Tower 7-1 FC Village
07/04/07 - League

Only a week after fielding a fairly decent side the Village spent the Saturday morning trying to get a team together which they did but then they had to deal with one of the most biased referee's they've ever had. With no Booey, Leigh, Maggot, Ritchie, Damo or Gav the side had to call up Toby for a rare appearance but also saw the return Muzza and so it was a matter of just a few positional changes. In fact it wasn’t the line up that cost them this match as they matched their opponents for most of it, it was the over zealous ref who seemed to take a dislike to the visitors even before the game had kicked off. With less than five minutes gone Tower made an attack and got a corner which the Village defence cleared. When the ball was played back in to the box one of the Tower forwards looped a header in to the net and the ref gave no offside. However minutes later when Colin was played through and he expertly lobbed home the ref gave him offside when it looked exactly the same as the previous incident. Then came another controversial incident when Sweeney collected the ball some 35 yards out and smashed the ball against the bar and as it bounced down it could easily have appeared to have crossed the line. The Village appealed for a goal and the Tower keeper who now had the ball kicked it up field. The ref who was well off the play favoured the home side once more and waved play on. This resulted in an attack up at the Village end and Tower had extended their lead, so instead of being on level terms, they were now two down. The ref now started picking on anything the Village players said as well as seeming to give most decisions against them. Throughout the rest of the game he would go on to book five of the Village players, all for so called dissent but none of them warranted a yellow card. Back to the match and when the Village conceded another two goals it was a matter of pride which seems to be the thing for them in recent games. Then just before the interval they pulled a goal back when Sweeney controlled a long through ball and tucked it past the advancing keeper. The side now thought that despite being 1-4 down they still had a chance but once more the ref put paid to that with some strange decisions and it was left to Tower to romp home and record one of their best results of the season. The Village did get one really good chance to score a second consolation goal when the ball bounced off the bumpy surface and hit a Tower players arm in the box and the ref gave the visitors a penalty. With Colin missing the previous week up stepped Sweeney only to see the keeper dive the right way and prevent him from getting his second of the match. So even though the final score line looked like a real thumping, the Village have played a lot worse and still not let in that many goals. They need to get some of their players back otherwise the good season they had had will become just a distant memory.