Sloppy start leaves Dockers too much to do

Newhaven 2 Eastbourne United 3, RUR Cup Second Round

A third home game in just seven days brought Eastbourne United to Fort Road in the second round of the RUR Cup.

Following a fiery, hard-fought league encounter between the two sides earlier in the season, it was hard to imagine seeing anything different this time around. 

These are two teams who have serious title aspirations and, while there may have been no points on offer last night, a win would surely offer the victors a serious morale boost going forward.

In fairness, after 20 minutes a hard-fought encounter was far from what we were seeing. There was only one team in it. Unfortunately for the Dockers, that team was Eastbourne United.

Newhaven had actually gone close to opening the scoring inside a couple of minutes; Marcell Powell curling just wide from the corner of the 18-yard-box.

That would be as good as it would get for the hosts for quite a while. With less than five minutes on the clock, United took the lead. A well worked move down the right culminated with the ball being fired low across the box, where 16-year-old Mason Creese was waiting to tap his side into the lead.

Ten minutes later it was two. Again, Eastbourne played some great stuff in the build-up, tearing a hole in Newhaven’s left-flank before another pull back from the right found Max Thompson who finished clinically past the helpless Jake Buss to double the visitor’s advantage.

Newhaven were visibly rocking. United sensed blood, looking to attack the shaky Dockers defence at every opportunity. The fact their number three had possibly the longest throw I’ve ever seen – easily able to reach the penalty spot from around the halfway line – was not exactly helping Newhaven to relieve the near constant pressure. 

Eastbourne just looked sharper in every department. 

Startingly slowly – dare I say sloppily – is a trend that had dogged the Dockers at times this season. Steyning on the opening weekend and Bexhill in the league a few weeks ago both instantly spring to mind.

While they managed to sail through the Bexhill storm unscathed and managed to stay in the game against Steyning when they could have been well out of it by half-time (even though they did ultimately end up losing), Eastbourne were clearly not in the mood to let their struggling hosts off the hook.

It took around 25 minutes for Newhaven to truly start to settle. The Eastbourne keeper had to be alert to tip over a shot from the typically industrious Marcin Ruda, while a number of other shots were fired at the visiting goal. Unfortunately, they were more concerning to the night-time skaters in the skate park than they were the United custodian.

With Newhaven seemingly starting to gain a measure of stability, on 32 minutes Eastbourne scored what would ultimately prove to be the decisive third. And if ever there was a goal to perfectly encapsulate a half of football (from Newhaven's perspective), then this was it.

Having defended the constant barrage of long throws fairly well, the defence simply fell apart from a mis-hit corner. A scuffed effort from Simon Johnson really shouldn’t have beaten the first man (men). Unfortunately, a lack of communication somewhere along the line saw two defenders leave the barely moving ball for each other, Buss leave it for the defenders, allowing the ball to somehow end up in the back of the net. Even this morning, sitting here typing this, I’m still baffled to exactly how this happened!

To be fair to the Dockers, the last 10 minutes of the half was their best of the match to date (although this isn't saying much). While you couldn’t call it dominant, there were occasional glimpses as to what they’re capable of. Ruda and the recently introduced John Lucero (on for the injured Billy Barker) were at the heart of most of the improved things the hosts were doing.

At the interval, though, it was hard to see a way back for the Dockers. Especially against a team as well versed in game management as Eastbourne United. Yes, some of their antics can be frustrating to watch at times but, and let’s be fair here, if it’s your team carrying them out, you’re not complaining.

Five minutes into the second-half, however, and it was slightly easier to see a way back into the game. Not for the first time this season (sorry starting to sound like a broken record here) it was a completely different Dockers team who emerged after the restart.

Within five minutes they were back in it. Fort Road has witnessed a few wonder strikes in recent weeks – Ryan Blunt, Bailie Rogers… - and here was another one to add to the collection.

This time Ruda was the protagonist, brilliantly working some space for himself outside the area before curling a sublime effort into the top corner. A brilliant goal – although possibly not even the best of the night. More of that in a bit.

Suddenly, it was the Dockers who were dominant and United who looked shaky; looking to take the sting out of the game wherever possible.

Newhaven thought they had another goal back just past the hour, when a header from a corner crashed back off the bar. The referee waved away appeals that the ball had crossed the line and then dismissed more vehement appeals that a United defender had handled the ball to stop it from going over.

It was impossible to see from where I was standing quite what had happened as the bundle of bodies trying to force the ball either over or away from the line was more reminiscent of a rugby scrum than to anything you typically see on a football pitch.

With the game’s tempo becoming ever more frantic, a number of niggly incidents began to take place all over the pitch, making it really difficult for the officials to take control. I actually thought for the most part the officials handled the game fairly well in difficult circumstances but, surely, there are only so many ‘last warnings’ you can give to players before taking action. They do make a rod off their own back on occasion (at least in my opinion).

With the game entering the first of almost ten minutes of injury time (as previously mentioned, there was a fair bit of 'game management' going on) Newhaven got a second. It was another unreal strike, this time from Lucero, lashing a dipping, angled volley from the corner of the area (on his weaker foot) into the far corner.

The Docker’s October goal of the month competition is going to be simply unreal!

From there on it was near-constant Newhaven pressure as they pressed for the unlikeliest of unlikely equalisers.

With almost the last kick of the match, Ruda thought he had sent the game to penalties only to see his low strike go inches the wrong side of the post.

So it is Eastbourne United who progress into the next round of the RUR, where they face last year’s SCFL champions Littlehampton.

While the Dockers can rightly be proud of their second-half performance (I can’t personally recall witnessing many better 45 minutes from them this season) they were punished for their sloppy start and allowing a quality team to get too many goals in front before they finally woke up. Credit has to go to United here, who were electric in the opening exchanges, clearly more up for it than the hosts and that’s ultimately what won them the game.

Regardless of the result, it ended up being a great spectacle full of excitement. Something that hadn’t looked likely at half-time. The beauty of non-league football, my friends.

It’s yet another home game this weekend, with in-form Hassocks the next visitors to Fort Road in what looks like being a hugely important top-of-the-table clash.

Get yourselves down there. While I can’t 100 per cent proclaim that entertainment is guaranteed, I can rightly declare with some confidence that it’s more than likely!

Come on you Dockers!

My MOM (aka, the controversial part): Marcin Ruda and John Lucero. Simply impossible to split the two goal-scorers. Ruda looked on a different level to everyone else on the pitch at times and marries his skill with constant endeavour. Lucero’s introduction, meanwhile, helped to swing the game in Newhaven’s favour, with the right-back a constant presence up and down the right flank, putting in a number of dangerous crosses and scoring an absolutely worldie!