Day hat-trick is enough to give Town vital win
LOUGHBOROUGH TOWN MEN’S 1ST XI 3 BEDFORD 2 ENGLAND HOCKEY LEAGUE CONFERENCE MIDLANDS
OFF THE back of a disappointing loss to Lichfield under the Saturday night lights the previous week, Town welcomed Bedford to Loughborough on the Sunday lunchtime.
The pre-game chat was filled with wondering whether Duckworthmay be needed to finalise the result due to the atrocious conditions but thankfully as the teams came out to warm up, so did the sun.
The match could be summed up by one team scored their corners and one team didn’t. A hat-trick for Town’s Ryan Day from corners was a better return than Bedford managed as they didn’t score any of their four corners past a usually slightly leaky Loughborough penalty corner defence.
Having gone down 1-0 Bedford fought back with two scrappy but deserved goals to actually be leading the match going into the final quarter. But Day stepped up and with one penalty corner with five minutes to go and then with the final play of the game (although with quite a lot of help from two deflections from Bedford players) got Town the three points.
In the end, Loughborough did deserve the victory and special mentions should go to Toby Jackson for finally showing he can save a drag flick and stand out performances from Lewis Ratcliff and James Lewis.
Loughborough welcome Harleston Magpies next weekend, which is a 12.30pm start on the water base at Loughborough University.