Oxford Hawks Mens 4’s Vs Amersham & Chalfont 3s – 23.11.24

“No Biggie”

The 4s marched up to BRN amidst the winds of storm Bert, but we arrived too the great news that our glorious leader Guy “Minner” Biggs was not going to be at the match due to the arrival of baby Biggs last night – Well done Yas and Guy! We also had the lovely news that someone was going to make an honest man of Danny, who had got engaged this week – well done Danny!

So the management of the Team was now onto Tom “Roben Amorim” Harris and stand in captain Oakes. The first management decision was to allocate the warmup to Lammy, and what a joy it was with the introduction of Hokey Cokey keeping the young guns in the team really enthused.

The big pre-match decision was who to play up front with Maidlow the only recognised forward available (Guy with baby, Chris A called up to the 3s, Luke ill, George away). So the responsibility fell to the only person in the team left who had scored more than 2 goals - new captain Oakes, as well as Ex first team player Blackburn and the man the captains son is named after Benji.

The 4s started brightly, playing the ball round really well, Bertie and James spraying it around from the back, Alex and Willo with driving runs from full back and midfielders driving through. Young Ben had several shots go past the back post, Holder ever got into the D and had 2 shots from the P spot (definitely proving he should stay in defence). Eventually the deadlock was broken from a short corner, Bertie drove the ball in, it hit a defender’s foot and looped into the air hitting (and breaking) Maidlows watch on the way and dropping just over the goal line - Goal Maidlow’s watch. Soon after Willo knocked out an opposition child with an accidental follow through. The enforced 5 minute break galvanised Amersham and they started to play better, scoring from a short corner. The start of the second half and Amersham were still in full flow and scored 2 more short corners to take a 3-1 lead. Hawks had to up their game if there were not to ruin the missing Captains day. A lovely piece of play down the left ended with the ball with Oakes, who drove to the baseline and played a reverse stick ball across the goal mouth for a Willo to tap in at the far post with 10 mins to go. Hawks were now in the ascendancy, so much so Lammy decided to even the odds by talking himself into a green card. This did not hold Hawks back, Josh had a couple of driving runs into the D only for some great last-ditch tackles, Oakes running down the right crashed a ball into the D, right to the P spot for Benji to tap in but unfortunately his feet got in the way. A few minutes later there was a carbon copy move but this time Drew crashed the ball in for Benji to get the ball into the goal BUT unfortunately it was also off his feet. There was still time for a Benji to put things right, with 2 minutes to go Bertie had the ball in the centre of the pitch, he played a high paced pass to Benji who controlled the ball, turned, did an excellent reverse stick hit to Oakes who deflected the ball past the keeper. 3-3! Unfortunately, there was not enough time for 1 more goal to get the win they should have got, however a draw after being 3-1 is still a good result

MOM – Oakes

DOD – Lammy (for his card and his aerial off the pitch) And Benji’s “feet”