Carlsberg South West Peninsula premier
Dartmouth 3
Tavistock AFC 0
A BELOW strength Tavistock side without Matt David, Chris Menhenick, Dave Hallett, Jimmy Steer and Nigel Pugh all out through injury, suffered a defeat at Dartmouth. Mark Conday, Lee Coxon and Shane Krac played carrying knocks. A number of reserve players made their debuts for the first team.
It was only two weeks ago that the Lambs defeated a useful Dartmouth side at Langsford Park but the tables were well and truly reversed at Longcross as Dartmouth were very worthy winners.
Dartmouth were the first to show and had the Lambs on the back foot from the start. Even when the Lambs managed to get themselves in a good position neither Mark Conday, Ryan Honey or Shane Krac were able to trouble Nathan Murphy in the Dartmouth goal.
It was no surprise that Dartmouth opened the scoring on 20 minutes when Tom Comyn picked the ball up midway inside the Tavistock half and beat the challenges of both Sam Chitty and Mike Arscott before firing low past the advancing Andy Meeds into the corner of the goal. Then on 35 minutes from a Jamie Bennellick free kick Comyn was able to flick the ball over the Tavistock defence for winger John Barrow to meet the ball on the half volley and rifle the ball into the top corner of the Tavistock goal leaving Andy Meeds no chance.
Tavistock were forced to make changes at the start of the second half which saw the injured Shane Krac and Lee Coxon replaced by experienced striker Andy Bowker and captain Will Stringer who himself was returning from injury. Stringer's introduction seem to have an immediate impact on the Lambs and for the first time in the game they were able to start putting the home side under some real pressure. However, despite enjoying their best period of the game the Lambs were unable to carve out any clear cut chances.
The Lambs' best hope of success seemed to be from set pieces and especially from corners as Lee Bevan superbly delivered numerous corners into the danger area but no one was on hand to meet them with any real conviction.
It was slightly against the run of play that Churchill scored as Dartmouth hit Tavistock on the break and with only 12 minutes remaining this ended any hope the Lambs had of getting anything out of the game.
Tavistock manager Ian Southcott was honest in his verdict of the afternoon.
He told the Times: 'I know the situation regarding injured players is getting beyond the point of ridiculous at the moment but I still felt we had a good enough side to get a result on Saturday but the effort and attitude of a couple of the players was unacceptable.
'In November we had a real chance of winning the league and blew that by December and only four weeks ago we were in with a great chance of runners up spot. Now we have a real fight on for a top five finish. I am sure if we can get a few key players we are capable of winning our five remaining games, but if we perform like we did on Saturday we will be lucky if we pick up another point.'
• This weekend fixtures: Tavistock first team, Good Friday, Launceston away, kick-off 3pm. Reserves visit Sticker, Saturday, kick-off 2.30pm. Tavistock Vets v Calstock Vets, Thursday, 7.30pm.