Defeat for 10-man Melford

After two tough games already this week the first team made the trip up to Soham buoyed by Wednesday’s win.

Melford travelled to Cambridgeshire without several players due to injuries or availability issues but despite this, tails were up and a good game was expected.

The home side were out of the traps fast and forced Melford to defend well early on.

The lively Luke Brown was pulling the strings for Soham. It was he who headed home Soham’s opener from a corner. It helped that he got away with a two-handed shove on his marker in the process but the match officials seemed to miss this.

Speaking of the officials, on 30 minutes Melford were left with a mountain to climb when the referee deemed a tackle from Ben Humphreys to be worthy of a straight red and he was sent from the field of play. A decision it seems that few (if any) onlookers could agree with and the consensus was a yellow at worst.

Sadly, much of the game was marred by contentious decisions from the referee in a game that really and truthfully didn’t have a bad tackle in it.

Melford came out for the second half down but not cowed and fashioned some excellent chances to pull level. Hassan Ally, Jacob Brown and Perry Newman all got into great positions but couldn’t find the net.

At the other end David Leader made several impressive saves to keep Melford in the game. That was until a cross from the home right back flew into the top corner and game Soham a deserved 2-0 lead.

That was how the scoreline remained and all credit to the home side who bounce back following two league defeats.

Melford can reflect on three points from a busy week and what might have been today if key decisions had gone their way.

David Hennessey’s team now have a week to rest and recover before a spell of five games in 14 days.

LONG MELFORD: Leader, Holmes, Newton, Jackson, Roy, Collins, Ally, Whiting-Noakes, Humphreys, Brown (c), Newman

Subs: Gibbs, Dende, Ward

Unused: Brown, Fayers

• Meanwhile at Halstead Town our Reserves were beaten 4-2 with Yainnis Yiasemis and Ollie Broomfield the scorers for Melford. No report this week as manager Darren Thomas missed the game because of Covid (get well soon Daz!).