The weather gods smiled on the Cabbage Patch last weekend for round 10 of the North Coast Hotel Group Premier League football competition, streaming sunshine and soft zephyrs of a breeze that favoured neither side, yes if you were somewhere else you were in the wrong place.
Matthew Bennet the man in charge for this match and the Coffs Coast Tigers put under some pressure by the home side in the early exchanges. The combination of Craig Simpson, Lockie Indian Manning and Ben Dooley punching holes in a scrambling Tigers defence, only the woodwork keeping the scores even. The first from Tim Ruprecth bouncing his shot off the near post and minutes later Fabrice Wamara thumping his shot off the other post, in between those efforts Tigers keeper Jake Tarrant had making several acrobatic saves, the Tigers defending grimly now but still after winning possession turned it over too quickly. Still hitting the woodwork doesn’t win matches and it would take 38 minutes to breakdown the stiffening Tigers defence.
A long throw from Jaxen Heward not dealt with the by Tigers Luke Kliendienst and the ball sat up nicely for Fabrice Wamara to thump home. Nothing Tarrant could do on this occasion except retrieve the ball. So 1-0 at the break, and the Tigers really needing to go to plan B to get anything out of this match. Perhaps the Tigers best opportunity of the match arrived 14 minutes into the second half after Mark Ifrah let go a thunderbolt that had plenty of power but lacked direction. The Raiders hit back though from a right side move it was the ginger bread man aka Jai Waddick delivering a cross for Fabrice Wamara slide past Tarrant and advance the score to 2-0. The rest of the half marked by tackles of dubious intent testing Mr Bennett’s patience and he did well to only issue two yellow cards both to Coffs Tigers. 2-0 the final scoreline and three points for the Raiders, coach Paul Pomroy pleased with the discipline shown by his squad who really always looked in command.
In other matches the men’s reserve grade went to the Raiders 1-0 Joseph Andrew Pettit the lone scorer, the women’s 1st grade a 2-0 away win over Dorrigo.
Urunga Raiders V Coffs Coast Tigers Rnd 10
