East Grinstead Town v Ashford United. Isthmian League Division 1 South-East. 21st of September 2019.

East Grinstead Town  1

Ashford United  3

from Ashford United’s Milton Keynes Correspondent

First game of the season for me - and Ashford’s eighth – although I did turn up for the game at Whyteleafe last week. On that occasion, ten minutes before kick-off, what sounded like a space ship descended upon the ground and landed on the pitch. Sadly, it was an air ambulance, and because it had come to attend to the mother of one of the Whyteleafe players, the match was, quite rightly, called off.

There were no such problems today, though. It was the perfect Saturday. A cloudless, late-September afternoon. All the trains ran on time – and Ashford United won away. Today’s win lifts Ashford to second in the division. More importantly, it maintains our 100% record in the league, after five games. Sevenoaks Town are the current leaders, a point ahead of us, but having played two games more.

After last season’s highest-ever finish for the Club since The Reformation – fourth in the Isthmian League Division 1 South East – the narrative over the summer was that things would be tougher for us this time around, in the light of a significant cut in the playing budget. That may well eventually turn out to be the case, but there has been no sign of this so far. On the evidence of my first sight of the boys, we appear to have a very solid team, and I would trust in Tommy Warrilow’s experience and pedigree as a manager to ensure that we are there or thereabouts, challenging for promotion, at the end of the season.

The team news, on arrival at the ground, was that our hosts, East Grinstead Town, had made six changes since their last match – which was probably a reflection of The Wasps starting the day third-bottom of the league, having managed just the three points from their first six games. For Ashford, Jay May, with just one goal to his name so far this season, had been relegated to the bench, with Tashi-Jay Kwayie playing further forward, to partner David Smith up front. This change might have been partly to do with the fact that Tommy Warrilow had a new name to put on the team sheet, that of Aaron Condon, who wore the No.11 shirt this afternoon. Another slight surprise (to me) was that Sam Mott, our goalie, was Ashford’s captain, although the rest of the team had a very familiar ring about it, with Warrilow having stuck with pretty much the same team during the season to date: Josh Wisson and Mohammed Kamara in central defence; Jerald Aboagye at right-back and Jake McIntyre at left-back; Danny Walder, Zak Henry, Lee Prescott and Aaron Condon in midfield. Joining Jay May on the bench were Hassan Ibrahiym, Levi Gold, Theo Osinfolarin (a name which seems vaguely elvish) and spare goalie Lee Hook.

It’s always a pleasure to come here. East Court is an entirely tree-lined ground, set in parkland, and it’s a pleasant 20 minutes’ walk from East Grinstead Rail Station – left at the church, past the tennis courts and then through Mount Noddy Cemetery (which is a damn silly name for a cemetery – sounds like an instruction to Big Ears).

The pitch also looked a picture – flat and with short grass – and this probably contributed a great deal to an entertaining and fast-paced first half. The first 20 minutes were particularly full of action, with each team scoring at the beginning and the end of this period of play.

It was Ashford who scored first, with Aaron Condon taking just five minutes to get off the mark for his new club. A long cross from Jerald Aboagye, from the right, found Condon near the left edge of the penalty area. Rather than crossing the ball, his first touch took him past the defender, with the ball now on his right foot, and he placed a low shot under the body of goalkeeper Brannon Daly.

But the home side came back at Ashford with plenty of good, fast football, and looked anything but a side having just two teams below them in the league. Just a minute after going behind, they had a corner. This was taken short, resulting in a firm shot from an acute angle, which required a good, diving save from Sam Mott. Five minutes later, a long clearance from Mott created a three-against-three situation for Ashford, but this resulted in Tashie-Jay Kwayie hitting a shot straight at the goalie. Both sides also had dangerous free-kick situations, near to the opponent’s by-line – Ashford in the 13^th minute, after Jake McIntyre was needlessly hacked down from behind by Andrew Blake, and East Grinstead in the 15^th minute, after Aaron Condon made a very late ‘striker’s tackle’ on Gil Carvalho – but neither chance was converted.

In the 16^th minute, an Ashford break from defence ended with ginger-haired No.8 Kwayie finding David Smith with just the one defender to beat, but Smith could do no more than win a corner – which was over-hit by Zak Henry. Two minutes later, full-back Jerald Aboagye, who was dangerous down the right for Ashford all afternoon, won a corner. The resulting cross was met with a powerful header by Lee Prescott, near the edge of the penalty area, but his effort went straight at goalkeeper Brannon Daly. That was also the fate of a curling shot by David Smith in the 19^th minute.

With both teams launching their fair share of attacks during this opening period, East Grinstead’s equaliser, which came in the 20^th minute, was by no means against the run of play, and it came as a result of a wonderful piece of skill from O’shaye Giraud-Hutchinson. After a good build-up by The Wasps on the left side of the field, the ball was fed inside to O’shaye, who hit a curling shot, from about 25 yards, into the top corner of the net. Sam Mott was at full stretch with a dive, but he never had a chance to get near Giraud-Hutchinson’s shot.

Following the East Grinstead goal, Ashford had an uncertain spell during which several passes went astray, and we seemed to be conceding all the free-kicks. However, order was restored in the 35^th minute, thanks to a moment of pure inspiration from Jerald Aboagye – who was a strong candidate for Man of the Match, this afternoon. Picking the ball up a few yards from the corner of the penalty area, Jerald charged towards goal and simply lashed the ball into the net.

The visitors had the better of the final ten minutes of the half – their best chance during this time falling to Aaron Condon, in the 37^th minute, after a good move involving David Smith and Lee Prescott, but his shot went over the bar – and so they were good value for their 1-2 lead at the break.

