Ongar Town welcomed Faces to Love lane on Saturday on a bright and still afternoon, almost perfect for football.

With the entire defence deciding that it would be a damn good idea to take the same weekend off there were numerous absentees including Grandy, Rob Newman, Lodgey, and Ready. Flighty was also unavailable but at least he had the good grace to be injured. Town were therefore left with a bare 12 man squad the only sub being the returning Wiggy.

Despite appearing to be very 'flat' before kick off Town started brightly and just edged the opening phase of the game. Town fielded three, 17 year olds, Brad Merrick, Ben Stone and Matt Macedo, all of whom started enthusiastically and went on to have fine games. Up front Liam Murphy, making his first competitive start, showed straight away what an excellent capture he is and made several powerful runs and held the ball up superbly. Headon found his range and started to play probing balls to the front men and from one such pass Ben Polley hit a first time shot narrowly wide with the keeper beaten. Town took the lead after 20 minutes when Headon played another superb through ball which Polley latched onto, rounded a couple of defenders and was just about to pull the trigger when he was fouled in the area, penalty. He dusted himself down and duly despatched the penalty himself, 1-0. A few minutes later and and a carbon copy build up led to the second goal. Polley was again played in by another exquisite Headon through ball but this time Polley's shot was saved and the rebound landed rather awkwardly on the edge of the box to Liam Murphy, who adjusted superbly and lobbed the ball over their stranded keeper and a couple of defenders into the empty net, 2-0. Still Town poured forward and a few minutes later Liam Murphy added his second, and Towns third goal, with a neat finish from 12 yards out, 3-0. Town now got complacent and sloppy and conceded 2 goals in the next 5 minutes just prior to half time to go from being in a very comfortable position with a 3-0 lead after 40 minutes to a narrow one goal lead at half time, 3-2.

To their credit Town kicked off the second half in determined mood and made every effort to redeem themselves for their 5 minutes of sloppiness. Their reward didn't take long to arrive when after 7 minutes of the second half a through ball, left Liam Murphy with an awful lot to do, the odds were 60/40 in the keepers favour but Liam accelerated faster than the Porsche he drives to get to the ball before their keeper and score with a perfect lob to complete his hat trick, 4-2. Shortly after Liam, exhausted, had to be replaced for the final 30 minutes. Headon was now struggling with an injury but couldn't come off because we didn't have another sub !!! To be fair Faces continued to play football and the remainder of the second half was an entertaining end to end affair. With 15 minutes left Polley scored his second, and Town's fifth goal of the game. After an outrageous dummy that was bought by the Faces keeper, and most of the crowd, he walked the ball into an empty net , 5-2.

An excellent performance with several notable performances; Headons range of passing and vision was outstanding, the 3 youngsters Brad, Matt & Ben did superbly and have given the more senior players a real boost, Lee Humphrey and Mark Neal provided the experience in the middle of the park, Chris Neal was assured and looked comfortable in goal, Andy Allen and Jeater were solid as a rock at the back, Polley produced 2 more goals and some real quality moments.

This weeks player of the match must go to Liam Murphy - this was his league debut, he has played little or no football for a couple of years, he is by his own admission not fit but he produced an outstanding performance scoring 3 goals and is a real gem of a find - I just cant wait until he gets fit !!!

El Col