Oxford Hawks Mens 5’s vs Marlow 4s – 05.12.24

On a lovely December Saturday, the 5s were blown down the M40 to Marlow. Despite several checks of the news on Sumser's advice, the game went ahead. It could be argued that the time would have been better spent by some of the team checking the traffic instead given their late arrival...

The first half began with Marlow largely on top but excellent work by the Hawks defense and some inspired keeping by Sobey somehow kept the score at 0-0. Hawks slowly grew into the game with George, Willo, Ash and Alex gaining a foot hold in midfield. The game remained fairly even until halftime with the game all square.

After a inspired half time team talk, the team came out with renewed energy despite playing in to the again increasing wind. 5 minutes in, excellent interchange play between Alex, George and Willo down the right, led to Willo breaking free down the bye line. Beating the last defender allowed the ball to be played across the goal to be tapped in at the back post to make it 1-0 to Hawks. The Hawks goal meant Marlow picked it up a few gears and pushed for a quick equaliser, which came within 5 minutes. Another goal quickly followed from Marlow to leave the score 2-1.

Hawks came out fighting and some close chances followed. Some excellent defending from the backline of Sumser, Theo, Charlie, Finn and Sam kept Marlow at bay for the next 15 minutes. Unfortunately a short corner rebound was finished off leaving the score 3-1 with 10 minutes to go and seemingly the match over as a contest. Hawks didn't give up and kept fighting to the end and good play on the left led to a circle entry and short corner being awarded. The ball was slammed into the backboard by Greg to leave the score at 3-2. Despite a late short being awarded, it could not be finished off by Hawks leaving the final score 3-2.

Credit goes to all the players that braved the stormy weather to put in a solid performance, with lots of positives to take into the new year despite the narrow loss.

Merry Christmas to all.