Friendly
Dawlish A 2
Okehampton Men's A 4
THE Okehampton A team in their penultimate friendly game faced a tough fight against Dawlish A who finished fourth in the league above last season.
Okehampton started off well and quickly found their rhythm. Forwards Jake Lloyd and Tom Forrester caused problems for the Dawlish defence and the Oke back line of Martin Jones, Mike Reynolds and Dave Dennis snuffed out any opposition attacks.
The visitors took the lead after ten minutes when some good play from Forrester resulted in him passing the ball to Jake Lloyd, who took a moment to compose himself before putting the ball into the net.
Things got even better for Oke with more good play from Forrester which allowed him to finish off a great solo goal.
Dawlish did have some good chances but Dave Dennis, who had an exceptional game throughout, managed to get a crucial touch on what was surely a goal scoring opportunity.
Okehampton scored a third just before the break in the best worked goal of the game with Jake Lloyd and Hayden Bond combining with a 1-2 which left Lloyd in front of an open net which he could hardly miss.
After the break there was a marked improvement in the general performance from the Oke team with a lot more passing play but it was Dawlish who clawed one back through a short corner after some clever passing to take out the Oke defence before firing it into the back of the net.
With the intense heat, Okehampton tired and it left Dawlish to control the match after some good passing, the home team cut through the Oke defence to score. This set up a tense finish to the match with both sides having chances.
Brett Lawson was thwarted by a superb diving save from the Dawlish keeper and Dawlish being denied a third by the faintest of touches from keeper Pete Sim to tip it past the right hand post.
Okehampton killed the game off when Tom Forrester scored his second with a powerful strike into the net.
Okehampton men of the match were Martin Jones and Tom Forrester.