The Greatest Escape?

Upminster travelled to Old Brentwoods this week and one of their favourite away fixtures of the season. The U’s were looking to avenge their over 45’s semi-final defeat in March at the hands of OB’s and to return to winning ways having not won a match since February. Despite Steve Foster not being around this week his influence was still evident having passed his team sheet onto his right hand man the night before. His plans were thrown into disarray due to the no show of Graham Redwood and a power struggle that saw Tony Myers usurp the role of caretaker manager between the changing rooms and 5 mile hike to the pitch. So Upminster lined up with a revolutionary 3-5-2 formation that Myers felt confident was the way forward. Not long into the game and the U’s found themselves 1-0 down with OB’s first attack ending in a goal. OB’s seemed to score at will and soon found themselves 4-0 up with barely 15 minutes of the game gone! At this stage Redwood had turned up and Upminster immediately reverted to Foster’s original game plan, bringing Redwood on for Damian O’Reilly and the normal 4-4-2 formation. For the remainder of the first half Upminster created lots of chances but failed to get anything on target whilst OB’s were easily contained. Eventually Billy Read got one back not long before half time to give the U’some hope at 4-1.

In the second half it was all Upminster yet still they faced a momentous struggle if they were to get anything out of this game. Paul Lyons was pushed up front to join Read and this quickly paid dividends with Lyons putting Read in who lifted the ball over the keeper to make it 4-2. OB’s seemed to really struggle with the pacey look to the U’s frontline and Read then repaid Lyons by putting him in for a one-on-one with the keeper, allowing Lyons to score and to make it 4-3. Now that it looked possible that Upminster could at least get a draw out of this game and you could sense that OB’s felt the same way. Read scored the almost inevitable equaliser and his third with a shot that was smashed home, the OB’s goalkeeper seemingly diving to get out of the way of the ball! The greatest comeback was fittingly completed by Redwood who finished smartly from a corner giving Upminster victory in one of their greatest comebacks ever.

Assistant Manager’s MOTM – “Billy Read, always a threat and typical clinical finishing given a chance.”