Bees Brave Wintery Wind to Blow Away Wilmslow

The Bees started well, immediately pushing Wilmslow back into their own half, creating a number of chances and forcing a succession of penalty corners, which were defended well by the visitors, with Bees striker Richard Greenhough particularly unfortunate, seeing his powerful strike stopped on the line by a Wilmslow stick. But the Bees kept up the pressure, and in the twelfth minute the ball was played to Tom Hornsby, whose cross pinballed off the feet of three defenders, before crossing the line. Two minutes later, Hornsby popped up again with his second, finishing from close in after good work by James Skinkis.

After that, a little bit of complacency seemed to creep into the South Manchester attackers, and they began to over-complicate attacks, rather than stick with the simple passing that had reaped rewards. The game was also slowed by niggling challenges from both sides, with Vivek Tharaken and a Wilmslow striker both lucky to avoid cards for poor challenges, while Tom Ainsley was rightly Green-Carded for dissent. This allowed the Wilmslow defence to regroup and get through to half-time without conceding again.

South Manchester started the second with the same kind of focus that they had started the first, and just six minutes into the second half Hornsby completed his hat trick, sweeping the ball in at the back post after the Wilmslow defence had stopped shots from both Greenhough and captain Gareth Hampton. Hampton wasn’t to be denied though and added two to his tally for the season, the second after good work at a penalty corner left him one-on-one with the Wilmslow keeper. Another penalty corner led to another goal for the Bees, as the ball was played back to injector Matt Bottomley, who made no mistake with his sweep into the bottom corner.

There was still time for one more goal, as midfielder Simon Lamb eased his way through the Wilmslow defence before lifting the ball past the keeper. Hampton was almost able to complete his hat trick, but dawdled when through on goal and was stopped by the umpire calling time.

Man of the Match was awarded to Tom Ainsley for his strong performance in both attack and defence, whilst Dick of the Day was awarded to Tharaken for numerous poor challenges and arguing with the umpire.