Penycae v Hawarden Rangers

SCORERS: Austin Owen
M.O.T.M: Austin Owen
STARTING XI: Matt Griffiths Kyle Davies Aled Roberts Ryan Merrill Ryan Jones Adam Peters Alex Rowlands Shaun Pemberton Austin Owen Josh Millington Ben Jones
SUBSTITUTES: Adam Yeap Joe Davies Callum Williams Nick Jones Josh Williams

After last week’s result against Llay, we needed to drive forward and give the same fight and passion against a Hawarden side sitting below us in the table. With several players unavailable we had to manage the change and still go out looking for the win.

Right from the first whistle it was clear that Hawarden had come for a battle and started off well. We took everything they threw at us for the first twenty mins and were pegged back in our own half defending deep. After several corners and free kicks they finally took the lead from a set piece on 21mins. Disappointingly their player ran in unmarked and headed home.

We then started to get our shape a bit better and started to press. On 28 mins a through ball for Austin Owen to chase paid off. Pressing the defender, he won the ball and smashed it into the roof of the net to take us in at half time 1-1

The second half was a dog fight with us trying to get a hold on the game.  Joe Davies stepped in for the injured Aled Roberts who suffered a hamstring injury. There were several gritty tackles from both sides flying in. Then Hawarden were awarded a free kick on the edge of the box on 58 mins. The referee’s decision was poor to say the least. The dive was better than some of Tom Daleys. However they took the free kick well and slotted around the wall and into the top corner.

We had a few chances to pull it back with Josh Millington putting the ball just over the bar. This was a difficult game to watch and frustrating as we are capable of much better. We take on Corwen next week and we need to take our learning from this game and get back to basics.