Bruised Blues Suffer Another Defeat

By Riley Finch 

A wasteful Margate side missed another opportunity to enter the top-half of the table in a 2-0 loss to third place Enfield Town at the Queen Elizabeth II Stadium.

Despite what was a bright start from the Gate, the home side took the lead through Sam Youngs, acrobatic, improvised finish just twelve-minutes in.

The ball bobbled around the penalty area and Youngs reacted quickest with a flying volley to put the ball past a helpless Harry Seaden.

Thirteen-minutes later, Reece Beckles-Richards was able to prod the ball over the line after Margate failed to clear their lines from a difficult ball into the box.

In an all too familiar feeling to the Gate however, the scoreline did not reflect the dictatorship of the game with Reece Prestidge’s side having chance after chance not just to draw us level but to get ourselves in front.

Margate’s game plan seemed set to cause Enfield problems all afternoon as Olly Box exploited the home sides high line with his electric pace from the first kick of the game.

Steve Cawley and Box had free roam of the final third during the majority of the first-half but both forwards failed to convert key chances.

The biggest chance of all fell to Box as he timed his run to perfection to slip in behind the defence and dart towards the goal but an ever closing angle meant his shot was easily saved by Rhys Forster’s foot.

Cawley, who scored twice last time out against Bognir Regis Town, also found himself in a one on one situation but he just couldn’t get clean contact on the ball and his shot rolled into the arms of a grateful Enfield keeper.

Ben Greenhalgh also had a big chance as he cleverly picked the pockets of a rattled Enfield defence but his shot did not match his darting run and his curled effort sailed over.

Despite facing a two-nil deficit, it seemed only a matter of time before we would get a deserved goal but just minutes from half-time the shining light of our attack, Olly Box, was forced off due to injury.

Enfield had their chances to put the game to bed in the second-half after a number of breakaway chances whilst the Gate struggled to repeat their attacking threat shown in the first 45 resulting in a another tough defeat on the road.

The loss was a disappointing end to a promising week for the Gate after narrowly losing out on three points against Bognir Regis Town to a alate equaliser.

Veteran defender, Tyrone Sterling, spoke after the game: “It’s no more Mr Nice guy in there.

“A lack of desire, not willing enough to defend at times, it wasn’t good enough.

“We had our chances but Enfield finish theirs and we don’t.

“You can’t make excuses.

“We were just speaking in there, just above the relegation zone, it’s not where we want to be.

“We feel the pressure and we should. Just gotta use Thursday to put things right.”

The Gate take perhaps an encouraged break from the league in our next match this Tuesday against Whitehawk in the Velocity Trophy with another long (almost certainly cold) away day ahead of us.

Line-up

Margate: Harry Seaden, Harrison Hatfull, Archie Johnson, Godfrey Poku (Phil Roberts 83'), Tyrone Sterling, Harry Hudson, Sam Blackman, Ben Greenhalgh, Steve Cawley, Olly Box (Fyn Rutherford 39'), Lewis Knight (Rohdell Gordon 64')

Unused Subs: Vinnie Bowman, Leo Mazzone

Attendance

503

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