Dulwich Hamlet v Ashford Town. Ryman Division One South. 24th of January 2009.

Dulwich Hamlet 1 Ashford Town 1
from Your Milton Keynes Correspondent

Today’s fixture away to Dulwich Hamlet took us deep into South London – not for our longest trip in the calendar, but certainly for the slowest and most arduous. On our two previous trips to Champion Hill, we’ve gone clockwise around the M25, over the Dartford Bridge, off at Junction 3 and then crawled our way through South East London. Today, we decided to do something different, approaching Dulwich from the West, using the M3 as our spur off the M25. Leaving Milton Keynes shortly before 11.30am, all began well, since, having been the bane of our life for the past two season, the roadworks on the Luton section of the M1 are now complete. Helped by four broad, free-flowing lanes of speeding traffic, we passed Heathrow after about half an hour’s drive. There was soon some delay as we competed for space with the middle-classes of England in the Twickenham area – it seems that both Harlequins and Rosslyn Park were playing catch at home – and we sort of made it up as we went along after that, but we arrived at the ground just before 2pm, and claimed a much-coveted space in the stadium’s car park.

One other snag about the trip to Dulwich is that there is not a convenient pub that does decent food on the way to the ground. Instead, we sought much-needed sustenance, in the form of a coffee and a sandwich, in the Starbucks that is housed within the Sainsburys store right next-door to the ground.

I’m very glad that we did, as we bumped into former Ashford Town Manager John Cumberbatch. A former player at The Hamlet, John was able to update us on how some of the former Ashford players are getting on at Champion Hill. He reported that his son Marc, the Dulwich Hamlet captain, has been playing well at the moment, but that Walid Matata has suffered from a succession of injuries. I enquired about John-Paul Collier, but the news of J-P is that he is currently nursing a fairly serious cruciate injury, having played just the one game for the club, (in which he scored).

Today’s hosts are actually going through a tough time with injuries, particularly with their strikers, and the official team news was that top-scorer Laurent Hamici, who has knocked in 13 league goals so far this season – a total currently bettered only by Kingstonian’s Bobby Traynor – was on the injury list. The anecdotal info from a Dulwich Hamlet fan was that the home side was to be represented up front by a defender and a midfielder.

There were no such problems for Steve Lovell, except for the fact that his injured-again son Mark was present at the ground in a purely supportive capacity – and the fact that Steve was himself laid up in bed, meaning that Assistant Manager Hugo Langton took sole control of the team today. With an otherwise full squad to pick from, the only real intrigue these days, as far as team selection is concerned, revolves around who partners Ryan Briggs in central midfield: Charlie Glyde, Danny Lye or James Humphries ? Well, today the shirt was given to Charlie Glyde – unsurprisingly, probably, given his reportedly good display at home to Burgess Hill Town on Saturday.

The full, familiar line-up, with subs, therefore, was: Barton, Elford, Brathwaite D, Brathwaite E, Ray (capt.), Browne, Briggs, Glyde, Sherwood, Jones and Wilkins, with Ibrahim, Lye, Humphries, Bottle and Spice on the bench. The presence of Darren Ibrahim in the dug-out as sub goalie tells us that the luckless Josh Willis is still not fit – Josh was prowling around Champion Hill this afternoon, probably reflecting on what he wouldn’t give to have a chance of keeping goal behind that very solid back four !

For those who haven’t had the benefit of visiting this ground, the main feature here is the main stand. I always find this beige brick-built structure, with “DHFC” embossed in large letters, to be deeply impressive. I can’t say many nice things about the pitch, unfortunately. It looked to be very muddy in the centre, and also in both penalty areas, with divots throughout, even before the kick-off. Having passed a precautionary 10am inspection, it was a good guess that it had soaked up plenty of rain recently, and those who had walked on it reported it to be very soft under foot. This prepared us for the fact that today’s game might be a bit of a battle, rather than a feast of fluid football – which was a shame, given that it was a bright, windless afternoon, which was otherwise ideal for footy.

Given the temperature reading of 6ºC, it was surprisingly mild, sitting at the back of the stand, warmed by a watery, setting sun. There was also a cacophony of colour, down on the pitch, with the home side in pink shirts, navy blue sleeves, shorts and sockies, contrasting with the yellow shirts, green shorts and yellow socks of the visitors – with the added splash of colour provided by the yellow ball and Walid Matata’s famous yellow boots, (although the latter were mostly tucked under the Dulwich bench today).

One slightly unusual thing about the Dulwich Hamlet squad today was that all 16 players, with the exception of the goalkeeper, were black. It doesn’t make any difference to anything – it’s just unusual, that’s all.

