TRAINING AND MATCH - SAT 19 NOVEMBER

Hi all

Training in ON this Friday night as usual.

On Saturday we play our 2^nd fixture in the Chester & District Shield.

We play Vicars Cross at 10:30am KO (10am arrival) at HOME on Waverton Primary pitches. 

Rested players are Fin, Will B and Austin.

If anyone cannot play please let me know ASAP so we can bring in a rested player.

Thanks

Rob

MATCH REPORT - SAT 12 NOVEMBER

ROCKETS 5 - 0 BLACON YOUTH

The boys avoided a potential banana skin this morning in the Chester Shield cup game to record their first competitive win.

Prior to the game we held a minutes silence to remember the fallen of all the wars. The boys from both teams did this impeccably. This was Blacon's idea and it showed what a great club they are.  

The training session last night went really well, with an overlap passing drill and a high standard mini-game so Hayden and I were looking forward to some flowing and passing football.

However, in the first 12 minutes, whilst we did try hard, we over indulged individually and played into Blacon's hands by not playing as a team. It would also be fair to say that the Blacon keeper was having an absolute blinder!

Into the second quarter we swapped 3 players, with George, Rory, Xander joining Austin and from the outset we got wider, used the space and started passing and overlapping. From there we scored two very good goals from Rory and then George.

In the third quarter the lads who started the game improved massively and we did try to get the ball moving. One or two of the moves cut Blacon to pieces.

Again the Blacon goalie kept them in the game with some unbelievable saves and being really fast off his line. However we managed to get another one through Xander who broke the Blacon line before charging through and firing hard and low.

In the final quarter we produced a pretty dominant display and swapped players and positions about. George grabbed another, cutting in from the wing and firing hard and low into the corner and then Blacon were unlucky to concede an own goal to make it 5-0 and put some gloss on the score-line.

Its hard to be critical of a 5-0 victory when Hugo had one save to make and on another day it could have been 10 or 12. To some extent perhaps we dropped to Blacon's level and got into a tackling war on a muddy pitch! BUT, even on a poor surface we could have moved the ball about better and played more for each other rather than individually. We will have stiffer tests to come if we want to do well in this competition.

Overall I'd say this was 60% of how we can play, so loads of room for improvement which is a good thing!!

MOTM was between Charlie, Austin and George who all played very well. The award went to George who gave us great width, found space and created and scored goals today.

Well done on the result and clean sheet.

FINALLY, just for Steve, here is the photo of Harry last night at training. There is nothing wrong with supporting the team at the top of the league...and he looks very good in red instead of blue! Early night and no tea for Harry I'd say...

MATCH REPORT - SAT 29 OCTOBER

ROCKETS 1 - 2 ELLESMERE PORT

Paul and I now realise how David Moyes is feeling! The boys did everything we asked of them today and we were undone by Ellesmere Ports' only shot in the first half and huge divot causing the ball to bobble in the second!

Its not an understatement to say we deserved to win the game by two or three goals bearing in mind the balance of play, but we are not getting any luck at the moment at the top end of the pitch and then to 'rub  it in' fortune went against us at the back.

The first 20 minutes we played brilliantly, knocking the ball about and attacking EP to create huge pressure and lots of corners. Remarkably though from EP's only attack of the half they scored after we failed to clear the ball and it broke to their striker who swept it past William. William got his only touch of the half...picking the ball out of the net!

At half time the boys were quite down but we emphasised how well we had played.

We started a bit slowly in second half and EP did manage to play some football but after 5 minutes we settled down and we started to get on the ball. A clearance from the EP defender found its way on target and as Fin was about to pick up the ball it bobbled to the right and went in - there was nothing anyone could have done; it was just a huge slice of luck.

After that we played really well, as I know the boys all felt very hard done to. Our play become too much for EP and after a 4 player move Austin smashed one to the left corner to deservedly get us back to 2-1.

The boys threw everything at EP and again we were very unlucky with EP clearing off and on the line, Austin going close again and our boys camped in the EP penalty area.

Obviously everyone was very disappointed in the result and we deserved a lot more. After the match we talked about all the positives. Although we are going through a sticky patch I'm convinced we have a big performance and score line coming.

MOTM went to Austin. He gave 100% against lads much bigger than him, he ran his socks off and scored a great goal. Xander's performance would have also got him MOTM on any other day - his passing, crossing and attacking play was superb.

Thanks also to William and Fin for stepping in for Hugo. Its not easy and the team owes them both for being brave enough to go in goal.


Well done to the boys for a good effort. Lets keep going and our luck will change (I hope!!).  

MATCH REPORT - SAT 22 OCTOBER

ROCKETS 2 - 3 PRINCES VILLA

A really encouraging performance against a strong 'A' side shows that our Rockets shouldn't fear any team in Chester. We are now competing at a high level and hopefully we can convert our efforts into results with the 'business end' of the season soon upon us.

