AFC Wimbledon Youth 1 Woking Town 0
West Surrey Premier Elite - Sunday 19 March 2006
AFC Youth turned in an embarrassingly bad performance against a relegated side who have collected just five points all season and conceded 83 goals. The reigning league champions made very hard work of securing the maximum points they needed to keep alive their title aspirations. Matthew Braben remained on the injury list, and the top scorer, Timi da Silva, was ruled out with an injury sustained yesterday while being kicked off the park playing for the Surrey Representative side. James Snishko also turned out for Surrey yesterday, and so he was rested for the first half hour of this match.
Despite the mediocrity of the play, AFC completely dominated the first twenty minutes, and should have scored twice in the opening five minutes when shots were blazed off target from fairly close range. The play was very ragged with both sides giving away possession with stray passes and needless errors, but nevertheless the hosts managed to create several good chances. Troy Murray fired over from a very good position, and then Sonny Russell had a shot saved by the keeper. There were occasional breakaways by Woking, but they never looked like scoring against a watertight defence. As the half progressed the standard of play remained dreadfully poor, and after two further AFC misses, Woking finally went close with a long-range strike that passed safely over the crossbar. After half-an-hour of this fare, AFC sent on James Snishko to go three at the back, with Jack Malin going up front and Paul Nicholls replacing Luke Ewing on the left flank. This nearly paid immediate dividends when Troy Murray slipped a pass into the path of Jack Malin, who brushed aside the last defender at pace, but then lifted his shot over the bar as the keeper closed him down. Both sides continued to struggle to put three or four passes together, and while most of the shooting came from AFC Youth, it was always off target. Then, two minutes before the interval, Charlie Dennis swung over a superb corner, and Jack Malin thundering in, met it with an unstoppable close-range header to score what turned out to be the only goal of the game.
In the second half Woking were forced to defend in numbers as the hosts went on all-out attack in search of another goal. In response Woking shrewdly put their best two players up front to threaten the three-man AFC defence with their pace on the break. Both Jack Malin and Troy Murray had many excellent opportunities to find the net, but the end product was always the wrong side of the post or passing over the bar. Paul Nicholls made some good runs down the left, but by and large the standard of play remained very scrappy. Jack Malin was putting himself about and creating plenty of problems with his hustling and pace, but when through on goal he lacked either the composure or the left foot to put the ball in the back of the net. Woking were now quite dangerous on the break, and they were denied a certain goal when Nick Greaves made a brilliant diving save to keep out a powerful shot from outside the box. Tee-Jay Ryan, Charlie Dennis and James Snishko were winning the ball with some great challenges, but the AFC passing was truly abysmal. Nevertheless, AFC looked certain to score when Sonny Russell stepped through several challenges in the penalty area, but he shot across the face of the goal rom a tight angle. AFC then had a header brilliantly saved by the Woking keeper, and soon after Jack Malin crossed hard across the face of the goal, but there was no one to put the chance away. Woking then broke quickly, but their striker scuffed his shot when through on goal. Woking then won a corner, and a smart shot on the turn flew just wide of the goal. The Woking goal then had another narrow escape, and five minutes from time Jack Malin was pulled back into the AFC defence. This tightened things up and AFC dominated possession, but then almost at the close Woking were denied an equaliser when a terrific shot from outside the area was saved in spectacular fashion by Nick Greaves.
So three points for AFC Youth and they now move into second spot, but a very poor team performance showing no fluency or control in a match littered with poor passing. Nick Greaves gets man of the match for producing two outstanding saves that kept AFC Youth's slim title hopes alive.
Reporter's man of the match: Nick Greaves
Team: Nick Greaves; Scott Fullerton, Sam King, Jack Malin, Charlie Dennis; Matthew O'Brien, Sonny Russell, Tee-Jay Ryan, Luke Ewing; William Taylor, Troy Murray. Sub: Paul Nicholls, James Snishko.