Town welcomed Rayleigh Town to Love Lane on Saturday eager to build on a good second half performance against White Ensign on Tuesday night. Numerous injuries to key players and a couple of absentees forced the management to get the cheque book out, make several frantic last minute phone calls, untold changes in team selection and 2 last minute “on the day” signings. In the end Town took to the pitch with a very good and solid looking starting 11 but with barely anyone fit enough to last more than a few minutes on the bench (does Fergie have these problems??). New signings Niki Love and Brad Mills were drafted straight in, Dave Martin was on a stag do, and Ben Polley, Mark Neal, Wiggy, Lodgey and Headon, all carrying injuries took their places on the bench.

So all change then as the game kicked off but within 3 minutes Town had taken the lead; The Rayleigh keeper “half cleared” a Town through ball and his clearance fell at the feet of Brez some 40 yards out from goal: Brez sidestepped a challenge, looked up, composed himself and chipped the ball into the goal from fully 35 yards, evading the retreating keeper quite comfortably 1-0. – 2 minutes later it got even better when Town scored again to go two up. Brad Merrick, who went on to have a superb game, won the ball in centre midfield and sprayed an excellent pass out to Lee Humphrey raiding down the right wing; Lee sped into the penalty box and rather than shooting pulled the ball back for Niki Love, on debut, to convert with a neat side foot finish from 10 yards out - 2-0 - Blimey – Town had started a game brighter than the other side; first time for everything!!! Rayleigh were stunned into action and responded by taking the game to Town, but they run into a solid looking Town defence with Ready, Jeater and Andy Allen dealing with most threats, leaving Chris Neal in goal fairly redundant. A two goal lead at half time would have been excellent but 3 minutes before the half Rayleigh pulled one back with a dipping half volley from distance that flew into the net over the head of Chris 2-1. Half time.

The second half kicked off and we had no idea of what was to come. In playing terms the game was fairly even with both teams enjoying just about equal possession and Town missed a couple of very good chances to seal the win. New boy Davey Armstrong, who worked his socks off up front, was denied by a cruel bobble from close range having made up tons of ground to tap in from close range and Niki Love, who’s pace and movement had been a threat all afternoon, shot agonisingly wide from the edge of the box with the outside of his foot. Brad Mills, after a slightly nervous start on debut started to get on the ball and played some nice simple one touch passes to keep possession and looks to be a good addition to the squad. With 20 minutes left a Rayleigh player was sent off and strangely, as per the previous week against Galleywood, Town seemed to take their foot off the pedal and Rayleigh enjoyed probably their best spell of the game. Andy Martin was replaced by Wiggy and It was anyone’s game now but then, amazingly, 3 more Rayleigh players were sent off in a 10 minute spell between the 75th and 85th minutes and the game was then abandoned as Rayleigh had gone down to 7 men which isn’t in the rules which state that there must be LESS than 7 players!! However the league confirmed after that Town would be awarded the points. All a bit of an anti climax though.

In over 35 years of Football this is one of the weirdest games I have ever been involved in – in truth the game was played in a great competitive spirit by both teams and there was absolutely no animosity between the sides and not one bad tackle in the whole game but we end up with Rayleigh being reduced to 7 men and the game abandoned. To be honest the abandonment did take the gloss of what had been a very good Town performance but, in my opinion, Town deserved to and would probably have gone on to win the game anyway.

Player of the match this week is young Brad Merrick.

El Col