Meir KA Bench Talk
Saturday 20 December 2003

A warm welcome to everyone connected with Meir KA for this pre-xmas fixture here at Tally Ho.

At our game 12 days ago at Leamington I witnessed something on a football pitch that I have never encountered in all my years in the game. If you see Darren Carmell down here at the game today then just have a quiet word in his 'shell like'. I am sure he will talk you through it. The things that player's will do to get their name in the headlines!

I am certain that our editor Dave Coulson will have included the detail elsewhere in the programme. The best bit is that the goal should have been disallowed. Apparently the referee Luis Martin comes from the 'David Elleray' school of excellence when it comes to awarding goals against goalkeepers. The best part of all this is that Mr Martin is a serving West Midlands police officer and is a probationary constable on Dayle Speeds shift.

Darren had an outstanding game between the sticks apart from his little gliche! Leamington were deserved winners. Unfortunately we did not turn up in the first half and turned around two nil down. The second period saw a much improved performance from us, however, we conceded a late goal to end up 3-0 losers.

Last Saturday saw us go down by two goals to one at Romulus in a tightly fought game. We had massive problems turning out a side with Neill and myself having to call in quite a few favours from 'golden oldies'. It was young gun Stuart Evans who shocked the league leaders on the quarter hour mark when he took advantage of hesitancy in their defence as he sneaked in behind them to latch onto a long ball to tuck the ball past the advancing goalkeeper.

ROMULUS EQUALISED WITH 10 MINUTES AND THEN THE GAME BECAME ATTRITION BETWEEN THEIR ATTACK AND OUR DEFENCE WITH ROMULUS FINDING IT EXTREMELY DIFFICULT TO CREATE ANY CHANCES. UNFORTUNATELY THEY HEADED HOME THE WINNER WITH 15 MINUTES TO GO BUT CAME UNDER PRESSURE IN THE LAST 10 MINUTES AS WE SOUGHT AN EQUALISER.

Sadly, Dayle Speed who was injured by an 'over the top' tackle after 10 minutes has broken his leg and will be out for a lengthy period. I can't say anymore! My sympathies are with Dayle who was just returning to something like his true form following two major operations to his ankle in the last two years.

We were forced into making seven changes to the starting line-up for the Romulus game and I have no idea how many changes we will need to make for today's game but I will make a guess at a minimum of four.

OUR CONGRATULATIONS TO LEAMINGTON WHO DID THEMSELVES AND THE MIDLAND COMBINATION PROUD WHEN THEY DEFEATED ONE OF THE FA VASE FAVOURITES DURHAM CITY 2-1 LAST SATURDAY. THEIR REWARD IS AN INTRIGUING AND MOUTH WATERING TIE AWAY TO STUDLEY ON THE 17TH JANUARY.

Enjoy the game and have a Merry Xmas and a happy New Year.

Jim Scott