to score a goal, to make it 2-1, but the referee said that the ball had not crossed the line. Even though the side netting was moving from were the ball had rebounded back out from goal, for the keeper to collect.

But still the boys pushed very hard for the goals that we needed. Our mid field boys, Niall, Jake, Alex and Joe ran there hearts out in the second half, and eventually we got the goal that we deserved. Joe Wingfield buried a high volleyed shot from 20 yards to make it 2-1.

After we scored our goal it was constant pressure in the opponents half. The ball never moved out of their half for about 8 minutes. But after all that pressure in their goal mouth, and with the two full backs coming up too assist, we couldn't get that last goal that we thoroughly deserved to even things up.

The boys played hard and fought hard but were also very fair. I was very pleased with their work rate and commitment. They were a credit to Glenavon Football Club.

Our man of the match was Jake Beardsmore, a constant threat to our opponents goal down the right.

Ah, the beginning of a new season, you could almost see the excitement in the air never mind just feel it.

After a decent pre-season we would now see how the boys reacted to playing in 40 minute games.

We started pretty well and kept the lion share of possession. We were pressuring Ridgewood’s defence but we just couldn't provide the killer ball.

Any threat that came from Ridgewood was being dealt with comfortably by the defensive pairing of Ben Mitchell and Josh Saunders and what little that bypassed those two was mopped up by efficiently by Luke Dixon in goal.

However, with 10 minutes gone the breakthrough came. A lovely sweeping move from the right ended with Jake Jones drilling the ball left footed into the far left hand corner of the goal. From here we seemed to relax and were able to step up a gear. 

The second goal followed shortly after. Good work on the right saw the ball slipped through to Sean Griffiths who, with a defender advancing, quickly slipped the ball right foot to left to despatch a shot coolly into the back of the net.

Following this it became one-way traffic. The midfield of Jack Larsen, Harry Cumming and Sean Ratchford worked tirelessly to control the game, blocking off any threat before it began and setting up a plethora of opportunities.

Throughout the course of the game we earned in excess of 20 corners, but disappointingly we never truly looked like scoring from them…until… early in the second half a defensive mix up allowed the ball to fall to Sean G who gratefully swept the ball home for 3-0.

After this chance after chance fell our way, but it took a slight deflection from a Sean Ratchford long angled cross to divert the ball over the head of their keeper and into the back of the net.

As the end of the game approached both sides were tiring but Jake Jones capped off a fine performance with a smart finish to make the score line truly reflect our dominance.

All in all, a very solid (and tiring) 40 minutes with some good individual displays, but most pleasing of all was the way the team combined as a unit, to produce a thoroughly deserved victory.

MOM : Harry Cumming