Friendly game sweeps off the cobwebs........
This encounter was a good warm up for both teams in preparation of next weeks kick-off to the winter season. The Classics had scraped together 12 players for their first ever visit to Bakerview Park, a field that was hastily arranged after a mix up with South Surrey #1. Transit had the luxury of five substitutes and the game started off as an end to end encounter.

The first chance of the game fell to the Classics when the home keeper made the error of a bad throw out to his defender. The ball was well intercepted by John Wilson who did all the right things by bringing the ball under control and powering into the box. Unfortunately the finish was not executed with the same precision and the ball was blasted high and wide, somewhat reminiscent of an Alfie Deglan shot!

Five minutes later a good midfield move resulted in another wayward shot, this time from the left boot of Jim Eden. On the quarter hour mark a mistake by Fisher Crockett let in the Transit winger who followed suit and ceremoniously blasted the ball way over the bar. If this standard was going to be maintained it looked a cert for a 0-0 draw.

The second half was an evenly matched affair which was decided by two mistakes. The first one resulted in a Transit forward shooting high and across the goal in the 50th. minute. Manfred Soucker made a valiant attempt and got his fingertips to the ball but the shot had enough power to dip and drop into the top corner of the net for the opening goal.

The second error came two minutes from the final whistle, courtesy of Dave Moore (according to his team-mates). Dave was making his comeback from injury and was playing in a heavily drugged state, having consumed 4 Advil just before the second half kick-off. The game was played in 40 minute halves and Advil are supposed to last for 10 minutes each. The drugs wore off at that time and Dave was in excrutiating pain which disabled his jumping ability and made him disorientated. However, Dave's touch laid the ball on nicely for Transit, whos player competently rounded Soucker to finish off the game.

There were good performances from Chuck McGill and Ray Marrington who held the defence together well, Billy Ranger and Ron Jennings who effectively put themselves about a lot up front, and Chris Arcari who took control of the midfield. Soucker made some good saves and proved himself as a good replacement goalkeeper. All in all it was a good run out for both teams in a match where fitness and stamina was the main concern before the big kick off next Sunday.

Final Score 2-0 (0-0)

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