On a warm sunday morning at Barlow school, the 8 men and 2 ladies  of Cosmos lined up against our local rivals from Didsbury juniors. The declaration of Eid (acceptable) allied to the usual non attendances (unacceptable) meant we were without our goalkeeper and also unable to field a full strength or even a full team.

Chris kindly volunteered to play in goal and we lined up with Cat, Craig, Sarah and Cal in defence with Sarah taking the sweeper role. Ben and JD took the central midfield roles with Jonathon left and Ant right midfield. Max (der bomber) was left to play the lone striking role.

The first 10 minutes were quite even with both sides testing out each other. Much of our attacking was funnelled through JD playing balls over the top for max to chase on to. Unfortunately the tiny pitch - whilst a help in terms of our lack of numbers - was a hindrance to our ability to break at speed as balls which would normally fall into space were reaching the Didsbury goalie quite easily. At the other end, the Didsbury team were strong and physical through the centre and also had a tricky right winger who was quite willing to try and take on Cat. Overall the defence coped extremely well in this spell with Chris commanding in goal.

The ifrst goal went to Cosmos courtesy of Max. The ball was played into the cntre of the Didsbury penalty area and after a melee in which a free kick could easily have been given against Cosmos for a foul on the goalkeeper, Max was on hand to tuck the ball away into an empty net.

Cosmos went further ahead as a through ball to Max saw him shrug off a defender and faced with a one on one with the keeper lift the ball over the keeper - a real touch of class.

Credit to Didsbury, they refused to let their heads drop and a prolonged spell of pressure saw a goal mouth melee end with their striker tuck the ball away into the corner.

Didsbury continued with their strong forward play causing trouble all across our back line and a further spell of pressure saw them get right back into the game. We failed to pick up at a short corner and when the ball was played to an unmarked Didsbury player, he was able to tuck it away for 2-2.

Cosmos refused to give up and continued to attack the Didsbury goal at every opportunity. One attack led to a corner taken from our left which Max secured his hat trick with a well placed header into the Didsbury goal. 3-2 to Cosmos and a welcome half time break.

A few hopefully well chosen words from yours truly highlighted a few areas we needed to tighten up on - mainly better tracking and harder tackling and we lined up for the second half.

The first ten minutes of the first half saw Didsbury come at us and hard. They had made a few substitutions and the appearance of a couple of big lads gave them the impetus to test the Cosmos defence over and over. The back four were absolutely superb, putting in tackle after tackle, thwarting everything Didsbury threw at us. At the other end, JD was putting in a magnificent performance, covering acres of grass to make up for our lack of numbers.

Eventually, another unmarked short corner saw the ball fall to a Didsbury player and he found the top righ hand corner of the goal giving Chris no chance.

This goal only served to galvanise the whole team into tackling harder; Ben in central midfield came into his own and started to pas the ball around. Jonathon on the left worked his socks off to support Cat and help out the strikers and we were able to foray regularly down both flanks causing the Didsbury defence loads of problems. It was from one of these many atacks, this time down the left that saw Max battle away and put the ball across the face of the Didsbury goal. Anthony, cutting in from the right wing was on hand to finish quite beautifully and put us 4-3 in front.

The game then became a fully end to end contest. They would attack, we would defend like our lives depended upon it. The ball would then go up to the other end and the roles would be reversed. With just one goal in it, the game was very tense and it took a fantastic piece of skill from JD, playing a complete captains role to releive Bluestar nerves and settle the game. A typical mazy run saw him take on and beat a number of Didsbury players before slipping the ball past the Didsbury keeper for 5-3.

The last ten minutes were mainly a rearguard offensive from Cosmos as Didsbury continued to battle and press for further goals. The defence held strong helped by the midfield and the didsbury forwards were unable to find a way past Chris who was immense in goal. In fact, we could have scored a sixth goal as Josh beat the offside trap but wasnt able to fire his shot on target.

The end of the match saw a triumphant Cosmos team overcome a strong Didsbury team 5 - 3 and leave me feeling immensely proud. This performance ranks up with last season when we annilhated Vikings, not in terms of the scoreline but in terms of the effort and commitment shown by all of the team. 

Thoughts on the performance.
Chris in goal was excellent. Nothing he could do about the goals. Caught the ball well, made a couple of great saves and gave the back four massive confidence.
Cal at RB had a superb game. He tackled extremely well especially in the second half, was always looking for thr pass to midfield and could have scored his second goal but left his shooting boots at home.
Catriona at LB was up against a tricky right winger and gave a brilliant account of herself. Her tackling was immense, her positional play was excellent and she was very communicative all game.
Craig at CB had another excellent game. As usual, his tackling was fierce and hard, he was always looking to go forward with the ball and proved extremely hard for the opponents to get past.
Sarah at sweeper had a great game. An unfamiliar role saw her commanding the back line. She was always able to free herself of a striker and looked a natural in this difficult role. Her tackling was brilliant as ever and she was a tower of strength for the team.
Ben in defensive midfield had a very good game. He fits into the role of spoiler extremely well. He is always there snapping into tackles, breaking up attacks and always looks to get the ball wide to set up attacks.
Jonathon in left midfield had a quiet first half and occasionally found it difficult to keep up with the pace. However as the game progressed, he got more amd more into the game and took his defensive duties very seriously helping out Catriona on the left. Jonathon is getting used to the pace of the game and is developing into a valuable team member.
Anthony in right midfield is developing into a powerful player storming down the right hand side. He needs to work on his defensive duties to help out Cal but had a good game today and took his goal very well indeed.
Josh in centre midfield had a great game.  The switch was well and truly turned on today. An awesome performance with all of our attacking flair being channelled through him. A true captains performance.
Max wears the number 9 shirt very well. A bid strong bustling center forward, hard in the tackle, strong in the run and superb today in  link up play. A superb hat trick with3 goals of individual quality.

It was very difficuly today to select the various players of the match but the following awards were made.

Players MOTM as chosen by Cal - Josh
Parents MOTM - Max
Coaches MOTM - Chris

Well done to one and all.

ROB

Kathy has posted a match report on the Metro website. I will endeavour to post it here when I can find it.

ROB