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| Farnborough Town 0 Yeovil Town 0
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Scorers
None.
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Attendance : 870
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Officials
S. Tomlin (Lewes)
J. Singh (Hounslow - Red Trim)
S. Tomlinson (Farnham - Yellow Trim)
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Line-Up & Formation
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Malcolm Rigby |
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David Piper |
Rob Cousins |
Al-James Hannigan |
Dean Chandler |
Murray Fishlock |
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Steve Thompson |
Steve Stott |
Phil Simpson |
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Owen Pickard |
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Darren Keeling |
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Substitutes :
Tonkin (not used), Appleton (57 minutes for Keeling), B Smith (90 minutes for Thompson)
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Team Selection :
All change at the back yet again. Murray Fishlock and Rob Cousins returned, replacing an injured Kevan Brown and an incredibly unlucky Tony Pounderwho dropped completely out of the fourteen. Warren Patmore, like Brown, had a hamstring injury and so Keeling made his first start since January.
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| First Half :
Yeovil had put nine goals past Farnborough in their last two meetings. Farnborough were bottom of the league, and were so short of players they had only named two substitutes at their Saturday game against Barrow. It seemed as though Yeovil should have a feast day. True, the first half brought Yeovil much pressure, and half chances for Thompson and Keeling that went wide of the goal brought early promise.
On 17 minutes, Yeovil forced two clear chances. The first came when Keeling flicked back a ball wide of the goal-line and the shot by Simpson was deflected for a corner. Then from that corner, Pickard headed the ball down and there seemeed to be a strong case for handball near the goal line but nothing giving from the referee.
In fact bar those chances, Mr Tomlin, the referee seemed to be the most dominating figure on the park. He seemed to forget that football can be a contact sport, and so the game went in a stop/start routine, and neither side got anything further out of the half.
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| Half Time : Farnborough Town 0 Yeovil Town 0
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| Second Half :
If the first half was dull, then the second half took the biscuit. This was like watching paint dry. With Yeovil now facing an increasing wind, and Farnborough seemingly inept, bar Chris Boothe, the first 35 minutes of the half were devoid of action.
Arthur Appleton tried to liven things up by coming on as a substitute in the 57th minute for an increasingly non-existant Darren Keeling, but despite his enthusiasm little came his way.
Al-James Hannigan took his frustration out on the ball when yet another peculiar refereeing decision was made, and so he made the only indent in the referees notebook for kicking the ball away. Farnborough brought on Neil Davis for Nick Hooper with nine minutes left, but by then the game had fizzled out entirely. Farnborough had their attacks but Rigby looked confident in his handling and Cousins was mopping up everything else.
Some brief hope for Yeovil right at the end suggested a late goal but Stuart Harte took the ball off Appleton's boot for a corner.
Then with the last kick of the game,Steve Thompson limped off with a hamstring strain to give Ben Smith 20 seconds of fame, and from the corner taken by Simpson, a Hannigan header was cleared off the line by Lloyd Wye. Then finally the referee put us all out of our misery.
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| Final Score : Farnborough Town 0 Yeovil Town 0
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Verdict :
Sort of positive in the sense that Yeovil's defence looked far more sturdy than they did on Saturday, with Rob Cousins making an excellent return. But up front, Yeovil had near zero creativity and were missing Patmore badly. As entertainment value this was a one-star match, and Yeovil were just going through the motions, seemingly content with the single point. The staggering thing was that Farnborough felt the same, failing to manage a single shot on target all game.
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| Badger's Man of the Match : Rob Cousins :
Like Saturday, few players deserved credit for this performance. One exception was Rob, who despite having very little to do, mopped it up well, and ensured that Farnborough put little pressure on Rigby's goal.
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