The M7s had the flavour of the old Tankards teams at the weekend, with two junior debutants (Kaylan Shah and Gabe Commons), a surprise return from Shamit Shukla in his old sweeper role, a handful of Titans (Ali Priestly, Jatin Patel and Randall Hyer), and the welcome return from injury of Leon Flack.
OMTs had a similar balance, with a squad of the experienced and young juniors, which offered the opportunity for a finely-balanced match.
In truth, it should have been over and done with after ten minutes, as a midfield of Ali Priestley, Martin Christie, Michiel Van Soest and Randall Hyer started on the front foot and helped Kaylan Shah, Jatin Patel, Gabe Commons and Dan Rookes force a flurry of saves from the OMTs keeper and some last ditch tackles from their defenders.
A goal didn’t come though, and despite holding the balance of play, Southgate struggled to create clear opportunities and started to rush and get impatient.
At the other end, Neil Murphy, Leon Flack and Neil Commons in goal had to keep aware as OMTs resorted to crash balls and aerials to stretch the play, but the three were able to sweep up whatever was thrown at them.
0-0 at half time and a match that was too finely balanced for comfort. A slight rejig of formation, and an instruction to keep the ball better and to be more patient was needed.
With Shamit Shukla starting to pull the strings from the sweeper role, spaces started to open up and short corners started to come – surely a goal would follow.
Eventually, it did: fine work down the right was capped off with a smart square ball from Gabe Commons that was tucked away by Michiel Van Soest. 1-0 at last, and now was the time to focus.
The match started to open up, and Southgate found themselves in more space as the game became stretched and OMTs tried to force their way back into the match. A tense and frantic final 10 minutes that somehow didn’t produce a goal, left the final score at 1-0 to Southgate.
Man Of The Match was Ali Priestley, with Randall Hyer also taking several votes.
So, a victory, a clean sheet, and some promising debuts and returning faces meant that it was a good day at the office with the promise of better to come.