Match Report - South Saxons M4 6: St Francis M2 1

Four goals from James Heafield, and one a-piece from Dan Chamberlain and Toby Walker, saw the M 4s chalk up an impressive victory over St Francis M2s on a soggy Bexhill Academy pitch on Saturday.

Chamberlain opened the scoring after 4 minutes with a fine individual goal. His run took him past 3 St Francis defenders before slotting home. Heafield drilled in his first, and Saxons second, on 9 minutes and when he added a third on 27 minutes Saxons looked to be cruising to a big victory. But St Francis started to get a foothold in the game and despite resolute defending from Quintin Hulley, Lewis Mason and captain Garry Cooper, and some fine saves from ‘keeper Murphy Reed, they were back in the game with a goal just before half time.

Saxons nerves were settled 4 minutes into the second half, however, when the excellent Toby Walker scored after a scramble in the St Francis D. Saxons were now fully in control of the game with Matt Bate, Ben Kemsley and Charlie Ogilvie dominating the midfield and Leo Gandhi mesmerising the opposition with his stick skills and tremendous energy.

Billy Whizz was making a nuisance of himself amongst the St Francis defenders, creating space for the top diamond and the other forwards to operate and Mason was causing problems for St Francis on their left flank with some piercing runs up the Saxons right touchline. Heathfield sealed the victory with 2 well hit strikes on 54 and 62 minutes, and could easily have ended the game as Star Player, but the youngsters Ghandi, Walker, Reed and Mason, in particular, were outstanding and all featured heavily in the Star Player voting by the team at the end of the game, with Lewis Mason coming out on top.