Harvest suffer shock cup final mauling
Harvest’s hopes of claiming silverware in their first full Hampshire Premier League season were shattered in a shock final defeat.
Steve Harris’ side were hot favourites going into the HPL’s end-of-season L4 Teamwear Challenge Cup final against Hook at Winchester City FC.
They hadn’t lost since November, winning 13 and drawing three of their last 16 games and finishing runnersup in Division 1 South East. In contrast, Hook had finished fourth in Division 1 North.
But Harvest failed to capitalise on their early superiority and ended up crashing to a 4-0 loss.
A goal down approaching the interval, Harvest were then reduced to 10 men for 10 minutes when defender Mychal Griffin was sinbinned.
Before he had returned to action, Harvest conceded again at the start of the second half.
Hook added a third and then a fourth, scoring the rebound after Jordan Camburn had saved a penalty.
‘It was so frustrating, unreal,’ said Harris. ‘We should have been 2-0 up in the first 20 minutes - should have, not could have.
‘They (Hook) were looking leggy, they were looking tired. I was thinking ‘we’ve got this’, but then we just crumbled.
‘In football you have to score when you’re on top. They did and we didn’t.
‘Absolutely no excuses, we didn’t turn up - simple as that. They wanted it more.
‘The things that we have been doing right all season we didn’t do right. We were our own worst enemies, 100 per cent.’
Harris added: ‘I’m still proud of the boys for the season we have had.