Ottery St Mary Under-14 too generous with the substitutions

Ottery St Mary 0, Pinhoe Spartans 5

Ottery St Mary Under-14s coach Steve Flinders was left feeling he had been the maker of his teams down fall, post match.

He explained saying: “I am sure many other coaches will empathise with me on the subject of substitutions and how many you need in matches. It’s such a tough thing finding a balance between not wanting to let lads down and give them football and upsetting the balance of a side and indeed the flow of a game. This was one such occasion when, with half a dozen substitutes, we were forced to continually make changes and that certainly upset the rhythm of the side.”

This was a much closer contest than the final score suggests! The teams were locked at 0-0 with under 20 minutes to go. However, once Jack Proctor’s right wing raid and cross was turned home by Jack Chadwick, the visitors got stronger and the home heads dropped.

Chadwick netted a second and goals from Jack Proctor, Josh Moore and Harry Mollins gave Spartans a nap hand success. Jac Khaliq was the stand-out star for Ottery.

The pair will meet again early next month in a cup tie. Otters’ boss Steve Flinders said: “We played really well until the final quarter of the game. I feel for the lads as anyone looking at the score line would think we were well beaten, but the score does not tell the whole story!”

The Spartans coach agreed with Flinders saying: “It was a close game and could have gone either way until our late flurry of goals.”