We started the game with a formation designed to keep us in the game and to a great extent this worked, playing William just in front of the defence and then a block of 3 midfielders ahead of them. We didn't quite go for Mourinho's flat back 6!!! 

In the first 20 minutes our tactic's worked brilliantly although it was hard to create chances. Unfortunately though we went 0-1 down as William was forced to push out to plug a gap in midfield and we were left exposed at the back.

At half time we switched to our normal 2-3-1 formation and while we had a few shaky moments, going 2-0 down, we were more of a threat going forward as we had an outlet in either Harry or Rory.

After we had settled down to the new formation we got back in the game as Rory controlled a cross-field ball and found the bottom corner with a great finish.

At this stage we looked like we could catch them on the break and were very unlucky not to draw level as Harry broke clear, only for the ball to bobble as he was about to score.

Soon after we were unfortunate to go 1-3 down as from a good Villa move Hugo pulled off a save only for the ball to fall to a Villa player who couldn't miss.

With 10 minutes to go we entered the period we always play our best football and the pressure was resulting in Villa giving away plenty of corners and free-kicks. Harry stepped up to bend one into the bottom corner. 2-3 with a couple of minutes to go.

The boys couldn't quite get us level and although we are disappointed the performance was pleasing. MOTM went to William who's position was always spot on, he won his individual battles and kept us organised. A sign we could have a centre half amongst us!!

Next week we play a friendly against Ellesmere Port (2-2 earlier this season) and Paul and I are keen to let the boys play with complete freedom and to make their own decisions. We've done lots of recent work on passing in the hope we can find a balance between attacking runs and team play - we know that some boys are adapting to this but as pitches get bigger its important.

From what we've seen in training and today I'm certain we are close to finding a performance beyond which we've seen so far....

THIS WEEKEND - SAT 22 OCTOBER

Hi all

This week we will train on Friday at 5:45pm at the County offices astro pitches on PITCH 2.

On Saturday we are HOME against Princes Villa. Its a 10:30am KO (10am arrival) at Waverton Primary School.

Fin, Wills B and Austin are rested this weekend.

Best regards

Rob

TRAINING REPORT - SAT 15 OCTOBER

Following the disappointment of our performance against Elton we asked the boys for a reaction over the Friday and Saturday training sessions.

On Friday we felt the best thing was just to play football and have some fun. We designed some overload games (7v5) with some of our skilful dribblers on one team versus some of the boys more prone to passing. It was a good test and throughout the session and definitely towards the end some of the passing from Harry, Fin, Xander and Wills was exceptional.

This morning we mixed things up again with some overload and some even games. The most pleasing thing this morning was that our decision making between dribbling and passing was spot on most of the time, which resulted in goals and assists galore rather than the broken down moves or lost possession we experienced versus Elton.

Bailey was back this week after missing the Elton game, and across both sessions his overall play, work rate and attitude makes him our Captain for the tough fixture next weekend against Princess Villa.

All the boys did really well but we will pick a team next weekend designed to give us the best chance of a positive result as its important for our Cup seeding.

We will try to arrange some friendlies over the half-term involving all available players.

MATCH REPORT- SAT 8 OCTOBER

ROCKETS 3 - 4 ELTON YOUTH

A frustrating result and performance as the boys went down to our first league defeat of the season.

After brilliant passing displays against Blacon and Ellesmere Port, when we got in behind teams, and following a really good training session we felt we could get a result.

Unfortunately though we showed our opposition far too much respect, with tackles and belief lacking in the first 10 minutes as Elton eased into a 0-1 lead.

Across the park bad habits crept back in against the one team in the league you don't run at! We needed to move them about as we knew they can tackle and break; so over doing dribbles wasn't the way forward and wasn't what we'd talked about...

However, after a poor start we did manage to apply some pressure, gaining ground and few corners. From this the ball came out to Charlie who hit a screamer into the top of the net for his first Waverton goal! 1-1, game on and we looked like we could get on top.

In the second half unfortunately we reverted back to earlier form and went 4-1 down from a mixture of good Elton play, not clearing our lines and us never really relaxing and knocking the ball about. Perhaps we were trying to hard individually.

Fair play to the lads for coming back late on to 3-4 through a nice George right footed finish and then a goalkeeper own goal. We almost got back to 4-4 with the last kick of the match seeing the goalie deflect the ball round the post.

Elton deserved their victory today but we would have given them a better match if we could have reached the standard of play showed the previous week.

We now have a run of three matches all against last years 'A' league teams so it will be very tough few weeks if we don't play like a team - which we know WE CAN.

At training on Friday we will regroup and hope to see a reaction on Saturday.