Kingstonian 3 Grays Athletic 1 (Away)
Sat, September 6, 2003. Kick off: 3:00 PM
BROWNE FINDS HOLES IN BLUE'S DEFENCE By Carol Smith-Allen
A mediocre performance by Blue’s at Kingsmeadow enabled the K’s to notch-up their first win since 23rd August, 2003.
The first half was scrappy with most of the play occurring in the middle of the park, as a result of which, there was hardly any goal mouth action. The most telling incident of this half was to be the booking of Blue’s Joe Bruce for a ‘alleged’ foul, which was felt to be an incredibly harsh decision, as he appeared to get the ball.
Blue’s best chance of the half came on 41 minutes when first Ade Olayinka’s header was saved by Lance Keys, then 30 seconds later Freddy Eastwood’s shot was tipped over, and from the resulting corner Eddie Youd’s header went wide. The couple of chances that K’s had were easily saved by Scott Barrett.
The second half started, looking much livelier than the first, but things went drastically wrong for Blue’s, in what can only be described as ‘five minutes of madness.’ Firstly, K’s took the lead on 52 minutes when ex-Blue’s player Stafford Browne volleyed Mark Beard’s corner past Scott Barrett, who had a minute earlier made an excellent save to deny Browne. Then it got even worse for Blue’s when almost immediately, Joe Bruce received a second yellow for a challenge on K’s Greg Ball, and Blue’s were down to ten men.
On 54 minutes K’s looked like they were going to get their second, but for an excellent tackle by Steve Robinson; they’re ‘tails were now most certainly up.’ Blues were now having a period where they looked unsettled, and on 62 minutes replaced the hard-working Tony Lock with Toby Oshitola. K’s created a couple of chances, but failed to make them count.
Blue’s got the equaliser on 78 minutes, when from a corner Lance Key parried Blue’s first shot, and in the goal-mouth scramble that followed Freddy Eastwood or Martin Carthy poked the ball home. (Note, this goal has been credited to Carthy but from where I was standing it distinctly looked like Eastwood scored it.) At this point we would have been more than happy to settle for a draw, but it was not to be! Poor marking allowed K’s Captain Mark Beard to cross for Stafford-Browne to head home, and restore their lead on 82 minutes.
They then made their win secure on 90 minutes, when Stafford Browne saw his shot parried by Scott Barrett, and Bashiru Alimi tapped the rebound into the back of the net.
At the moment, Blue’s seem unable to find any consistency in their performances, but if it is any consolation, at least Canvey and Hornchurch also lost, and ‘Purfock’ only managed a point!!
Attendance:- 363
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