More to the point, Dulwich looked a decent side this afternoon, and they made a fast start to the match, no doubt fired up by Manager Craig Edwards to rise to the challenge of facing a team that had won its previous seven league games on the trot. They had a corner in the opening seconds, which was strongly headed clear by Sean Ray – not for the last time this afternoon. The ball fell to Daryl Plummer, on the edge of the area. His first stab at the ball was a complete air shot, but he had time to connect with a second attempt, which he pulled wide.

Although Dulwich had most possession in the opening quarter of an hour, when Ashford did have the ball they knocked it around with an instinctive fluency that only develops when players’ confidence is high and they’re comfortable with playing in a settled team. The home side certainly wasn’t afraid to shoot from long range, but their execution was fairly poor, which effectively nullified their early efforts. Stanley Muguo was one of the worst culprits; he hit a long-range shot well wide, in the twelfth minute, after Sean Ray had headed a corner clear, and then, in the 16th minute, he attempted a shot from even further out, which missed by twice as much. (I won’t make any Mr Magoo jokes – but it’s tempting !). A minute later, big No.9 Cedric Ngakam picked the ball up straight from a Seb Barton kick-out, and careered forward, through the Ashford half. With the visitors’ defence pushing upfield, expecting the ball to have sailed forward over their head, there were plenty of good options for Ngakam to invite a team-mate to run into space, but he instead attempted a shot from long range, which missed the target.

By the 27th minute, with Ashford’s final ball being poor, there had been no threat to either goalkeeper – nor had there been any hint of indiscipline or animosity between the two sides. That all changed in an instant, when Tony Browne made a poor tackle on Daryl Plummer. Contrary to some reports elsewhere, it was not two-footed, but it was over the top of the ball – and it was probably not insignificant that it happened right in front of the Dulwich Hamlet bench. Immediately, some of the home side’s substitutes and officials crossed the white line to vent their disapproval of the challenge – but it was former Ashford Town left-back Nathan Simpson who rushed up to “strike the first blow”. Everything happened in a few frantic moments, and we all see these things differently, but my take was that Simpson somehow managed to keep his hands by his side, and merely “chested” Browney away – but there were others there who speak of seeing a punch thrown, and I wouldn’t argue with what they say they saw.

Simpson was merely shown the yellow card, so we might deduce from that that Referee Ian Crouch saw, (or rather didn’t see), the same as me. Tony Browne was sent off the old-fashioned way. No silly red card. No prolonged lecture as a prelude to the sending off by a would-be celebrity ref grandstanding to the cameras. Referee Crouch immediately just gestured in the direction of the nearby dressing rooms, telling Browne to be on his way. Skipper Sean Ray was also booked during the prolonged delay. I don’t know the reason for the booking, but I have to say that the referee handled the whole incident pretty well. It wasn’t the worst tackle I’ve seen on a football pitch, and I didn’t see it as being a stone-cold red card, but the tackle was late, and it was over the top of the ball, so it was probably the correct decision.

Worse was to follow for Ashford. Play eventually restarted, on the half-hour mark, with a free-kick to Dulwich, close to the touchline. Benson Paka pumped the kick long, into the Ashford penalty area. The ball was allowed to go all the way to the far post. Although I couldn’t see exactly what happened, from the back of the stand – I really must invest in some Peter O’Sullevan binoculars – it appeared that Seb Barton was struggling to deal with the situation, and Junior Kaffo somehow managed to bundle the ball into the back of the net. Regardless of the detail, it was Dulwich Hamlet 1 Ashford Town 0.

So, from riding the wave of an unbeaten run of eleven games that had seen them rise to third in the table, Ashford were suddenly faced with a real test of their character and resolve, (not to mention quality). The immediate problem was having to come from a goal down, with ten men, against one of the better teams in the division. More long term, Steve Lovell would have the conundrum of how to cope with the breaking up of his settled side. I’m convinced that consistency of team selection, which has been made possible by consistency of player availability, has made a major contribution to the achievement of consistency in terms of results over the past few weeks. Although Steve still has a strong squad to pick from, that all-important continuity is about to come to an end to some extent. Razor’s yellow card was his fifth of the season, meaning that he will be suspended for one game, due to the totting-up system. Depending on the detail of the referee’s report, Tony Browne will be banned for one, two or maybe three games.

The immediate solution to going a man down this afternoon was for Craig Wilkins to revert to being a defender, filling in at right-back, with Jimmy Elford moving up to occupy the gap left by the Browne Dog on the right side of midfield. We therefore played out the remainder of the half with a 4-4-1 formation, but Mitch Sherwood pushed up, whenever possible, so that it was sometimes more 4-3-2. (Thinking further ahead, with Steve Lovell’s seven-day approach for a striker, as cover in the squad, still “live”, it is likely that Wilko will find himself deployed rather more in defence than attack whilst Steve Lovell negotiates this short period of turbulence).

