Match Report
Cobham 2 v 3 Rye United, FA Vase 2nd Round Replay, November 20th 2007
Report by Andy.
On what was a typically English winter night complete with drizzle, damp and a persistent chill in the air Cobham and their Sussex visitors Rye United once more attempted to break their deadlock that has lasted 120 minutes on Saturday. Concerns that the match might have to be called-off due to the consistant rain throughout the day proved unfounded as the Anvil Lane pitch more than coped with the copious amounts of water, and so the game got underway.
Those who arrived late will be kicking themselves as the home side put themselves in the lead within 5 minutes through Jimmy Davis who pounced on the ball after a back-pass was miss-kicked by the Rye goalie. At this stage Cobham had started very brightly and were the better team all over the pitch. Unfortunately this was not to last as on 25 minutes the home defence allowed some direct upfield play to fall to the feet of a Rye forward who executed a perfect lob from outside the area over Nick McGregor in the Cobham goal. Rye were now in the ascendancy and were unlucky not to take the lead as a goal-mouth scramble following a corner resulted in a Cobham player heading the ball against his own post before eventually being cleared. Despite looking nervy at the back it was the home side who scored next thanks to Marcus Rose who took advantage of a fortunate passage of play to knock the ball home. At half-time Cobham would have been the happier of the two teams although with the back-line being stretched on numerous occasions this game was far from over - 2-1.
Following the break, Cobham could have extended their lead through Michael Carpenter who was put through on goal but he only managed to lob the ball past the post from outside the box. The home side would live to regret that miss as although the game was still very even and hotly competitive (with a number of Cobham players seeing yellow cards) it was Rye who scored to equalise the game on 78 minutes after Cobham failed to clear successfully from a corner allowing the ball to be played back into the box and be thumpingly heading home. The Sussex side noticeably had the wind in their sails and it was through another corner that they scored the winner past the helpless McGregor. Although Cobham frantically tried to retrieve the game, it was now beyond their reach and it's Rye United who go through to 3rd round.
Overall, it was a very even game which could have gone either way but Cobham disappointedly could not quite put the game out of reach when they were in charge and could not nullify Rye enough when they fought back in the second half.
