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Berkhamsted 0
Hayes & Yeading Utd 1
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Hayes & Yeading’s penultimate pre-season fixture saw Paul Hughes’ side visit our friends at Berkhamsted who are about to embark on their first season in the Evo-Stik South, Central, the renamed division that we competed in last year.
The home side lined up with a familiar face between the sticks as Luke Daley has moved from United to the Comrades recently looking to establish himself as their number 1.
As on Saturday, United were so nearly off to a flyer as a deep Tom Jelley centre was met on the volley at the far post by Toby Little after just 25 seconds, the shot being deflected onto the post and wide of the target.
Chances were to be at a premium on a hard bumpy pitch caused by the recent heatwave in the south-east but on 14 minutes another opening came the way of the visitors as Jelley and Kaan Fehmi combined to open up a shooting chance for skipper Scott Donnelly, his shot going just the wrong side of the upright.
Within a minute a better chance came for United as Little crossed from the left to an unmarked Scott Bridges who sadly could not direct his header on target and the effort went well wide of Daley’s goal.
The home side almost struck a fortuitous blow minutes later when the impressive Ibe Lukalulay broke away down the left side, his cross beating James Shaw in the United goal before glancing off the crossbar and going out of play.
Three chances for United in the space of ten minutes followed. Fehmi and Lee Barney played a neat one-two with the former seeing his shot tipped over by Daley and then Lewis Toomey beat the on-coming Daley to a through ball, chesting the ball into space before rushing his effort and putting the ball wide with the goal at his mercy.
Barney and Fehmi again set an attack in motion on the half hour mark, Fehmi’s shot being blocked straight to Donnelly who tried to place the ball in the bottom corner from the edge of the box but his effort again went the wrong side of the post.
The half closed out with little or no goalmouth incident and the sides went in at the break scoreless.
As with the majority of pre-season games a flurry of changes at the break or soon after do not help the tempo of the game and in this regard the first real opening of the half came on 65 minutes and this saw United break the deadlock as Fehmi fired past Daley following a centre from the right side.
Having edged ahead, neither side really looked like scoring until stoppage time although Daley did deny Little on 73 minutes after a neat pass from Ismael Ehui set up a shooting chance inside the Comrades box.
In stoppage time it was the home side that almost broke through the United defence on two occasions. Firstly a nice through ball sent the home centre forward Matt Bateman through, Shaw was quickly out to snub that effort away however within a minute, a free-kick conceded some 30 yards out saw the ball dropped into a scramble within the six yard box where United were thankful to Ola Olajubu who kept a cool head to clear the ball away from danger as referee Stevens brought the game to its conclusion with a 1-0 victory for United sealed just seconds later.
Report by Kevin Watts.
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Berkhamsted |
Hayes & Yeading United |
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