If the opening day of the season was a night out, it would be New Year’s Eve. We’ve all had one great NYE that set the bar unobtainably high for future years, and it is now just a once a year special that never lives up to expectations, but one you feel dutybound to see through to the end. Where the DTFC opening day peak was is debatable, but a 3-0 win at St Albans seems to be the majority verdict. That day at Clarance Park in 2007 saw us cruise to victory with goals from Jamie Gleeson, Hardy Pinto-Moreria and Matt Groves giving hope that the season to come would be an enjoyable one. Fast forward several months and we were relegated by a Lewes side that included Matt Groves… There is no evidence to suggest that such hardships lie ahead for the 2023/24 incarnation of DTFC, but much like many nights out as the clock has ticked from December 31st towards January 1st, Saturday at Merthyr left those of us there feeling like it could have been better and didn’t quite live up to expectation.
This wasn’t actually a game I had intended to go to, but the weather Gods made the trip over the Severn Bridge possible as Dorchester Second XI’s fixture at Cattistock was called off at 1045. This left just enough time for me to jump in El Générale’s armoured Ford at 1100 as we set off towards Wales with no idea what to really expect from the afternoon’s game. El Gen has seen more of the pre-season than I have, with my solitary game being the 2-1 home loss against Wimborne when many of the regular starters were sat just away from us in the stand. So seeing what was a trialist/younger player heavy side mixed with some first team players wasn’t exactly the best gauge of what to expect come 1500 at Merthyr. Our discussions on pre-season did reach the conclusion that wingbacks were the preferred formation, and that if we can keep key players fit, we’ve got a pretty decent squad.
We’ve kept most of what we’d have wanted to, with none of the departures feeling irreplaceable. With the main outs being Harvey Bradbury, Charlie Gunson, Matty Neale, Kieran Douglas and Alfie Stanley, those who have come in don’t feel like downgrades at all. Jack Wright seems to have impressed everyone in defence, Leighton Thomas has a point to prove and certainly has potential, Ollie Haste won promotion from this league only last season, Jordan Barnett has undoubted quality, the permanent signings of Alex Moyse and Olaf Koszela are huge given how they performed last season, and not only does he look a lively footballer, but the signing of Benjani Jnr means we still have the son of a Pompey terrace hero playing for us. We also start the season with a first choice keeper who is our player and not a loan, as well as being someone we have seen play before. All promising signs as we look to finally finish somewhere other than the bottom half of this league.
After a guess at how we’d lineup for the game ahead, which we both got totally fucking wrong, we found ourselves rapidly approaching our destination and both predicted a draw would be the end result. We both agreed that you don’t want to lose the opening game. If only. Parking spaces at the ground had already been filled by 1400, so after a bit of backstreet navigation, El Gen found a place to park. Front passenger side wheel near the kerb, rear passenger side wheel near to Bristol. There was a good crowd of people heading towards the ground on what had turned into a really nice day, totally different to the rain and wind we’d left behind, and there was a queue already as we got to the turnstiles at Penydarren Park.
Penydarren Park is not a ground I’d visited before, although I am familiar with a few Merthyr fans from when we lost 3-2 at Farnborough many years ago, and the Merthyr fans’ weekender nearby at Fleet had been ruined by the weather. So they joined what was pretty much just Cam and I on the terraces there as we watched us fall one step closer to relegation and the Southern Premier abyss, proving that if you try really hard, you can have a almost passable day out in Farnborough. They’re an excellent bunch of fans who deserve a good season. Back in Merthyr, the ground was what I’d hoped and expected it to be in that undefinable non-league character was in abundance, and is still a really good place to watch football. Some grounds in our league are either too new and feel like a leisure centre (Walton) or are in need of some serious work in all areas to get them up to even basic standards (Winchester), but Merthyr is what you’d hope it to be, with some excellent terrace food to match.
With only the downstairs bar open due to a wedding that was taking place at the main one (assuming they were a Merthyr fan, not just someone who was surprised by the interest in their nuptials), we found an equally confused Bargey and his entourage in search of a beer. Having realised the bar entrance was actually back outside, we eventually found our way in and spoke with the other travellers from Dorch and learned of the team news. Lloyd Thomas in goal was as expected, Lewis Waterfield as right wingback was definitely not. El Gen and I had assumed it would be Jordi Foot occupying that position, but he was unavailable, and with Harvey Bertrand injured and Jake Graziano ill, Lewis was asked to be the emergency option. The other slots at the back were less surprising with Louie Slough, Jack Wright and Callum Buckley being the central three, new man Ollie Haste as the left sided wingback. Moyse, Captain Ngalo and Barnett as the men in the middle, and Leighton Thomas up top with Shaq, Olaf finding himself on the bench with Lewis Toms, Benjani Jnr, Ieuan Turner and Tiago Sa. It wasn’t what we’d expected, but it was still a strong side and one that had options on the bench.
