Peter Bentley Cup Second Round
The Beaconsfield, Hailsham
Admission: £5.00
Programme: 50p
Attendance: 72
For my midweek action this week, I decided to pay my first visit of the season to The Beaconsfield for my first competitive game of the season, for an interesting looking cup game, and with the promise of a decent printed programme on offer.
There have been no noticeable changes to The Beaconsfield since my last visit last autumn, and indeed none were necessary, as this remains a spacious, well maintained ground to watch football at. Hailsham continue to produce printed programmes, and it continues to be an excellent publication, consisting of 36 pages packed full of interesting reading material covering the club's various teams, the visitors, and various other interesting articles. And most remarkably, only 50p is charged for it - apparently, the price has remained unchanged in 25 years.
Hailsham were struggling near the foot of the table in the Southern Combination League Division One in both of the last two abandoned seasons, and were second bottom last season, following seven wins from their ten games played, and opened this season with 1-3 home defeat against Godalming Town. Shoreham were doing well in the same division last season, in second place after picking up 20 points from their 12 league games played, and they opened their season with a 0-3 away win at Storrington on Saturday.
This was a game that followed a pattern that may have been predicted, with Shoreham always looking in control of the game. They took the lead on ten minutes when the ball was pulled back from the byline and Ramon Santos drilled the ball low into the bottom right corner. After Hailsham gave the ball away in midfield, a shot from well outside the area was parried by the keeper, but for Shoreham's dominance, they did not manage to get too many shots on goal, and Hailsham were still very much in the game at half time, only one goal down.
The visitors certainly upped their attacking intent after the break though, and on 47 minutes saw a shot blocked by the keeper's legs. But on 62 minutes, Shoreham did double their lead following a diagonal ball forward into the box which a defender couldn't quite cut out, but Paschal Nwamadi drove the ball past the keeper, before embarking on an extravagant somersault celebration. It felt like game over on 65 minutes when a free kick was played into the box and, following a deflection off a defender, Johnathan Lansdale tapped the ball home. To their credit, Hailsham had probably their best spell of the game, seeing a couple of shots go just wide, although Shoreham came close to scoring a fourth on 79 minutes when a shot came back off the bar and the ball fell to Nwamadi, who took a touch and shot at goal, but a defender managed to clear the ball. But they did score their fourth on 89 minutes when the ball was played into the box and Santos just managed to get to the ball before the keeper to chip it into the net. The visitors had a great chance to make it five with the last action of the game, when a free kick from the right was headed wide of the post from a good position
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