Under 15 Boys:
Sunshine Coast Fire 3 v Olympic 2
The Fire started well with some good possession, pressing Olympic high up the field and making it difficult for them to get any kind of rhythm and combination play. There were a few free kicks given early to both sides but neither team created any real chances early on.
Fullbacks Abe Reeves and Callum Jones restricted Olympic’s wingers causing them to become frustrated; this gave our fullbacks more freedom to join in on the attacks and saw good overlapping runs from which lead to some half chances.
Fire was finally rewarded in the 20th minute when good pressure from the goal kick let Kobe Fuller nick the ball off the Olympic defender and play a ball to Jesse Gibbs. Gibbs jinked across the 18 yard box and delivered a pass to Jack Bowen on the edge of the box who delivered a cracking finish past the Olympic keeper.
This sparked some good pressure from Olympic who looked to try and answer quickly but some brilliant defending from Mason Bell and Jake Nalder kept the opposition at bay.
Another chance arose when Gibbs and Fuller combined but it was snuffed out for a corner. However, as half-time approached the Fire’s tireless work pressing Olympic in the final third paid off once again when another brilliant challenge from Fuller on the centre back saw the ball fall to Gibbs, who played the ball back to Fuller to beat a defender and pull the ball left across the goal to bury it with his left foot. This would see the fire go into the break 2-0.
After the restart the game continued at a high tempo with some niggling on-field battles going on, particularly between the fullbacks and the wingers.
Olympic started to press a lot higher but could not threaten the Fire’s backline lead by Bell lead with some amazing last ditch tackles.
Fire was also getting forward with some real chances to extend the lead; Gibbs got himself in a good 1v1 situation on the edge of the area and drove into the box, beating his marker before just scuffing the shot.
Bowen was reintroduced and quickly joined back in the action as he picked up a ball on half way and glided through the Olympic defence, beating four players to find himself inside the 18 yard box before shooting just wide.
Soon after wards, Fire was awarded a penalty after the keeper came in with his knees raised high and smashed into jack’s head. Fuller slotted the penalty home for a 3-0 lead.
Fire was unlucky not to add to the tally when Jones’ free kick 20 yards out fizzed past the post. The game started to get a bit more heated and with only 10 min to go Fire conceded a goal with a brilliant darting run from Olympic’s Dane Ingham leaving Fire’s back four unable to regather. He slotted the ball in from a tight angle to give Olympic a glimmer of hope.
Three minutes later Reis Hanton was deemed to have handballed in the box and Olympic was awarded a penalty which was coolly converted to bring the score to 3-2.
The last few minutes seemed to be a very rough and ugly as Fire fought hard to hold the lead, but the boys held on and were pleased to secure a victory over top-placed Olympic.
Coach Daniel Carew said he was proud of his team’s effort.
“We knew we could get a result and we were pumped to show Olympic that they were lucky last time against us,” he said.
“Our back four were strong today; Mason Bell was fantastic – his big, strong challenges kept us in the game. Jack bowen was dangerous too and he was unlucky not to be on the score sheet a few more times. I am lucky to have so much depth up front with Jack, Kye, Kobe and Jesse – they all can create chances.”
“We deserved the win and we played some good football in the first half to set the platform, we just panicked towards the last 10 min or so. Being fatigued we just needed to relax, but the boys will learn from this and if it happens again they will slow it down and close the game out a bit better.”
Man of the Match: Kobe fuller, 2 goals and was causing Olympics back four all sorts of problems.
