A horrendously wet day saw Sutton Valence 3rd XI travel to Herne Bay to play the 5th XI in an eagerly anticipated top of the table clash.

The game started at a high pace with SV relentlessly attacking through the middle of the park with Brett Angel, Bob Bartlett and Tom Willson dominating possession. The first goal was scored by SV relatively early in the game, with a slipped pass from the top of the D to Rob Cockayne who slotted the ball past the keeper.

SV scored again only a few minutes later with Darren “No Knees” Thompson playing one of his trademark rapid bouncy passes to Rob Cockayne to pass it into the goal.

SV continued to attack with all of its might, with the third goal following soon after with the ball being injected into Paul Linaker, who’s shot deflected off the sliding keepers pads, over to Cockayne, to tap a volley in.

Just before half time SV scored a fourth, with Bob Bartlett hammering a pass into Cockayne, who managed to collect the ball in the air, shoot via a reverse stick volley, which was saved by the keeper, only for it to be kicked into the back of a Herne Bay players legs, which deflected back into the goal.

In the second half SV continued to strive for more goals, the sixth of which came shortly after the restart with Tom Willson skilling past a number of players, to slot it to Cockayne who was sitting unmarked on the penalty spot to slip it into the bottom right hand corner.

Credit to Herne Bay, as they continued to battle hard, utilising their younger players in the middle of the pitch and making a number of darting attacks into the SV D. Herne Bay managed to pull one back thanks to some nice stick skills to slot the ball past keeper Ross Mackay.

Cockayne made it seven goals with another darting run into the D from Ben Tragett, for Cockayne to dink over the logging keeper, which unluckily for Herne Bay, they were unable to clear off the line.

SV’s eight goal came courtesy of some intelligent play from Bob “El Capitano” Sagrott, who held the ball up on the 25, to play a lovely reverse stick pass to a loitering Cockayne, who skilled past two defenders, throwing the goalkeeper the wrong way, to dart around and slot in another goal.

Goal nine was unfortunate for Herne Bay, with a Cockayne shot being kicked into the goal by a Herne Bay defender who was desperately trying to track back to cover the line.

Herne Bay benefited from a last-minute penalty flick, awarded as a result of David Turner losing his footing on the wet pitch to stop a goal bound shot with his body.

2-9 the final result.

Teamsheet:
Ross Mackay
Bob Sagrott
Julian Mills
Bob Bartlett
Paul Linaker
David Turner
Mike Nettle
Rob Cockayne
Ben Tragett
Darren Thompson
Tom Willson
Brett Angel

Goals: Cockayne (9)