Saturday17th September 2022

Lancing Starting XI;

Alieu Secka, Jake LeGrange, Tom Butler, Marcus Allen, Mohammed Joumaa Zabadne, Finn Daniels-Yeoman (Capt.), Darius Goldsmith, Marcel Powell, Louis Veneti, Billy Fuller, Faris Khallouqi .

Substitutes:

Ben Bayoko, Sean Stephenson, James Hatch, Ashley Mutongerwa, Ben Hack.

Not my usual blow by blow account of Lancing’s latest league match. A family event arranged by my daughter some time ago meant that I was at The Nature Discovery Centre, Thatcham, Berks together with my wife Joan, daughter Corinna and grandson Harrison meeting 3 of my 4 brothers and other family members who had travelled up from Wales instead of being at Southwood Stadium, Ramsgate. So, apologies for absence.

I have, however been able to draw upon observations by the few loyal committee members who were able to make the away trip, to enable me to give readers some information as to how Lancing fared. I hope they have no objection to this.

The bare facts are as follows.

Ramsgate took the lead on 31 minutes through James Coyle, and doubled that on 45 minutes when Theo Osinfolarin converted a penalty.

In between, leading scorer Louis Veneti had to leave the field with an injury, to be replaced by Ben Bayoko.

The second half saw Marcel Powell standing down on 53 minutes for Sean Stephenson. Lancing closed the gap on 76 minutes courtesy of an o.g by Tijan Jadama.

The unanimous view from our committee present was that the referee had an extremely poor game. A home crowd of 612 might have had some bearing on this. The penalty award was based on the decision of the assistant referee, with the man in the middle being unwilling to overturn him. A number of off the ball infringements by Ramsgate went unpunished by the referee.

Lancing rattled the opposition and, with better finishing , could have won 4 or 5-2. The substitution of Marcel Powell was a surprise, as he was causing problems for the home defence. But, having said this, this may not have been an adverse reflection on his performance, but a tactical switch as Lancing played extremely well for the last 30 minutes forcing the home keeper to pull off a number of vital saves. Right at the death, Lancing were awarded a penalty. Faris Khallouqi had the courage to take the spot kick but failed to beat the keeper, who did not have to move to make the save.

Ramsgate were defending desperately and were mightily relived when the final whistle blew.

Lancing players can take great encouragement from their performance against a team who have won 4 and drawn 1 of their 5 league games and now sit top of the table. Considering also the fact that there were some regular Lancing starters missing for the second game in a row, there are signs of a squad looking to have some depth to it when others can step up to the plate and do well. This particularly applies to Tom Butler. Ashley Mutongerwa had looked impressive alongside Marcus Allen at centre back in the opening fixtures but Tom has proved to be a real asset. There was very high praise for Marcus Allen and Tom Butler who were real rocks at the back on Saturday, and so I have taken the liberty of selecting  them as joint MOM.

Ashley is back on the bench so I am assuming he has recovered from his injury and will be pressing for a return. And a new face in the starting XI., Billy Fuller, on loan for Worthing, who looked quite promising.

Normal match reporting service should be resumed for Tuesday’s home fixture against Whitehawk, which means in our opening 6 league games we will have met the top three.

Dave Wilmott