Carlsberg South West Peninsula premier

Stoke Gabriel 1

Tavistock AFC 0

TAVISTOCK were forced to make changes to their starting line up, with Jack Crago and Tyler Elliot both serving suspensions. Josh Robins returned to the team after completing his suspension and Jack Tribble made the starting line up.

The Lambs spurned a good chance to open the scoring in the second minute when Dave Hallett played a great through ball that split open the home defence, but Jack Tribble came off second best in a challenge with goalkeeper Corderoy as they both went for the ball. Tribble was in the action again in the ninth minute when he broke into the penalty area cutting along the dead ball line; he elected to shoot from an acute angle so his effort was blocked and cleared by a defender.

Stoke Gabriel’s first real attempt on the visitors’ goal came after 20 minutes when Josh Oak made a really good save to deny Kelly from scoring.

On the half hour Jack Tribble saw his terrific over head kick spectacularly turned away by Corderoy for a corner kick.

Five minutes later Corderoy pulled off another fine save to deny Josh Grant; he then made another good save tipping over a fine effort from Ben Cross. The Stoke Gabrield keeper then denied Dave Hallett twice — the first was a spectacular save from a free kick and the second a fierce shot from the edge of the penalty area.

Just before the interval Josh Oak made a fine save to deny O ’Callaghan header over the bar.

The second period saw the Lambs continue to dominate possession. Dave Hallett had another effort saved in the opening minutes. Five minutes into the half the Lambs had a real scare when a defensive mix up following a corner kick saw the ball fall to Hennessy his effort saw Josh Robins make a fine goal line clearance to keep the scores level.

The Lambs then had a good spell of play even though they were finding it difficult to get their flowing passing game going on the difficult playing surface.

From a corner kick a Warren Daw header was tipped over the bar by Corderoy. Immediately after Tavistock appealed for a penalty when Grant looked as if he was brought down in the area, but the referee waved play on. Corderoy then made a really good save to thwart Daw and three minute later the same player saw his powerful shot flash inches wide of the target.

The visitors pushed more and more men forward in an effort to try and find that elusive goal that their play deserved. As a result, in a rare counter attack, Oak had to made a good save to deny Bowker from opening the scoring.

In the 82nd  minute from a Hallett corner kick Lewis Daw saw his bullet like header go inches over the bar. Two shots from Grant and Robins were both blocked as they looked destined for the net.

Then in the last minute of normal time in a counter the ball fell kindly for them which allowed them a rare counter attack that saw the Lambs short of numbers at the back; the ball found Kelly, his fine pass saw Hobbes who let the ball run across his body, wrong footing his marker before firing the ball past Oak into the corner of the net.

The Lambs had one final effort in time added on but once again Corderoy made a fine save to seal a victory.

This was a bitter blow to the Lambs defence of their title. They were well below their best on a difficult playing surface. They dominated the game for long periods of time but they found it difficult to get their normal fluent passing high tempo game going against the defensive line up of 5-4-1.

The home defence worked tirelessly throughout the 90 minutes, but if it had not have been for Corderoy in the home goal, who was in outstanding form, making at least six outstanding saves to keep his team in the game, the Lambs would have come away comfortable winners.

The team need to forget this game, pick themselves up and bounce back to winning was when they entertain Sticker this Saturday.