VWFC vs Bishop's Cleeve Dev.
07/04/2018 Virginia Water Reserves 1-1 Bishop's Cleeve Development (aet, BC win 5-6 pens)
Chairman's Challenge Cup
Report by Steve Cox
Virginia Water’s Reserves hosted Division Two West side Bishops Cleeve Development in the quarterfinals of the Chairman’s Challenge Cup on Saturday. Unfortunately, after a 120-minute battle, Waters came up short in the penalty shootout, ending any small hope of winning a trophy this season.
It was a close run affair with both defences unprepared to yield under any sustained attacking threat over the 120 minutes. The visitors took the lead in the first half after 20 minutes, once again, failure from a wide midfielder to track his runner led to a shot at goal that Mark Pisani failed to completely deal with and the Bishop’s Cleeve striker prodded home from 12 yards out. Waters responded 8 minutes later when a 30-yard free kick from Michael Chambers, struck with accuracy and power into the bottom right corner, hauled Waters deservedly level.
For the rest of the match, on a stamina sapping, pitch Waters had the best of the chances. Steve Mills in the 87th minute hit the crossbar with a rasping drive, and, in extra time, Scott Ancell had two excellent opportunities to win it for Waters towards the end. The first chance saw his volley at the far past go into the side netting, and the second brought the save of the match from the Cleeve goalkeeper, as he dived low down to his left to claw away the goal bound shot.
Waters’ inability to find a winning goal was to cost them dearly as they couldn’t match Cleeve’s penalty taking accuracy and allowed the Cleeve keeper to make a couple of routine saves, to their one miss, to knock the home side out of the cup 5-6 at the end of the sudden death shootout.
MoM: Dan Stevens
Line up:
Mark Pisani
Dan Stevens
Dave Atkins
Michael Chambers
Billy cox
Steve Mills
Aaron Nevitt
Luke Sperling
Harrison Duff
Mark Carter-Draper
Sam Meadows
Subs:
Jack Deabill
Scott Ancell
Rob Lamb