Away to Edinburgh University 3s

Sun and clear skies welcomed us at Peffermill, welcome relief after the drenching the previous day.
A slow start saw the University take the lead from a penalty corner, but thereafter the side began to get into its stride.
Their keeper made an excellent save from a drag flick heading for the top-right onion bag and scrambled away other good chances in the opeining 20 minutes. Tom finally equalised with some sharp work to move to ball around their keeper. Meanwhile at the other end, Forbes made a couple of sublime saves himself to keep the scores level.
Our defensive work was now paying off and the students were struggling to get the ball beyond us, but seemed loathe to attempt too many long balls and so lost a potential cutting edge.
Donald scored our second before the break, volleying home after some excellent work from Jack & Stumpy in the bottom corner of the pitch.

We should have put the game beyond the opposition early in the second half when their work-rate dropped and they started to make poor passes from the back-line. However, our attackers misfired too frequently and the score remained 2-1. Naturally, they grabbed an equaliser from a sweeping counter-attack and the game was back in the balance.
Fortunately, we bagged the winner with less than 10 minutes on the clock, an excellent turn-over in the middle of the park, followed by short, swift, accurate passes up the left flank of the pitch, and finally passing it beyond the keeper for a tap-in from Tintin. Simple hockey, oppo couldn't get close to the ball, created an unmissable chance and it looked great to boot.

A great game, played in excellent spirit by both sets of players - the kind of game, I wish we got to play every weekend.
Excellent work from those that played 2 games over the weekend - bodies were clearly empty after the match.
Thanks to Alastair for umpiring.

Photo - Derek approves