Making our way back out onto the terraces the conversation quickly switched from wingback options to food options, with sausage, chips and curry sauce winning that particular contest, and we headed towards the goal we’d be attacking with the other 40ish Dorch that had made the trip. The Goods, Kellaways and the Hodders had all made the journey and there was that cautious optimism that so often bites us in the arse in abundance. There was now only an impeccably observed minutes silence between us and the start of the new season. Well, or so we thought. There was a problem with the netting in Lloyd Thomas’ goal, so we didn’t kickoff until seven minutes past, but after that was fixed, we were underway. Now, although kickoff might have been at 1507, we didn’t appear to realise until 1517 with Merthyr having by far the better of the opening exchanges. Despite their early possession and getting into some dangerous areas, Merthyr didn’t really muster any chances of note, and it was soon us who looked the better side as Merthyr struggled to get out at times, and their habit of trying to play out from the back seemed a very high risk to low reward strategy.
Jordan Barnett saw an ambitious 30 yard effort go over, ex-Magpie Olly Mewhew fired over for the hosts as both sides got closer, but it was us who had the ball in the net first, only for the assistant’s flag to rule out Leighton Thomas’ close range finish for offside. Jordan Bennett saw himself booked in the aftermath of this, we assume for his rather vocal complaints, and many of our players seemed unhappy with the decision. Those of us behind the goal couldn’t have been in a worse position to judge the offside call and Ash and Ant who were on that side had their view obstructed by a bloody great pillar. But the one freezeframe we have seen does suggest we may actually have had a genuine case for complaint, with Leighton appearing to be just the correct side of the six yard line and being played onside by a similar distance the General’s back wheels were from the kerb. The fact it didn’t count didn’t really matter as a matter of minutes later, we took what was a deserved lead.
Barnett’s freekick from the wide left position found its way to Jack Wright on the far side, and his cross was met with a perfectly placed header from Shaq for his and our first goal of the season. The timing and placement of the header couldn’t have been better, and it was the goal our play had probably merited up until that point. Shaq celebrating in front of the young collection of Merthyr fans seemed to go down as well as would be expected with them, and the group of kids behind that goal were an odd bunch to say the least. Looking like the product of a failed experiment with feral cats and a Stone Island badge, they spent more time directing banal abuse at us than anything else. A weaker set of sperms to fertilise and egg you won’t see, and their chant offering to meet me outside was a particularly curious one – they never outlined their intentions or met me, but I assumed they’re just big fans of the blog?
On the pitch, we continued to look threatening as Ngalo saw an effort go just wide after a typically strong run from midfield, and Shaq was unlucky not to add to his tally as his close range header grazed the top of the bar after some good work from Buckers. A couple of Merthyr players were booked for fouls on Shaq, one coming as he was possibly just about to shoot after the keeper had strayed well outside of his area, but as the halftime whistle blew, we were by far the happier of the two sides as we went in 1-0 up, and it possibly should have been more. As we trotted towards the open end, we chatted with a couple of the familiar natives who seemed to be glad it was only 1-0 and were quick to distance themselves from the spunk bubble squadron from behind the goal. “It could be a long season for us if it carries on like this”, one remarked. “Don’t worry, there’s still 45 to go yet” was the almost unison response from El Gen and I. Turns out, we had sadly got our foreshadowing about right.
Much like the first half, we seemed to start playing at a slightly different time to our hosts as Merthyr were far quicker out of the blocks. Ricardo Rees had an angled effort strike the post, with the rebound falling to Mehew, but he was unable to finish and our one goal lead survived. A break in play followed for what was a medical incident in the crowd as play was halted and both physios headed over to the far side to attend to the supporter, who is thankfully now recovering well. The five minute break also allowed us to recover our composure a bit and we could have doubled our lead soon after the restart. Merthyr’s strategy of trying to play out from the back, one that got them into constant trouble in the first half due to their inability to retain possession, nearly came back to haunt them as Leighton Thomas blocked whatever it was the keeper was trying to do and the ball span off towards Shaq who was just unable to control with the goal at his mercy. “I blame Pep Guardiola” was El Gen’s summary of Merthyr’s tactics. Pep’s influence going from Munich and Manchester to Merthyr and beyond.
