Maids beat Slough in ‘feisty’ contest
Maidenhead Hockey Club: Cowell's men up to second after 4-2 victory
Maidenhead Men's 1sts are up to second in the fledgling South Central Men's Premier Division table after they beat Slough Hockey Club 4-2 in a 'feisty' contest at Altwood School on Saturday.
Phil Cowell's side have made an encouraging start to the campaign having also gone to last season's runners-up Banbury and claiming a 1-1 draw with a weakened team.
They were back to almost full strength for Saturday's visit of Slough and, after working hard to contain them and their elusive midfielder in the first half, they turned on the style after the interval to run out 4-2 winners.
Throughout the game Maids counter attacked clinically to take the game away from their visitors with Matt Heller, Alex Land, Dean Harrison, and Sam Kirkaldie grabbing the goals.
Slough, who'd opened their campaign with a positive 3-0 win over Bournemouth, became increasingly frustrated as the match wore on and Cowell said afterwards a couple of their players 'lost their heads'.
Victory lifts Maids to second in the standings behind local rivals Marlow who've also made an excellent start to the season having been promoted last season.
“It's been a brilliant start for us to be honest,” said Cowell.
“We lost a couple of players over the summer, and we've got quite a few young lads coming through, so we weren't really sure how we'd get on. We'd had a good pre-season under our new coach David Joshua, who is also director of hockey now at Maidenhead. And we've also got Phil Roper, an England and GB player, doing a bit of coaching every other week for us so that will be beneficial.
“We drew our first game against Banbury, and they just missed out on the title on goal difference. We had a couple of key players missing as well. We went over there with a game plan and ended up taking a draw which was a really good result as they're a strong side.
“We had near enough our full squad out on Saturday and played well against Slough. It was 4-2 but we could have nicked a few more goals.
“It got a bit feisty in the second half as they were chasing the game and we were defending quite well. Our keeper made some good saves, and we defended well to see out the game. We changed our tactics at half-time and that helped nullify them. They had a really good player in midfield, but we countered on them well and they were getting quite frustrated.
“As they chased the game a couple of them lost their heads a little bit, maybe not as fiery as it has been in the past, but it was still a classic Maidenhead v
Slough game.”
Maids visit seventh placed Bournemouth on Saturday.
They'll be hoping for a better result there than Maids' Women's 1st team who were beaten 5-1 by Bournemouth 1sts on Saturday.
The Women's team are eighth after two matches heading into Saturday's home game against Henley at Altwood School.