Lions Lose To Lokomotive In Tight Contest

The Lions winning start came to an end against Lokomotive Londres, as a late header consigned us to a first defeat of the season.

First meeting this term between teams who played out two 2-2 draws in their league meetings last season, so it was always going to be a tight game. Chances were few and far between, with the previously free-scoring Lions strangely hesitant in front of goal. The best chances for both teams in the first half were headers from corners that just cleared the bar, with our shot coming from Ben.

We did create a couple of other great opportunities: Gary danced his way into the penalty area and the goal was begging for a shot, but he hesitated a fraction too long and the chance was gone. Ben found himself clean through on goal, but an admittedly decent tackle took the ball off his toe. He did have a very good case for a penalty turned down earlier in the game, when he was clattered in the area.

And that was pretty much it for the first half. Don't recall either team actually getting a shot on target , despite some quality - if sometimes frenetic - build-up play from both sides.

The second half was more of the same, though Lokomotive started to shade it on chances created. Paul was called into action to turn away a near point blank shot after one of our CBs thought he could walk the ball out of the area (he was wrong) and then to fingertip away a shot flashed across the goal. Both sides had to fling bodies into the line of fire in the six-yard area to block shots, but the only time we worked their keeper was when Ben scuffed a low shot on the turn that had the keeper stretching low to keep it out.

It's not often you can say this about Sunday League football, but the more the match went on, the more likely it seemed that one goal would be enough to settle it. So it proved and unfortunately for us, we were on the wrong end of it.We were perhaps sleeping a little when they took a corner quickly, but their goal-scorer deserves some credit for a good leap and a bullet header that gave Paul no chance.

A bit sickening that the goal came with only a few minutes to play, because there was so little between the teams. Nobody on the pitch could be faulted on their performance (thought Nick Still in particular had an excellent game against their right winger) and the game could have gone either way.

Maybe a little worrying that we had so few shots compared to the previous games when we'd had shedloads, even if relatively few of them went in. A game this tight is decided by fine margins and we probably weren't helped by having no subs in the second half, compared to Lokomotive's constant use of their three.

So a close game doesn't quite go our way, but the performance is still there.Our next two matches are both cup ties, so hopefully we can rediscover the goal-scoring touch to go with it.