Our first change followed soon after, Barnett being replaced by Benjani Jnr. This seemed more out of necessity than any tactical switch as Barnett looked one foul or ill judged sentence away from a second yellow card. His undoubted footballing ability did not on this occasion appear to be backed up by thinking before he opened his mouth, so the change was made. Back came Merthyr as they forced a couple of good openings without anything to show for it, and despite us not having as much of the ball, we had two further excellent chances in quick succession. A goalmouth scramble saw two excellent blocks from the home defence keep the score at 1-0, and Leighton then saw an excellent curing effort from the left-hand side of the box smash off the frame of the goal. Having missed those chances to make it 2-0, the obvious happened as we conceded the equaliser within a matter of seconds.
Alex John got the ball about 25 yards out, and his dipping strike arrowed into the bottom corner to make it 1-1 with 73 minutes on the clock. It might have taken a slight deflection but it was a hell of a hit, and we had Lloyd Thomas to thank moments later as his one-on-one save kept it at 1-1 a matter of seconds later. We then made our second and most intriguing sub as Louie Slough was replaced by Olaf. Now, this was the one that struck us as strange at it caused us to change our whole shape and revert from wingbacks to a flat four. Had we been that bad that changing our entire tactical setup was the only option? I didn’t think so. Was this the only way we could get Olaf involved? Also no, for me. So why change from the formation that we’ve had pretty much all pre-season at the first sign of being under some proper pressure. Whatever the reason was, we hadn’t even finished chatting about it on the terraces before we were behind.
Haste, now at fullback, was contesting a ball well into the Merthyr half which he didn’t win. The predictable happened – the ball went into the space behind him, and the onward pass was just out of the reach of Jack Wright, with Ricardo Rees taking the ball down and calmly finishing past Lloyd Thomas, less than two minutes after our reshuffle. The home fans, who had now assembled behind that goal, were creating a very good atmosphere and things went from bad to worse on 83 minutes as Buckers made an uncharacteristic error as he misjudged a hopeful looking pass, with Rees this time having far more to do but making a difficult finish look incredibly easy. 3-1 down and all those goals had come in ten of the worst minutes of play I’ve seen us have for a fair old while. We’d gone from looking like getting a second to looking like a team of strangers, and it had cost us big time.
The game wasn’t done yet as Leighton saw an effort fizz past the post, and we had a couple of shots that were much further away from goal than we care to remember, but in the eleventh minute of thirteen added (yes, you read that correctly) we made it 3-2, due to Olaf controlling and finishing a very good cross from Ngalo. We were so keen to get a leveller, that Benjani Jnr actually tried to take the kick off before being informed it wasn’t ours to take, and the hosts saw out the game from there to claim the points. A 3-2 loss at fulltime and I’d usually say we deserved a point from a game like that, but those ten minutes were so bad, nothing was probably what we deserved.
El Gen and I headed back to the car for the trip home a bit despondent, Bargey and co having a more troublesome walk to their vehicle as some of the amoebas from behind the goal tried to follow them there for reasons that were never explained. All of us were wondering how we’d managed to chuck that away in such a grand manner after playing well for a good part of it. We’ll certainly play worse than that and win this season, and there are reasons to be optimistic for the season ahead. Harrow on Saturday gives us an excellent chance to get our first points on the board, and we do have a squad with some real quality in there. Ngalo playing in a slightly more advanced role was a real menace, Barnett has all the attributes to be a key player if he can avoid daft suspensions, Shaq and Olaf will score goals, and despite not always looking fully in control of all his limbs at various points, Leighton Thomas will cause a lot of defences a lot of problems.
Hopefully the backline becomes more settled and the formation does so as well as although I was very impressed with the first half, the second was a different story as we fell apart. That said, I like Jack Wright, Buckers and Slough as a back three, and add in Jordi Foot or Harvey Bertrand on the right to compliment Haste on the left, who looks to have a serious engine on him, and we’ll be in a good place. Walton is possibly my next game depending on if Dorch twos need a cymbals player or not, but until then, Up The Magpies – hopefully we’re closer to the top of the table come the end of the season than The Gen’s car was to the kerb. SV.
Leave a Reply