Kelvedon Hatch travelled to Ongar Town to play local rivals in this league encounter on a bright but freezing cold Saturday afternoon in January.

The Hatch started brightly and on 3 mins the Town keeper brought off an acrobatic save to deny a deft Hatch volleyfrom Kevin Marsden. The Hatch continued to put Town under pressure with Town struggling to make any inroads as they couldn’t get hold of the ball up to relieve the Hatch pressure. On 20 mins Hatch got their reward when a scuffed shot from the edge of the box was spilled by the Town keeper and Danny Dow had the easiest of tap ins from 3 yards out, 0-1. Town now settled down a bit and played some decent football without looking threatening and then suffered a set back when Hatch scored again to go two up on 32 mins. Town thought there was definitely a suspicion of offside but nevertheless their defence stood rooted to the spot whilst Darren Brown reacted quickest and slid the ball sideways for another tap in from 3 yards out, 0-2. On the stroke of half time, if it wasn’t already, it was definitely game over when Hatch scored a third from a looping header by Greig Taylor, 0-3. Town didn’t drop their heads and could in fact have scored when Jeater rounded a couple of Hatch defenders but his shot was well saved by the Michael Bowditch the young Hatch keeper, who pushed the ball away for a corner. The Hatch went into the half time break 3 goals up but it has to be said there hadn’t been a great deal to choose between the two sides and the truth is that Hatch had created 3 chances and scored 3 goals.

The second half was a strange rather subdued affair played in the middle third of the pitch with possession reasonably evenly matched although to be fair it must have been difficult for Hatch to motivate themselves knowing the game was already won. On 78 mins Nick Lowery replaced Duncan Sinnott. To their credit Town didn’t drop their heads and continued to at least try to play football but Hatch were in complete control and Town didn’t create a worthwhile effort on goal until late on when Evans hit the post and only just failed to scramble the rebound in. The Hatch added 3 more goals late on in the game through James Burt 80mins and 81 mins and Dow on 85 mins to take home 3 valuable league points from this 6-0 away victory.

The Hatch supporters had witnessed a comfortable win by their team who had scored 6 goals from 6 chances.

Anon