In spite of the home side’s numerical advantage, the next clear-cut chance fell to the team in yellow and green – and it was our best chance of the half, which really should have been converted. Jimmy Elford attempted a long-range shot, from outside the area, in the 36th minute, which was deflected into the path of Mitch Sherwood, just inside the penalty area. With only goalkeeper Jamie Lunan to beat, I think there’s a pretty strong consensus among Ashford Town watchers that the free-scoring Mitch Sherwood we had playing for us early on in the season would have stuck this past Lunan without too much fuss. Unfortunately, the confidence just doesn’t seem to be there at the moment, and the effort was tentative, and the save was made. Mitch did manage to pick up the rebound, but the Dulwich defence shepherded him away from goal, and the chance was gone.

One thing I should mention, however, is that, although it’s a long time since Mitchell has looked a potent goal threat, he did a great deal of good work defensively today, putting in some good, biting tackles.

The ten men of Ashford soldiered on to half time without further loss, in terms of goals, but there was the worrying sight of Skipper Sean Ray seeming to injure a shoulder, in the 44th minute. Sean took the ball into the Dulwich half, with a lumbering, but determined, run, and, as the home bench hurriedly loaded the big gun with the tranquiliser darts, it took the combined efforts of two players to body-check him to the ground. After flexing the shoulder a few times, our man-mountain rose from the ground, and the free-kick, which was launched into the Dulwich penalty area, led to two successive Ryan Briggs corners – but both were headed clear by the defence.

So, after three minutes of added time at the end of the first half, the two teams trooped in with Dulwich Hamlet leading 1-0.

It was certainly a test for stand-in Manager, Hugo Langton, to respond tactically to the Browne Dog’s sending off, and Hugo responded by replacing right-back Jimmy Elford with striker Bradley Spice, to restore a positive, two-man attack. The versatile Craig Wilkins remained at right-back, and Mitchell Sherwood switched to the right side of what initially looked to be a three-man midfield, but left-back Daniel Brathwaite pushed up the left flank whenever he could, so it was either a 4-3-2, or a 3-4-2, formation, depending on when you were looking.

Early on in the second half, Ashford seemed to catch the Dulwich Shooting Wide Disease, with Ryan Briggs aiming an ambitious lob well wide of the target, and Mitch Sherwood slicing a right-foot shot wide, in the 49th minute. A minute later, Brathwaite D was yellow-carded for a late tackle on Peter Martin, (which was a further reminder of how suspensions might yet derail Ashford’s push for a play-off place), but the whole momentum of the match swung in the 52nd minute, when the visitors equalised. The goal was simplicity itself, and stemmed from a straight-forward kick-out by Jamie Lunan. He got good distance with the kick, which found Craig Wilkins, just inside the Ashford half. Wilko met the ball with one of the most amazing headers, for distance, I’ve ever seen, as it found Paul Jones, in space, just outside the “D” of the Dulwich penalty area. Jonah took his time to line up his shot, and, with Lunan barely having had time to regain his position, thumped the ball firmly into the net, about a foot inside the far post. That’s now eleven goals for Paul in the league, as he climbs higher up the Ryman Division One South table of goal scorers.

For a time, it looked like Ashford had every chance of going on to take this game, with the whole psychology of the match turned on its head. Almost immediately, Charlie Glyde had a shooting chance, but was disappointed to scuff his shot well wide. In-form Charlie was visibly even more disappointed, in the 56th minute, when Hugo Langton replaced him with Danny Lye in what was a very courageous, tactical substitution – and it was good to see that Hugo immediately took the time to explain to Charlie precisely why the change had been made.

The psychological pendulum swung a little further away from the home side, in the 57th minute, when ‘keeper Jamie Lunan fluffed control of a gentle backpass, and allowed the ball to trickle over his goal line. All of the R&J Coaches away-day party saw that the ball had crossed the line, and so did the Lino, who was perfectly positioned, by the corner flag, so a corner was awarded. The kick was swung into the six-yard box by Ryan Briggs, from the left, and the ball popped up in the air off somebody’s head or shoulder. Elliott Brathwaite was positioned right underneath the ball, but somehow managed to head it over the bar, from about three yards out.

Dulwich soon recovered their composure, and got back into the game, and had a free-kick in a dangerous position, about ten yards outside the penalty area, when Mitch Sherwood was guilty of a late tackle on former Ashford captain Marc Cumberbatch, in the 60th minute – but the attempted shot went straight into the Ashford wall.

