The 61 FC (Luton) 5 Padbury United 1

[AWK]

I arrived late for the match and between parking and walking to the pitch, which is no distance at all, Padbury scored....who said I was a jinx A great goal from Padbury actually, The 61 defence had pushed up but failed to catch the striker offside, and despite the fast back peddling keeper Matt Marsden hit a wonderful lob over him and into the net. I soon found out we had already scored twice by this point so where actually 2-1 up (phew!).

 

After the goal we struggled to gain any shape and were put under pressure by our visitors, with the defence looking shaky but we were given a lifeline when a needless penalty was conceeded, our player going away from goal when he was taken out, and the resulting spot kick was converted by Arron Lewis (which was his third of the match).

 

A much improved second period saw us go at Padbury, and a fine goal would have been scored in the 50th minute, the ball curling past the keeper and into the far corner until a Padbury defender pulled off a save with his outstretched arm, it made me laugh as he told the ref "sorry, I tried to get out of the way of it" when it was obvious that he done anything but! The ref ordered a penalty and gave the defender his marching orders, which the 61 players were asking the ref not to do but really he had no choice under the circumstances. Lewis picked the ball up and confidently slotted his second pen away, only for the ref to order a retake, so the same player put the ball to the other side to claim his fourth of the match, and ninth in the past two.

 

Ten minutes later and Stephen Gravestock hit a hard low shot into the bottom of the goal for 5-1 and really there should have been more to follow as the game was then played almost exclusively in the Padbury half, the real culprit was bad finishing as the keeper only had to make a handful of saves, and of those he would have been expected to save. As the match wore on the biggest problem was lack of light, and the last ten minutes were really a waste of time as no-one could see properly, both sets of players and the officials were struggling but the game was beyond doubt by now.

 

Arron Lewis second penalty (ordered to retake)

 

 

The retaken penalty:

 

 

Stephen Gravestock makes it 5:

 

[HTFCew]

Have The 61FC ever won 6-1?

[AWK]

Our last 6-1 win was at Mursley United last season, a repeat on Saturday would be very much welcome

[Rhodes]

AWK - Congratulations and great pics.

[AWK]

Cheers Rhodes, the games are coming thick and fast for The 61 at the moment so hopefully I will be posting more pics in the coming weeks. BTW when are you going to announce your new ground share mate?

[Rhodes]

As I keep saying all good things come to those who wait! I expect you're busy doing programmes then and it was good to see you win the Division 2 award, I'll put a copy of our latest in the post to you, all 84 pages of it.

[AWK]

Thanks Rhodes, I look forward to receiving your programme as I do hearing about your groundshare. I trust you will still be a SSML club next season?

[SteveR]

AWK - being a relatively new resident in Luton, where do you play your home games?

[Rhodes]

Originally Posted By: AWK

I trust you will still be a SSML club next season?

Well that goes without saying!

[AWK]

Hi Steve, we play at Kingsway Recreation Ground. The ground is well hidden away, access to it via car is from Beverly Road, which due to the one way system makes it harder to explain how to get to. Beverly Road itself is opposite the Big Yellow Storage place on Dunstable Road. However you can't drive down Beverly Road from there as its one way in the wrong direction (if you get what I mean) so you would have to drive to the next road (Chandos Road) turn left at the bottom, and left again and into Beverly Road, almost immediately take a right into Kingsway Recreation Ground.

 

Here is a map of the ground:

 

 

 

[SteveR]

Blimey - that's about 5 minutes walk from my flat at the most! I know where that is.

 

I see you have a couple of Wednesday home games left this season, I shall endeavour to pop down to at least one of them.

[AWK]

Excellent Steve, you will be more than welcome to come along. Admission is free of charge by the way.