Photos (Top to Bottom): Clarence fullback Mattias Toghill crosses the ball into the danger zone; Clarence's Luke Crisp tests Lions keeper David Leamey in a tackle; Clarence striker Luke Crisp (left) and Lions' new signing from Northern Rangers, Andrew Davies [PlessPix]
Premier League Section Summer Cup (Group B, South Hobart, Sunday, 14 February 2010)
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Clarence United 2 (L Cripps 20, L Huigsloot 23)
Kingborough Lions United 1 (Greg Freeman 57)
HT: 2-0 Att: 200 Ref: P Galloway
Clarence United: Sweeney - Toghill, Lewis, Parker, A McIntyre - S McIntyre, Stevens, L Huigsloot, Nandan - Cripps, Hamlett [Interchange: Rees, Ling, Sweetten] [Coach: Andrew Brown]
Kingborough Lions United: Leamey - Palmer, Davies, Lucas, R Hinkley - Bevan, Iseli, Bremner, T Pearce - Greg Freeman, McDonald [Interchange: Marchioli, Brown] [Coach: Geoff Freeman]
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Clarence United deserved to win this encounter.
They missed some clear chances early on before Luke Cripps put them ahead in the 20th minute, sweeping the ball home from inside the 6-yard box after Luke Huigsloot had cut it back into his path from the byline on the right.
Huigsloot added the second with a back-header in the 23rd minute from Sam McIntyre’s deep cross from the right.
Sam McIntyre and Alex Nandan were causing problems for the Kingborough defence with their speed, height and agility, as well as with their ball skills.
Kingborough rarely got behind the Clarence back-four and keeper Cameron Sweeney had a quiet debut.
The second half was a little more even and, with three minutes remaining, the Lions were back in contention when poacher-supreme Greg Freeman grabbed a goal.
Ryan Bevan took a dubious free-kick from deep on the right and Freeman appeared out of nowhere to get to the ball and knock it in from close range.
That set-back caused Clarence to up the tempo a bit and Nandan was unlucky not to score two minutes from the end when he smashed a header against the post from Sam McIntyre’s delicate chip from the right.
Kingborough had left their run too late, however, and Clarence collected the three points to move into second place on goal-difference on the Group B ladder.
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· Clarence United coach, Andrew Brown, said:
“An important win. It’s the only one that we’ve played this year that matters.
“We played really well in the first half. We looked quite sharp and bright.
“The goals we scored were good, top quality.
“And, we started the second half well, I thought, to be fair.
“It’s disappointing. It’s like déjà vu. We did this last year against Kingborough and then conceded a late soft goal.
“But, if we can repeat last year and make the final, then that’d be great."
· Kingborough Lions United coach, Geoff Freeman, said:
“I thought we started brightly in the first half and probably played okay until they scored.
“It went downhill a bit after that. Not downhill, but they probably got the better of it until probably half-time.
“The second half, I thought, was relatively even. We defended better in the second half than we did in the first half and, although we didn’t create too much, we were more solid. Not necessarily better, but just more solid in the second half.
“We didn’t make their keeper work at all. We got into opportunities to shoot and we didn’t take those, but that’ll come.”
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