7's just come through

A late start for City of York 7s away at Thirsk. Night had well and truly fallen by push back and it was about to be a cold evening for York’s (captive) travelling support, despite their expectations of the excellent hockey they had seen during recent outing. York, once again, started positively, moving the ball around the pitch well. Emil Waites characteristically making spaces with his constant movement. Jamie Clarke and Finn Baqai initially commanding the midfield. But, the Thirsk defence were confident in the tackle and blunted York’s cutting edge.
The opposition began to settle into the game aided by York beginning to give ball away. Counter attacks were soaked up well by Dave Buckingham and attacks down the flanks were cut out well by Josh Perryman and Felix McClean. Despite York’s poor passing, attacks did trouble the Thirsk D and a number of short corners were won, although initial plan As for these tended to break down, they put substantial pressure on Thirsk. York’s finishing shots lacked some aggression and to give credit to the Thirsk goalkeeper, he was very solid in dealing with these. It was late in the 1st half before Finn Baqai connected with the ball with one of the shots he is known to be capable of. An excellent finished allowed York to end the half 1-0 up.
York’s mistakes carried on through the half-time break where there was substantial spillage of haribo. Fortunately, the chocolate orange segments were handled more competently. York continued to allow passes to go astray in the 2nd half, with even the senior pros being caught in possession. Douglas Duffus-Hodson was called into action in goal on a number of occasions and York were somewhat lucky to concede only one goal during this period.

However, York kept grinding on, with continued running from Tom Feetenby and Harvey Ake at the front, although movement was substantially slower than the speed Tom’s mother had been called upon to produce on the A19 to relocate from Huntington for the start of the match! Clarke, Aaron Clements, Baqai and even McClean senior continued to battle in midfield. Josh Prins, now in defence soaked up any breaks from Thirsk and launched counter attacks well. It was this passage of play that earned him another Man-of-the-Match award. Josh Perryman getting higher up the field on the right began to play good balls to those in and around the D. Allo (Big) began to turn up the skill level into the opposition D. York’s short corner tally began to mount. Finally, another scrambled plan B short corner attack was deftly finished by Harvey Ake. 2-1!

York managed to shut the game out at this score line. They had ground out another win, despite a general lack of movement and poor passing. In some ways, they really were saved by the cavalry, with Captain Perryman, putting the movement and running of most of his troops to shame, tidying up York’s errors all across the pitch. Three more points from a sub-par performance, but they all count and York will come back stronger next week.