London Old Boys Senior Cup

Football result - Old Meadonians 8 Mayfield Athletic 0

Old Meadonians were eager to announce their new year intentions, shake off the lethargy of enforced idleness due to the effects of the Christmas and weather break and, more importantly, were hungry for a renewed challenge in this low level encounter at Riverside Lands which was more a stroll in the park turning into a feeding frenzy as they wolfed down hapless Mayfield Athletic from two divisions below them to go through to the quarter finals of the London Old Boys Senior cup on Saturday.

Mayfield have been performing tidily in the league this season but have form as one of Meads’ victims earlier this season in the A.F.A. Middlesex and Essex Senior cup when they conceded six goals to a reply of two and that result was an Albatross round their neck leading them like lambs to the slaughter, with death wish writ large all over them. Meads hardly needed any help but were certainly not averse to accepting a head start when on twenty minutes a dozy visitors’ defender was robbed twenty five yards out by striker Craig Jones who romped in on the defenceless keeper to show no mercy.

However, although the hosts still showed signs of ring rustiness, even when they gave the ball away it was in the secure knowledge that they would get it back fairly quickly. As far as joint coach Paul Rumley was concerned in his post match briefing, it was important for constituent parts of the team to be seen to be functioning properly, and with cohesive integration. Thus, it was satisfying that the defence achieved a clean sheet, thanks to keeper Gary Robinson’s anticipation and full length dive which could be said to have forced the taker to pull an early second half penalty wide. Further forward Meads’ mid-field was a forceful blend of power, with Will Gerrish shaking the bar from twenty five yards and speed of thought and execution, sharpened by the pure pace of Matt Allen and Jack Costello’s penetrative passing, enabling leading scorer Jones to wreak havoc in a plodding defence as he added four to his season’s tally to take his total to nineteen.

Play-maker Costello showed he still had his shooting boots by hammering in numbers two and three from outside the area and newcomer to the squad, Tom Meredith showed his paces and scored from a deflected shot, and all before the interval. More germane to the prosperity of the rest of this season’s campaign was the fact that there was no let up by the hosts who relentlessly added four more on the restart through Ali McCombe’s header from a corner and a second half hat-trick from Jones who returned after recharging his batteries on the bench to be crowned MoM.

January 15, 2014