Thatcham Town v Andover New Street
FA Cup Preliminary Round
A return to FA cup action for me this weekend with the short trip to Thatcham, just two trains and around an hour travelling, for their tie with Andover New Street. With the hosts playing at step four in the Southern League Division One South and the visitors a Wessex League Premier side in step five, the odds were on the side of the home side but then this is the FA Cup…
This fixture had a certain symmetry for me, when I started this wandering lark two years ago, a visit to Streets Foxcotte Park was just my second game so this would be a good chance to catch up with them. As for Thatcham, I have been to Waterside Park before but many moons ago, visiting with Bracknell Town in their Hellenic league days.
Thatcham is one of the shorter walks from the train station I’ve experienced, not even five minutes walking over the Kennet and you’re there. I arrived around 1.45pm and visited their spacious clubhouse, buying a programme (£2) and having a swift pint of Thatchers cider (£4.40) on a warm sunny day.
Entry for this was £12 for an adult (cash only although you could use your card in the clubhouse to buy a ticket), which I thought was a little steep for an FA Cup preliminary game but looking at several other games on Twitter, most seemed to be around the £10-£11 mark so probably just me being tight!
Next up was a visit to the tea bar where I tried a very filling double cheeseburger and chips for £7.50 before taking my seat in the stand, waiting for kick off.
So the game kicked off with early chances at both ends. First Andover’s Lewis Williams beat the Town offside trap but a bad bounce took the ball away from him inside the box, at the other end, a nice diagonal ball led to a foot race between Kyle Tooze and keeper Matt Fredericks which Tooze won but could only get enough on it to hit the legs of the keeper.
In the tenth minute the hosts took the lead, a long ball forward led to a tussle in the area with both players going to ground and Kyle Daniel-Spray took advantage, picking up the loose ball and firing home. 1-0
The next ten minutes or so there was a lot of to-ing and fro-ing but with little goalmouth action. In the 23rd minute, a lovely floated ball from right to left found Streets Ryan Griffiths in space and his first time pass into the centre found Lewis Williams on his own to stroke the ball home. 1-1
The underdogs were now on top with Williams again looking dangerous down the right flank, forcing a save from Harry Cant in the Kingfishers goal. From the resulting corner, the kick was pulled back to the edge of the box where Callum Sweeney tried his luck but didn’t get a clean contact, his shot being helped on by Claudio Herbert before falling to Corey Taylor-Kelly who smashed the ball into the net from close range. 1-2
Thatcham tried to get back into the game but looked a little one dimensional just looking for the long ball down the flanks which were dealt with easily by the Streets defence. They did have a half chance just before the break but Daniel-Spray couldn’t find the finish this time, screwing his effort wide.
H-T: Thatcham Town 1 Andover New Street 2
The second half started slowly and the closest we came to adding to the scoreline was from an Andover free kick. Sweeney tried his luck from the edge of the area but the ball went high and wide with the ball closer to ending up in the nearby Kennet than the net.
Daniel-Spray made a great run down the left flank on 55 minutes but found himself isolated and was crowded out by three Andover defenders. We nearly had a mix-up in the home defence soon after, a punt down the left flank was chased after by Griffiths which Issiaga Kabba read well and passed back to keeper Cant. The keeper was quickly shut down by Davy Newbold and rolled his foot over the ball but just managed to regain control and clear.
Thatcham were now controlling the game in midfield, passing the ball around more and having waves of attacks but still not really looking like scoring. A decent cross into the box found a Thatcham player who hit a snapshot which nearly hit the corner flag.
At the death it was end to end stuff with Thatcham desperately pushing forward looking for an equaliser while leaving chances for Andover to hit them on the break. Josh Moore having the best chance on the break for the visitors, forcing a good save at his near post by Cant in added time.
F-T: Thatcham Town 1 Andover New Street 2
Thatcham will be disappointed with a performance in which they never really looked like they got going. They didn’t work the opposition goalkeeper enough and, once behind, didn’t really look like breaking down the hard working and well organised Andover defence.
Andover for their part will be delighted with this cup upset and the opportunity to move into the first qualifying round. The result was well deserved at the end of the day and they will be keen to keep the good form they’ve shown at the start of this season going over the coming weeks.
Good luck to Andover for the next round and all the best to both sides for the rest of the season.