Two off but Weymouth Reserves happy with point (From This is Hampshire)

Two off but Weymouth Reserves happy with point

6:00pm Monday 11th February 2013 in Hampshire Sport By David Williams, Sports Reporter

CRANBORNE 2 WEYMOUTH RESERVES 2

AN incident-packed game ended with the visitors reduced to nine men and Cranborne 10 but Weymouth joint-manager Jake Richmond was more than happy with a draw.

Matt Camp and Andy Hind were sent off in the closing stages though with nine players missing it was a hard-earned and deserved point for the Terras.

Weymouth took the lead twice and they could have finished with all three points had their defending not let them down for the two Cranborne equalisers.

“With nine players out and starting with a lot of youngsters, if you’d offered me a point before the match I would have taken it,” said Richmond.

“After last week we worked on some things in training and wanted to play more football rather than knock it long.

“And we played some nice stuff in the first half but it got a bit tetchy and physical in the second half.

“Our players aren’t dirty. They’ve got ambitions to make it as players and are an honest bunch.”

Weymouth began the brighter and Simon Crouch nearly opened the scoring with an audacious back-heeled volley from a Luke Winsper corner.

That came on the half hour and four minutes later the visitors did take the lead when Crouch’s pull back was palmed away by the home keeper and Sean Zima smashed the ball in from 15 yards.

Cranborne responded and they struck the bar just after the break before peppering Weymouth with long balls and crosses into the box.

But it was Weymouth who nearly doubled their advantage when Zima’s volley from 25 yards was brilliantly tipped onto the post before Chris Povall made a couple of superb saves at the other end.

With 15 minutes left Weymouth were pushing hard but in going for the jugular they left themselves open at the back and in no time it was 1-1 when Nick Day levelled.

However, with 10 minutes to go a Winsper corner was met by the head of Ben Doidge and he buried the ball into the net to make it 2-1.

Sixty seconds later, though, the game was all square as a missed tackle and some ball watching by a Weymouth defender proved costly as Day bagged his second.

Camp saw red eight minutes from time when he appeared to go into a challenge with two feet then with Weymouth hanging on near the end Hind retaliated to a push to the face by punching an opponent, who was also sent off.

“If you score you’ve got to be on your mettle for the next few minutes and to concede straight away was very annoying,” added Richmond. “I’ve laboured the point with them week in week out.

“It can be the difference between making the step up and just being a pub player.

“But we’re on a decent run now and to go there and get a point with the squad we had was great.”

Terras: Povall, Hind, Brown, Doidge, Beals, Camp, Winsper, Smith, Frame (Taylor 60), Crouch (Wilmore 75), Zima. Sub not used: Richmond