Graham Pearcey

Graham Pearcey

Colchester 3 Cherries 1

Date: 15 February 2005

A long way to go, and a late night out on a 'school night', for what turned out to to be a disappointing defeat. Colchester have now beaten Bournemouth 3-1 twice this season, as their fans delighted in reminding us by singing "6-2, 6-2, ..." (when they weren't singing, "1-0, and you f***ed it up, ...").

So Colchester remains one of our bogey teams. The sides looked fairly evenly matched in the fast half, and we were certainly not playing worse than Saturday, and if anything the team improved for the second half when playing towards our own fans. On a congested terrace it was at times hard to see some of the action, especially in the 'blind corner' where you couldn't distinguish a corner kick from a throw-in. But we saw the first goal OK: a screaming long range shot from left-back Cummings towards the goal behind which we stood, a shot that was deflected by a Col U defender into the roof of the net. 1-0 to us, just two minutes into the second half.

Col U equalised quickly, off a corner kick, one of what seemed like hundreds they were awarded throughout this game! But we continued to play well, and an excellent header from right-back Purches - proving again that we can score from almost anywhere - hit the crossbar. This was, however, to be our last serious goal shot of the night. Our good fortune deserted us. A free kick from a Colchester player was caught by Moss - then dropped. Ndumbu-Nsungu, whom we'd encountered earlier this season in a Sheffield Wednesday shirt, capitalised on the error to score his first goal for Colchester. And within a minute, as Bournemouth applied pressure, Danns broke away for a truly brilliant one-man effort, running and shooting. 1-3.

This would have been a good time to make substitutions, if only to rest players before two more first team fixtures within a week. But the triple substitution didn't come until one minute before the end of normal time. Too late, and I wonder whether all the subs even got a touch.

The starting line-up (with my scores out of ten) was :



N Moss (7);
Purches (7), Maher (8), Howe (7), Cummings (8);
O'Connor (8) Spicer (8), Stock (7), Elliott (6);
Hayter (6), Fletcher (7).



My 'man of the match' : Spicer.



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