The President's Division One Cup
Quarter Final
Marsh Rangers 5 Southall Town Reserves 1
Saturday, 08 February 2003
As a prelude to Manchester United v Arsenal in the F.A. Cup , this was just as eagerly awaited .
Southall Town res are top of div 1 , whilst Marsh Rangers have games in hand in close 3rd place . Southall Town opened the attacking play but it only took Marsh Rangers 90 seconds to take the lead . A long throw in from Steve Haughey was glanced goal ward by the head of TONY HEATH and Marsh were on their way . Southall Town hardly had time to recover before STEVE HAUGHEY tucked the ball away for goal number 2 .
Southall Town rallied , briefly , and mustered some attacking play of their own but
Tony Dowding , Scott Aley & Daren Brown rarely looked like being beaten . Mark Ferris was not called upon to make many saves in goal but always seemed well in control . Southall Town showed why they are top of the division with some excellent football but Marsh Rangers , with Chris Ranson back along side Tony Heath ,won the battle for midfield . Peter Muller put in another fine display , whilst Shaine Thomson worked hard to close down the Town defenders . John Mackenzie & Adam Ashby worked very hard out wide and helped keep
Southall Town on the back foot . Steve Haughey appeared to cover almost all of the pitch and proved a " thorn in the side " of the Town defence . It was STEVE HAUGHEY who put the result beyond any doubt with a speculative looping volley from 30 yards out on the wing giving the Town keeper no chance as it flew over his outstretched hands and into the net . Out wide , John Mackenzie " twinkle toe " touched his way through 3 Town players before laying off an inch perfect pass which only narrowly missed being converted .
Southall Towns' cause was not helped when a " rush of blood " to the head of a defender saw him dismissed for a shove in the face of a Marsh player .
Southall Town did not cave in , and neither were they expected to , but they were being outplayed on the day . The second half saw the 10 men of Southall Town not only withstand a Marsh Rangers onslaught but muster some more attacks of their own . The Marsh midfield began to dominate and more goals
were certain to follow . An excellent cross was rifled home by ADAM ASHBY and Marsh were home and dry .... or so they thought !!!!!!!! With Marsh now pushing more men forward a bad corner was intercepted by Town and a quick breakaway the length of the pitch caught the Marsh defence napping . A skilful finish gave Town some hope of a recovery .
Marsh brought Rob Manning into the game and he sprayed the ball around well with a number of cross field passes , as well as being called upon to tackle back in defence . John Mackenzie again went on a run , ghosting past 2 defenders , and putting over a superb cross . MATTHEW HOYLE replaced
Chris Ranson , who had played his part in the victory but was not fully match fit , and scored the fifth Rob Manning & John Mackenzie had to spend the remaining minutes in the heart of the Marsh defence due to various injuries to
key defenders , as Marsh lost a little momentum but all the Marsh Rangers players contributed to this excellent victory over a good footballing Southall Town side .
The game had been allowed to flow due to some good Refereeing
by Les Horne and BOTH sides helped make this a good footballing match to watch .
Marsh Rangers will now play either Hounslow Wanderers or Spelthorne Sports res. in the Semi Final whilst Actual Soccer , who beat Signcraft 6 - 1 , will play Neasden 2000 res in the other semi .
MAN of the MATCH : S T E V E H A U G H E Y .
Clive Goodman
Marsh Rangers F.C.
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