Was it a "Bridge to far.....?"

The long and winding road that leads to your door
Will never disappear
I've seen that road before it always leads me here
Leads me to your door
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So goes the last hit single the Beatles had as a group, and so it felt on Sunday, the road to the final had been a long and winding one.

With a bunch of new players, the team struggled in the early promotion/relegation games, mainly in sorting positions and playing tactics. Then it seemed to “Come Together” and for most of the round robin the team was clicking together, then towards the end it all became “Helter Skelter”, with 2 draws and a loss, we were wondering what was happening.

The semi was probably one of our most complete games, in that we played for most of it to the game plan, passing not dribbling, playing wide and using space.
And so the end of the road cam yesterday with the final.

It was a nice morning to play hockey, warm, no wind, and sunny.

And the team strode out onto the pitch through the gate, entering the field of battle through the gate that many other Naenae teams had trod before.

Through the first half The Farts had almost all the pressure, but just couldn’t put any away. Through some good trapping, and some luck, YWCA managed to thwart almost all of the Farts attacks around the circle edge, a few got into the circle and there were a couple of very close missed shots.

YWCA managed to take the early lead, then increase it to 2-0 through what appeared to be soft goals, both really against the general run of play.

Half time, and Richard M encouraged the guys that they were still in it, and they went out and played better than in the first half, they seemed to pass and look for passes more than they had, and again had the majority of attacking time in the opposition circle, but mainly without getting any reward for it.

Nuts had a number of runs at RW, and managed a good gaol to bring it back to 2-1, but the frustration levels started to show and with 12 mins to go Legs was sent for an early shower.

5 Mins later Trapper pulled Timbo off, and replaced him with an attacker, YW thought they were in but couldn’t capitalise on the lack of a gaolie, while the Farts weren’t able to finish off in the circle.

And so the Farts lost their second final in 3 years, a disspointing result, but also a different result. This time it was with a newer team, that had started to gel, next season looks more promising; the talent scouts are out looking for a few key “old timers” to come back into the fold.
So in the words of Arnie “we’ll be back.....”