Sunderland Sunday League
Sunday 4 January 2009
RCA The Barnes got back to winning ways with a 2-0 victory in a close fought encounter with Silksworth Paragon.
The match got the go-ahead from referee Gary Hargraves after long deliberation regarding the safety of the players on a half frosted surface, a decision which proved to be correct and credit must be given to both sets of players for producing such a good game on a suspect surface.
Silksworth Paragon started the brighter and kept the ball and control for the first 10 minutes, without ever troubling the RCA defence. RCA came on stronger as the half progressed and following fine interpassing in midfield Andy Place was released through the inside left channel. He drew the keeper and then unselfishly squared for Willie Crew to slot home easily after 20 minutes to give RCA the lead.
RCA continued to press down the slope and a fine cross from the left by Ross Hughes evaded the Paragon centre half. Willie Crew brought the ball down expertly on his chest and volleyed home left footed from 10 yards to extend the RCA lead to 2-0 after 35 minutes.
Defending against the slope in the second half RCA started brightly in a similar vein to Paragon in the first half and had a couple of half chances to kill the game off, but having failed to do so, Paragon then gained more and more control as the half progressed and created a number of opportunities, which were thwarted by some excellent goalkeeping from Chris Errington, ably assisted by resoloute defending from Alan Surtees and man of the match, 16 year old Liam Dunn, who took to playing left side of a back three like a duck to water.
As the final whistle approached it was becoming apparent that it was not going to be Paragon's day and RCA held out to record a welcome victory and get their season back on track after a dissappointing December.