Totteridge Youth (03/03/2002)

This game was the first meeting between our two clubs, this one being a re-arranged fixture of the game that was postponed from last October. It took place at the Hazlemere Recreation Ground in cool, dry but overcast weather. Owing to a very muddy area in one of the goalmouths we had to set up the nets on another of the pitches.

The game kicked off at 2.06pm and by 2:10pm, following a corner on the left Totteridge took the lead when Jermain Hockley put a good shot wide of the Hithercroft keeper. Eight minutes later, Duane White played a ball from the centre of the pitch out to Kevin Ife on the right wing. He took it down the to within 20 yards of the line before hitting it over the Totteridge goalkeeper’s head and it curved into the top right-hand corner of the net to level the score. After nineteen minutes Jason Guy, the Hithercroft captain had to leave the field for treatmant to a cut on his leg and he returned five minutes later. He was being closely marked up front and, on his return dropped back into midfield and started his attacks from there. After 29 minutes on end-to-end play Sam Barnett playerd a good shot from the left which went over Phil’s head and into the net putting the home team back into the lead.

The second half continued the same way that the first half had been played with end-to-end play. Totteridge’s Matthew Lovegrove made many runs down the right side of the field and showed some skillfull footwork when challenged whilst Hithercroft’s Jason Guy took his chances to run down through the middle but tended to over-hit the ball on occasions. Twenty eight minutes of the half had gone without a score when, in a flurry of activity in the Totteridge goal area, Duane White hit the ball into the net to bring the score level once again. Three minutes later Jammale Cole squeezed the ball past two defenders and the Hithercroft keeper to put Totteridge back in front for the third time but the game was not over yet! With just one minute left to play a Totteridge defender handled the ball in the penalty area and Duane White struck the resulting penalty to the keeper’s left to bring the final score to 3-3.

This had been a very competitive game between two evenly-matched sides and the sharing of the points was a fair result.

Totteridge’s goals came from Jermain Hockley, Sam Barnett and Jammale Cole.

Hithercroft’s goals came from Kevin Ife and Duane White (2).