Men’s 3s Stumble to 4-3 Defeat Against Saintfield Despite Strong Start

The Mens 3s hosted Saintfield 2s in Comber on Saturday. Having previously beaten them in the cup, the mood was confident in returning to winning ways. As the match got underway, the newly sand dressed pitch slowed play down, caused passes to go astray and affected first touches….. or that’s what the Comber men would have you believe. Simply, it was poor discipline in not following a gameplan and with only 5 minutes on the clock, the first break couldn’t come quick enough. The troops were rallied and the second quarter started much better. Skipper Sam Pyper soon got North Down into the lead from a short corner and should have made it 2 when a delightful aerial from veteran, Stephen Magee setup a great 2 on 1 counter. Pyper put Guy McGongile through beyond the last defender, who drew out the keeper and squared the ball to Pyper. The ball bobbled up and the striker took a wild swing infront of goal only to make zero contact.

Steven Saul was causing all sorts of mischief on the wing and more good work from Magee put him into the danger area. A def touch over the advancing keeper made it 2 nil and looking like the men in white were in cruise control.

After the half time break, Saintfield started to get more into the game and a number of short corners were kept out by Colin Mockford when it looked sure to break the net. Mockford didn’t put a foot wrong. His aerials out from the back were on point, tackles timed perfectly and a number of goal line clearances made it quite the performance. Unfortunately he had to come off shortly into 3rd quarter with a muscle strain. Saintfield took advantage and scored 2 quick fire goals to level things up. Their momentum carried into the last quarter taking the lead and extending it further to make it 4-2. Retirement from Loui McComb and Rhys Barrett due to injury had North finish with 10 men however this spurred them on determined to get something out of the game. A great move resulted in David Burch playing a perfect cross into Pyper who deflected smartly over the advancing keeper. With minutes to go North were on the up and a short corner in the final seconds was well worked only for the shot from Magee to be deemed high and final whistle was blown.

Much improvement needed next week.

Burch Autos MOTM Colin Mockford

Thanks to Keri Portinga and Richard Bruce for umpiring.