Late moves rescue point for Windsor in ‘chess match’

Windsor’s 1-1 draw with Molesey on Saturday was like an intriguing game of chess with the home side making some crucial moves in the dying embers of the game to rescue a point against the play-off chasers.

The Royalists have picked up the points needed for safety in recent weeks, and playing with a new formation at Holloways Park, they gave their visitors a good game in this entertaining score draw. Sixth-placed Molesey must have felt this would be an ‘away banker’ off the back of six straight wins, but, as it turned out, Windsor had other ideas.

Stand-in manager, and technical director, Tristan Lewis, rang the changes for this one, adopting an unfamiliar 3-4-3 formation which Molesey never really got to grips with.

Into the second half and Windsor were starting to master their new formation. Alfie Inman, Melvin Kambamba and Jamie Watson all came close to breaking the deadlock in the first 20 minutes of the half but, as the game wore on, it looked more and more likely to finish in a stalemate.

Molesey had other ideas though and took the lead in the 83rd minute when Jack Williamson flighted home a free kick from the left-hand side of the Windsor penalty area. This promoted much protestation from the Windsor manager, who pointed out the free kick was taken 30 yards away from where the offense took place. He was promptly booked for his troubles.

Molesey must have thought they’d done enough to win the game, but Tristan Lewis really earned his corn in the final minutes, making a triple substitution on 88 minutes which brough on the attacking trio of Tym Supernak, Reilly Hudson and Sam Heally.

It paid off in the 93rd minute when the effervescent Hudson smashed home an unstoppable low shot following a goalmouth scramble in the final seconds.

Windsor couldn’t make it an undefeated Easter bank holiday as they went down to a narrow 1-0 loss at play-off hopefuls Eversley & California on Monday.

The Royalists were in the game until late on when Bradley Brown scored the winning goal for Eversley to take them up to fifth above Molesey.

Windsor are 18th in the Combined Counties League 1 table, level on points with Spartans Youth FC in 17th and 13 points above the drop zone.

They have five matches left to play, starting at London Samurai Rovers this evening (Wednesday, April 3).