Cardea 0-5 Eunice Huntingdon

Eunice, opening their season after having the weekend off, took advantage of some tired legs in the Cardea team and had the better of the opening exchanges. They peppered the Cardea goal relentlessly and on a number of occasions ‘keeper James Wilson kept Cardea in the game with some fantastic stops.

Cardea struggled to deal with the Eunice midfield pressure and were finding it hard to get Klinkovics, Baldwin or Hart in to the game.

Despite being under pressure for most of the half, Cardea almost went 1-0 up after Nathan Ginty found Kieran Hart out wide in a rare bit of space. The winger drove in to the box and tried to curl his effort in at the far post but saw his effort go just wide.

HT: Cardea FC 0-0 Eunice Huntingdon

Cardea had the first chance of the second half after a excellently delivered free kick went past everyone, including the goalkeeper, but just went wide of the back post and out for a goal kick.

Eunice took the lead with their own free kick. The ball delivered from wide looked to be over hit towards the back post and beating everyone but was reached excellently by the Eunice attacker and over Wilson in goal.

The Cardea heads dropped after the goal and it was quickly 2 for Eunice as the striker ran on to a long forward ball and finished nicely.

The Cardea heads and legs had now gone but not the fight as the game became scrappy and heated with several bookings for the frustrated side. Skipper John Reddell getting lucky not to see red for a late challenge but the ref only issued a yellow.

The Eunice team had now decided to waste time and hold on to their lead but scoring goals became easy to them on the counter attack as they got their third and fourth of the game in similar fashion.

There was still time for both teams to be awarded and miss penalties - Ash Baldwin hitting the bar after Klinkovics was bought down in the box by the Eunice Keeper.

The game was capped off with another counter attack and the shot from the edge of the area, deflected off a couple of bodies and past Wilson who could only watch.

After the game manager Matt Robinson said “We were beat by a much better Eunice then the team we played last season, they were more organised and looked sharper from start to finish, they got in our heads and frustrated us and then picked us off when they had the chance. We have to put this right on Saturday away at Kings Cliffe.”

MOTM was Thomas Klinkovics who worked tirelessly for the team all game and when he got the ball caused the opposition some trouble. He also ended up dropping in to centre midfield to give us some much needed energy when the game became open.