Illuminated by floodlights that were as watery as the Winter sun had been in the first half, the play was not for the faint-hearted, with strong challenges flying in from both teams, and the pitch not becoming any easier to play on - but Dulwich centre-half Shayne Mangodza thoroughly deserved a yellow card when cynically bringing down Paul Jones, in the 65th minute. Ashford looked to be developing a two-against-two situation as Jones chased a ball down the right flank, when Mangodza, wearing what looked to be a silk, navy blue swimming cap, bundled him over. Unfortunately, Daniel Brathwaite rather wasted the free-kick, from the corner of the penalty area.

In the 71st minute, Dulwich rose above the under-foot conditions and put together a flowing passing movement which culminated in a clear-cut chance, in the centre of the Ashford area, but Mitch Sherwood did well to come sweeping across with a covering interception. Seb Barton was unable to prevent the ball from trickling over the by-line, but the resulting corner was headed clear.

As the pitch became browner and browner, there was a sign, in the 73rd minute, of how tiring it was to play on, when Paul Jones went down with cramp. In fact, it was at about this point that the ten men of Ashford appeared to start to tire, and the one-man advantage began to take its toll, as Dulwich finished the stronger. This late ascendancy was undoubtedly helped by the fact that Manager Craig Edwards took full advantage of having three substitutions up his sleeve, periodically bolstering his side with fresh legs. He made his first substitution as late as the 77th minute, when he replaced Daryl Plummer with Daniel Francis, and his side could, and should, have scored, just two minutes later. A cross from the left touchline was superbly whipped in by Nathan Simpson, almost placed on the head of Cedric Ngakam, in the centre, about ten yards out, but Cedric powered his header over the bar.

That was the signal for Craig Edwards to introduce an old favourite of the Ashford crowd – Walid Matata. Walid scored 16 goals for Ashford during the two previous seasons, at a rate of a goal every 220 minutes, which is a rate that has only been bettered in recent years by George Fenwick (of the strikers who have made it into double figures). There were a few boos from the knot of Ashford fans behind the goal, but undoubtedly all in fun.

Although there was plenty of defending for Ashford to do in the closing minutes, we did have our moments at the other end. In the 82nd minute, a long free-kick from about the half-way line was aimed towards Bradley Spice and Danny Lye, in the Dulwich penalty area, but the ball wouldn’t settle for either of them, and eventually rolled past the post, for a goal kick. Two minutes later, Bradley Spice won a corner, on the right, and attempted an ambitious back-header from the resulting cross, from Ryan Briggs, but the effort went well wide.

Everyone was back defending, in the 85th minute, after a Craig Wilkins trip gave Dulwich a free-kick, close to the left touchline, about ten yards from the corner flag. Seb Barton appeared to take the resulting cross cleanly, but then dropped the ball, before catching up with it before any damage could be done. It’s undoubtedly a tribute to the Ashford defence to point out that this was Seb’s most significant contribution in the second half, as I can’t remember him having to make a save during this time.

The home side’s final substitution saw Sol Pinnock replace big Junior Kaffo, in the 88th minute, to play the final two minutes of normal time, plus the three minutes of second-half injury time. Ashford managed to hang on for a well-deserved point, but it’s fair to say that Dulwich Hamlet probably had the better chances to take the three points after Ashford had equalised. Perhaps the best of these chances came in the 93rd, and final, minute. A cross from the right was headed away from the visitors’ goalmouth, but found Stanley Muguo, on the edge of the area. Mr Muguo squinted in the direction of a gaping goal, but hit a firm shot over the bar.

So the boys certainly came through the stern test of character that was set for them when they suffered the double blow of Tony Browne’s 27th-minute sending off and going behind from the resulting free-kick. I don’t think that anyone in the crowd of 270 – the second-highest league attendance of the season here at Champion Hill – thought that 1-1 was not a fair result. It was also a result that both sides might privately have been fairly happy with before the game started, with both harbouring ambitions of a play-off place at the end of the season. Well, neither side had such ambitions harmed by today’s result, as, incredibly, all of the teams in and around the play-off zone drew this afternoon. The only team in the top half of the table not to do so was leaders Kingstonian, who play tomorrow (Sunday), at home to Walton Casuals.

Well, the run of seven consecutive victories had to end some time, but at least Ashford extended their unbeaten run in the league to twelve games. Another impressive statistic is that the Nuts & Bolts remain unbeaten in league matches on a Saturday since we threw away a two-goal lead at Corinthian Casuals on the 6th of September !

Whilst Nathan Simpson was announced as the home side’s Man of the Match, our award could have gone to any one of the lads who did another solid job in the back four. Sean Ray just shaded it today, becoming the first player to be named as MoM in away games three times this season, so Razor now leads the race for the Milton Keynes Bowl.

Man of the Match
(to go towards the Milton Keynes Bowl)
Sean Ray