Ryman League Division One South
Walton Casuals 2 Whyteleafe 1
FOR the second successive Saturday, Whyteleafe's push for a Ryman South promotion playoff spot hit a bump in the road as they slumped to a 2-1 defeat to bottom club Walton Casuals in a sometimes bad-tempered affair by the Thames.
Bumps were very much the order of the day as Leafe failed to hit top gear on a pitch so uneven and undulating, it wouldn't have looked out of place on the links of St Andrews. But for all the travelling supporters' sense of injustice at the referee's performance, this was not a vintage Leafe display. Chances were created in spells, but a combination of good goalkeeping, tame finishing and sheer bad luck in front of goal proved crucial.
Leafe boss John Fowler elected to start with Roscoe DSane and Jason Henry up front, with Greg Andrews beginning the afternoon on the bench. Jason Thompson, seemingly back in favour as captain, again started in the heart of defence, where he has become a fixture since the departure from the club of Tommy Smith.
The game started in dour fashion, with neither side able to get into a rhythm. Then out of the blue on 11 minutes, Walton Casuals took the lead. A harmless-looking cross from the Casuals left eluded the normally sure-footed Dylan Merchant and reached Luke Medley, who set himself, took aim and fired powerfully past Sheikh Ceesay.
Leafe struggled to get any hold on the game, while the home defence, large in stature, contained the visitors' front-line and set up a number of breaks, although they rarely came to much. It took fully 27 minutes for Leafe to have a first shot on goal, Sam Clayton's fizzer from 20 yards met at a comfortable height by Casuals cat Harvey Cheadle.
From the half-hour mark, Leafe finally started to gain some good possession and look a threat going forward. On 37 minutes, they were unlucky not to level. Sol Patterson-Bohner and DSane combined well on the right-hand side, and DSane's cross-cum-shot drifted over the head of Cheadle, only to bounce back off the inside of the far post and be scrambled away. Leafe continued to press and just a minute later, Henry danced through the Casuals defence and appeared to have his standing foot taken away as he pulled the trigger on his shot. The referee waved away claims for a penalty, laying the foundations for a tempestuous relationship with the Leafe faithful in the second half.
Still Leafe kept pushing forward, and on 40 minutes Clayton forced another smart save from Cheadle, but there was a reminder just seconds later, at the other end, of the home side's potential on the break as Medley was put through on goal again, only to spurn the chance.
Back came Leafe, and on 43 minutes an overhead kick from six yards out by Jason Henry was brilliantly turned away by Cheadle, who was having an excellent first half. He was called into action a minute later as Alex Penfold got forward and unleashed a shot on goal, but right on the stroke of half-time, he could do nothing about Leafe's equaliser. DSane, so often Leafe's goalscoring hero both last season and this, found space on the right and his low-drilled shot from 8 yards flew in under Cheadle's outstretched right glove. The half-time whistle came and Leafe, for all their impotence in the first 25 minutes, deserved to go in all-square at the break.
Any hopes that the breakthrough would prove a springboard to a Leafe victory quickly dimmed as the second half began as had the first, with a period of stagnant play. Leafe had replaced the injured Ryan Fowler with Greg Andrews at the start of the half, but their attempts to press forward and take the game to Walton Casuals were thwarted by a combination of accomplished defending by the home side and over-zealous refereeing. DSane and Bentley Graham picked up bookings for fouls as indiscipline started to set in, and a free kick awarded to Walton Casuals in the 64th minute led to the home side regaining the lead. The ball was launched into the Leafe box, and after some confusion fell at the feet of Gabriel Odunaike, whose low shot was adjudged to have crossed the line before a Leafe boot could clear the danger.
Leafe struggled to muster an immediate response, but in a second half that mirrored the first, they finally started to press and create chances in the final 15 minutes of the game, and in truth will feel disappointed that none of the chances that came their way were converted.
On 75 minutes, Alex Penfold reached an advanced position on the left, and while his accurate cross found the head of Jason Henry, the diminutive striker could not get enough power into his header to trouble Cheadle. With the clock ticking down, Leafe's efforts to win the ball and get forward quickly became more frantic, and the referee came down hard on any infringements that resulted, to the mounting frustration of the visiting fans. Yet three further good chances came and went for Leafe in the dying minutes. On 86 minutes, a Penfold long throw found DSane unmarked at the far post, but his shot was cleared off the line by a defender. Just a minute later, more Leafe pressure saw Clayton deliver a cross from the left that found Jensen Grant with time to shoot, but he slashed his shot over the bar from eight yards with the goal at his mercy. Then, in the dying moments of a stoppage time period that featured a 17-man scuffle in the centre circle, one more desperately launched ball caused a scramble on the edge of the six-yard box that the home defence was able to smuggle away to safety.
Hard done by as the visiting fans might have felt as a result of the officiating, this was not Leafe at their best, and yet they still managed to create enough chances to get at least something from the game. The home side created very few clear-cut opportunities over the 90 minutes, but put away two of them – for the second week in a row, it was a reminder that taking your chances counts for more than huffing and puffing.
Despite back-to-back losses, Leafe reach Christmas still in an impressive fifth place in the Ryman South – the final promotion playoff spot - but with the likes of Worthing and South Park breathing more heavily down their necks than had been the case a fortnight ago. Leafe now look forward to hosting ninth-placed Tooting & Mitcham United on December 27, and will be hoping for one thing above all others in Santa's sack this Christmas – goals.
WHYTELEAFE: Ceesay, Patterson-Bohner, Penfold, Thompson, Merchant, Graham (Pratt), Fowler (Andrews 46), Grant, DSane, Henry, Clayton. Unused subs: May, Pykes.
NEXT MATCHES:
Saturday 27th December 3pm: Whyteleafe v Tooting & Mitcham Utd (Church Road, Whyteleafe) - Ryman League South
Thursday 1st January 3pm: Chipstead v Whyteleafe (High Road, Chipstead) - Ryman League South
