'Only The Cup'... Horton Heath 1 - 3 Polygon

Well it had to happen sometime but, we lost. Luckily it was in a Cup game and to a team in a higher division but nonetheless it was a loss and it hurts.

The two big factors in the loss were that A) We did not have our full squad, and B) We played a physical team who were also pretty good on the ball.

The two teams we had faced before, Romsey and Braishfield, were easily dominated both physically and our skill with the ball. The team today, Polygon, were well organised and comfortable on the ball and it is teams like this that we will need to be able to beat if we are to win this league convincingly, which I believe we are capable of on our day.

The game started with Polygon firmly on the front foot playing a mix of neat passing and incisive long balls which saw us quickly pinned back into our own half. Once we had started to get used to the style of play we began to get more of a hold on the game. Eventually, towards the middle of the half and against the run of play a ball was played through to the debutant James Guppy who made a Messi-esque run past 4 players before slotting the ball into the net.

The rest of the half we continued to be pressed in our half but hung on to our lead at half time.

We made two changes at half time and our 433 formation switched to a more conventional 442 formation and the second half started brightly with us starting to get into the game.
Nik Jones made some wonderful saves throughout the game but early in the 2nd half a loose ball on the edge of the area was absolutely and unstoppably spanked into the top corner making it 1-1.

Sadly we continued to be dominated and Polygon got their second goal from a badly defended corner with 20 minutes to go. Strangely it was at this point we began to play well stringing some nice passes together and attacking with pace. We managed a few shots  and started to look dangerous as we began to attack with pace.

As I said to start with, it was only the Cup and I stick by that. We can learn from this loss and hopefully use what we have gained to help us conquer this league.

I apologise for this depressing and boring post but I felt I had to write a match report and decided to fight back the tears and just get on with it.

HHAFC x

Strangely just as we were at our most threatening we conceded the killer blow making it 3-1 late on and effectively finishing the game.