Aldershot & Farnham Men’s first team (A&F) scored a last-minute winner to beat Canterbury’s second team 5-4 in their first home game after Christmas.

Despite Canterbury seeming to struggle in the South East Premier Division, A&F had not always had it their own way against them.

A&F decided to try to put the visitors under pressure from the start, putting on a full man-to-man press. This worked in the opening exchanges as Canterbury’s back line struggled to settle, producing errant touches and passes which allowed A&F to gain possession high up the field.

But they could not make this count and slowly Canterbury began to grow into the game, holding lots of possession in dangerous areas outside A&F’s D, with the home side unable to get out and put pressure on the ball carriers.

Canterbury were working it well in those dangerous areas and chances were starting to come. It was now A&F’s turn to produce errant touches and that prevented them from mopping up and playing out from the back, which they usually do so effectively.

Then Scott Perry was given a green card for deliberately knocking the ball away at a long corner, which was subsequently upgraded to a penalty corner. The resulting effort on goal squirmed under Kevin McCafferty and ricocheted in off the left post to put Canterbury 1-0 up.

With time and space to pick out passes into A&F’s D, coupled with the poor touches, Canterbury were causing some problems. Another crash ball hit McCafferty’s foot in the D as he tried to intercept. Although this time he did clear the drag flick from the penalty corner off the line, it fell kindly for Canterbury who promptly doubled their lead and went into half-time 2-0 up.

Coach Ian Jennings used his half-time team talk to call for calm, especially in the final third, and remind A&F that the game was still there for the taking. A&F responded well to this and began to string together some better moves and exert pressure on the visitors.

A&F’s resurgence, coupled with a yellow card for Canterbury’s forward, caused the visitors to capitulate quickly. The extra space let A&F’s dangerous midfield players get time on the ball. Their neat interplay brought success in the opposing D. Two penalty corners were won in quick succession and Perry dispatched both to bring A&F back on level terms at 2-2.

Canterbury made life harder for themselves as they lost another player to the sin bin to reduce them to nine men. A&F continued to press home the advantage and Perry’s third drag flick goal from another penalty corner gave A&F a 3-2 lead.

But with A&F looking into a low sun, Canterbury started to launch aerials to try to relieve the pressure they were under and get themselves up the pitch. This was somewhat effective and brought some joy down the wings. A penalty corner for the visitors led to a penalty stroke as McCafferty again failed to take the drag flick off the line, the ball striking his foot which prevented the equaliser. Canterbury converted the stroke well, the ball going low into the corner past Hamish Hall who was powerless to stop it going to 3-3.

Having worked so hard to get ahead, A&F then gave themselves a mountain to climb. Another crash ball into the D following a Canterbury long corner found a forward free. Hall did well to make a diving save from the initial shot, but the rebound fell kindly for a Canterbury forward who rounded Hall, who was unable to recover in time, and pushed the ball into an empty net to make it 4-3 with under ten minutes to go.

A&F piled forward to salvage something from the game. A few fine stops from Canterbury’s goalkeeper frustrated the home side. But Perry was the one to give them hope. Another flowing move down the left found Perry running at the D with intent. He weaved his way around despairing defenders and this time the goalkeeper could do nothing as he powerfully lifted the ball past his shoulder from a narrow angle to score his fourth and make it 4-4.

With A&F back in the ascendancy, Canterbury were reeling. A&F pushed forward again, this time down the right, around the back of the visiting defence and along the baseline.

The pull back was not on target, but Canterbury’s scrambled clearance found Will Caine. His untidy first shot fell back to him and this time he made no mistake in finding the bottom corner to give A&F a 5-4 lead with less than 30 seconds to go.

Coach Ian Jennings said: “It’s always good to put away sides which you dropped points to last season. It was also pleasing to score another five goals, but disappointing to let in four generally avoidable ones at the other end which kept us under a lot of unnecessary pressure.

“I think we were fairly lacklustre in the first 20 minutes and didn’t put away the chances we had, or the final pass was not at the level required in this league. This resulted in us being 2-0 down at half-time which obviously meant we had to step it up if we weren’t going to throw away points unnecessarily.

“The message at half-time was very clear, be more precise with our passing and try to avoid going route one in a panic to try to get back in the game, and I was delighted with the way this message was applied.

“Our discipline was once again very good, despite the opposition commenting on just about every decision, and in the end this led to their downfall as we were able to take advantage of their players being sent to the sin bin for dissent and poor tackling.

“Our movement through the lines was becoming more consistent and the pressure this put on the opposition became too much for them. Annoyingly it seemed every time we got control of the game we would let them back in with some sloppy defending. However we maintained our composure and in the end our persistent pressure paid off and we were able to grab the winner.”

Kevin McCafferty