Hay St Marys Reserves crashed out of the Emrys Morgan in emphatic style on Saturday as they were soundly beaten by a solid Maesglas side 5-0.
The omens for the home side were good pre game as the Saints were boosted by the return of both Alec Winstone and Liam Pugh. Harris opted to stick with his preferred formation of 3-5-2 pushing Ceri Ward into his preferred role in midfield whilst pushing Olly Cooke up front to partner the rejuvenated John Sly.
The Saints started strongly and dominated the opening ten minutes creating there first chance in the opening minute of the game which was put fractionally wide by Cooke. Moments later a deep ball to the far post was nearly met by a terrific diving header from Mike Ward, but what should have been a great platform for the hosts to bulid turned out to be the only time when they were truly in the ascendancy. Neither side created any chances of note for the first 40 minutes mainly being restricted to long range efforts, the Saints best chance coming from a Mike Ward shot which flew past the stanchion to the relief of the visiting ‘keeper.
Disaster struck for the home side when a Maesglas corner was Cooley headed home after a neat run that left Pugh on the wrong side of his marker and unable to get a challenge in. Maesglas nearly doubled their advantage on the stroke of half time only to be thwarted by Zack Snapes acrobatic clearance off the line.
HT 0-1
Harris switched to a more simple 4-4-2 system at half time although in truth the balance of the side didn’t look right once play had been resumed.
Then came a moment that Bradley will want to forget in a hurry as whilst appealing for a free kick due to a high footed challenge on M.Ward a nicely timed long range effort deflected of his forehead and past the despairing Jones in goal.
This effectively killed off the home side who never got back into the game and Hay were caught on the break five minutes later to make it 0-3. Harris brought on John Daw to try and improve the hold up play up top but the Maesglas number 5 dealt with it comfortably as he had done with so much already that afternoon.
The much improving Simmonds was introduced for Holland -who has had better days this season- and immediately injected his enthusiasm and energy on the right and a few minutes later Johnson came on for captain Alec Winston who was loosing his cool after a few tasty exchanges.
Apart from an excellent header for ‘keeper Jones there wasn’t much for the home side to get excited about and as the game died out the Saints succumbed to another two break away goals leaving them looking at a 0-5 scoreline.
FT 0-5
Harris said after the game ” I certainly don’t think that Maesglas were five goals better than us. It was just a very bad day at the office and what was most disappointing was the lack of fight from us to try and get back into the game at 0-2. Maesglas are a really good bunch of lads and i wish them well for the rest of the season and hope that their young left back does well in his G.C.S.E year.
Harris picked Maesglas’ number five as his man of the match as he dealt with everything that came his way with ease all day, whilst their number eleven was picked out by assistant manager Jones who felt he had played well in the middle. The away side picked Jamie Howard as their man of the match saying he had caused them trouble for most of the afternoon.
Next up for Hay is a visit from Llandodd colts this Saturday and Harris will be looking for an early Christmas present in the form of three points.