Badgers Extinguish the Blaze!

The Badgers continued their unbeaten start to the season with victory in an 11 goal thriller over Derry Hill Blaze at a sunny autumnal West Lavington yesterday. The game started at a frenetic pace with both sides fully committed. The Badgers pressed first, forcing a string of corners. Bailey put in great deliveries for each, creating chaos in the Blaze box with Ash, Jack and Toby all unlucky not to score before the pressure finally told. In a satisfying training ground move, William D turned in the 4th corner from the right with deft 'Vardy esque' flick in the 12th minute. Within 2 minutes the Badgers doubled their lead when the ever willing Jack crossed from the right for Jenson, poaching at the far post, to slot in from close range. The 3rd followed soon after when Eddie led the high press from a Derry goal kick to feed in a perfectly weighted pass between 2 defenders for Jack to coolly slot past the advancing Blaze keeper. Only an excellent near post save from the Blaze keeper from a stinging shot by Teddy, following a surging run past 2 men from left full back, kept the score down to 3-0 at the first break. The Badgers continued their dominance in the 2nd quarter. Harvey showed great composure in his first game of the season to quell any danger at right back, linking well with Freddie, who's non stop running and movement continually caused danger down the right hand side. Oli, leading from the front again as Captain, was playing the sweeper role to great effect, anticipating and snuffing out danger. The dominance told when the rampant Badgers scored their 4th after 13 minutes when the ball boke in the box for Reggie, timing his run to perfection, to calmly slide it home. it was therefore against the run of play when in the dying embers of the first half, the Blaze scored through a fantastic shot low into the corner of the Badgers net to make it 4-1 at half-time.

it was the Badgers who struck next in the 3rd quarter when an excellent through ball from Bailey allowed Jack to burst through down the left to fire in low off the far post. 5-1 soon became 6-1 when Jack latched onto another long ball over the top, this time from Teddy, to round the keeper and complete another excellent hat trick. To their credit, back came the Blaze to score two excellent long range goals of their own, the second from a free kick wide on the right. William G was now boisterously commanding the centre of defence, until a typically committed tackle left him temporarily stricken requiring Team Manager Mark to carry him off, somewhat fittingly in a fireman's lift, before rejoining the play shortly after. The 4th quarter became more end to end as the game became stretched as legs tired on the large West Lavington pitch. Lewis, playing in his favoured position of right midfield, enjoyed his best spell of the game, firstly playing a delightful through ball for William to make it 7-3 and then was unlucky not to score himself with a fizzing shot across the face of the goal. Similarly, Toby almost capped his Man of the Match performance of non stop effort and calm authority in midfield with two long range shots, both of which narrowly cleared the bar. However, it was the Blaze who completed the scoring with yet another superb long range effort from their man of the match midfielder to end a pulsating match 7-4, a result which leaves the Badgers second in the table on goal difference from Chippenham Town. A game which was yet another wonderful advert for youth football played in a excellent spirit and a credit to all the players in both teams.