East Grinstead made one substitution at half time, replacing Oluwajuwon Akintunde with Misha Djemaili, (which was the worst nightmare of the PA announcer, who struggled with players’ names all afternoon), but it was O’shaye Giraud-Hutchinson who had the home side’s first chance of the second half. This came after Jerald Aboagye had headed behind for a corner, in the 47^th minute. The corner was taken short, to O’shaye, who again showed great skill in sending in a curling shot towards the far post, managing to wrap his foot around the ball as he was running away from goal, but this time his effort went wide.

I don’t know the extent to which Tashi-Jay Kwayie was playing out of position, up front, but he generally looked fairly bewildered, and uncertain as to the role he should be playing. There were times when he actually got in David Smith’s way. This lack of assistance for Smith might have explained why the latter didn’t quite look like a man who had scored eight goals in six-and-a-bit appearances this season. Smith did enough when on the ball to show that he is certainly a class act as a striker – he had a great first touch, and showed good close control – but he had a frustrating time in front of goal for most of the afternoon.

T-J, too, looked a skillful player when on the ball, and he did set Smith up with a simple chance to score, in the 48^th minute. Attacking down the right, he managed to get to the by-line and send in a good cross, which was intercepted by an East Grinstead defender. There were immediate calls of “Hand Ball” from the Ashford fans behind the goal – who made up a large proportion of today’s crowd of 113 – and the referee, who was well positioned, immediately pointed to the penalty spot. There were no complaints from the East Grinstead players.

The expectation was that David Smith would step up and put away his ninth goal of the season, but Brannon Daly saved his low shot. The ball went straight back to Smith, and slotting home the rebound appeared to be easier than scoring from the penalty itself, but Daly somehow kept the follow-up effort out with his feet. It sort of summed up David Smith’s afternoon, but he looks capable of scoring many more goals this season.

Smith might have shown a little frustration, just two minutes later, when he bundled over O’shaye Giraud-Hutchinson, in a dangerous position. The resulting free-kick was an in-swinging cross, which was allowed to travel all the way through the Ashford penalty area, eventually going harmlessly away for a goal-kick. At the other end, in the 53^rd minute, Lee Prescott shot from just outside the penalty area, but straight at the goalkeeper. But the next incident of real note happened a minute later, and we might have witnessed the Goal of the Season. It came from a corner, on the right, which was conceded by Drew Cooney, as he cut out a Kwayie cross from the right. The resulting corner was hit deep, and was met by Aaron Condon with a beautifully-timed volley. The ball was screaming towards the far top corner of the net, but was headed away by the defender at the far post.

Condon had a similar chance in the 57^th minute, which was created by some good play between Kwayie and Aboagye. It was the right-back who supplied the deep cross, from the right, and this time Aaron hit his volley just as sweetly, but it was just too high.

There now followed a very scrappy passage of play during which not a great deal of football was played. There were a number of stoppages for free-kicks, and some niggles between players, and the Ashford players were perfectly happy to take plenty of time over goal-kicks, free-kicks and throw-ins. The situation just threatened to boil over in about the 65^th minute, when Ashford’s Zak Henry and East Grinstead’s Craig McGee had a session of ‘hand bags’ in the middle of the pitch – but the referee sorted things out with a quiet word. In fact, the ref was excellent all game. He was very decisive with his decisions and managed to maintain control of the game whilst keeping his cards in his trousers. His patience finally ran out with Zak Henry, however, in the 72^nd minute, when the Ashford No.7 was a little over-aggressive with a challenge once too often. It was a daft yellow card to pick up, given that Zak had received plenty of verbal warnings.

The attacks that were launched during this stop-start period of the game came from Ashford, and, in the 70^th minute, David Smith had a great chance to brighten up his entire afternoon. Jerald Aboagye got the better of East Grinstead’s tall, blond centre-forward Dean Bown, inside the home side’s half, which presented Ashford with a four-against-three situation. The ball was worked nicely, to give Smith a clear shooting chance from about ten yards out, but he fluffed his shot wide.

Smith finally got his goal in the 73^rd minute, the culmination of what was probably Ashford’s best move of the match. Tashi-Jay Kwayie moved the ball out to Jerald Aboagye, who was, as usual, wide on the right. Aboagye’s cross was deep, beyond the far post, from where Aaron Condon steered the ball across the face of the East Grinstead goal. David Smith was at the far post, stooping very low to head the ball into the net, from a couple of feet out.

And that third goal for Ashford was the final meaningful action of the game. There were substitutions made by the home side – Robin Deen for Dean Brown in the 81^st minute, and Dan Pearse for goal-scorer O’shaye Giraud-Hutchinson in the 84^th minute – but these seemed to be made for the sake of giving players a run out in the team, rather than to make a meaningful attempt to get something from the game. In fact, the home side spent the final 15 minutes of the game building patiently, putting sequences of passes together, but rarely managing to leave their own half of the field. Ashford were quite content to ‘sit in’ for the remainder of the game, and, in truth, after a fairly even first half, Sam Mott did have a very easy time of it in the second half. Tommy Warrilow did replace Kwayie with Levi Gold, in the 78^th minute, and Aaron Condon with Theo Osinfolarin, in the 80^th minute, but the match rather dozed off after the third Ashford goal.

This was a good win for Ashford. The scoreline might have been more emphatic if David Smith had had better support and had had a better finishing day, but there is plenty of cause for optimism for United’s fans for the season to come.