Bexhill College Men’s 1st team, in partnership with Eastbourne Borough Football Club and association with Chelsea Football Club Foundation, continued their fine start to the season with a 4-1 home victory against Whitstable Town.
A grey day on the south coast which pretty much summed up the opening 25 minutes of the game from an Eastbourne Borough perspective. It was a sloppy start from the hosts who lacked tempo, intensity and quality on the ball. In contrast, Whitstable started the game aggressively, pressing high up the pitch and looking to exploit the poor start from the hosts. 20 minutes in they did just that, a long ball down the right side put the forward through on goal only to see his angled shot come back off the post, Lucin blocked the follow-up but third time lucky for Whitstable as the ball was then tucked home past debutant Whiteside to give the away side a deserved lead. 15 minutes before the break the hosts levelled out of nothing. A ball out to centre back Stan Ketchell saw him with far too much space, allowing him to take a touch out of his feet and unleash a piledriver into the bottom corner from 35 yards out past the despairing keeper. The goal seemed to boost the confidence of the home side and dent that of the visitors with the remaining minutes of the half seeing Borough try to break down a compact and low block from the away side, something they weren’t able to do, meaning as the half time whistle was blown both sides went in evenly matched.
The second half began much like the first had ended, the home side needing to be patient in order to break down the stubborn rearguard of the visiting side. On 58 minutes they did just that. A lofted ball over the top from Ketchell was misjudged by the Whitstable defender allowing Sonny Walsh to demonstrate some excellent centre forward play. With 4 Whitstable shirts in close proximity he outmuscled one defender to get the ball down inside the box, shifted it inside of another and beat the keeper with a fierce effort. That goal was the catalyst for more to come and it took just 3 more minutes for Eastbourne to double their advantage. Thomas Lucin the instigator after excellently anticipating a pass, allowing him to force the mistake from the Whitstable defender giving the ball to debutant Tyano Wilson who drove into the box and smashed a shot off the inside of the left post all the way across the line hitting the inside wheel of the goal. The referee indicated a goal but the linesman kept his flag down and after some confusion and a quick conversation between the two officials a goal was rightfully awarded. Borough weren’t done there and took their tally to 4 with their third goal in the space of 10 minutes. Again after some excellent anticipation from Lucin, Walsh held off his defender to control the pass, allowing him to slide a pass into Sam Sharma who finished well beyond the goalkeeper taking his tally to 3 in 2 games. With 20 minutes left on the clock, Borough tried to threaten once again whilst Toby Whiteside in the Borough goal watched as an onlooker but couldn’t find a fifth, it was a rather uneventful final quarter of the game but Eastbourne had done the damage earlier on to ensure another 3 points and their 100% winning start continued.
Manager Shane Lovell said “I was really unhappy with the first 25 minutes, we were extremely poor and were rightfully punished. Full credit to Whitstable they were aggressive and caused us problems in that first half. Once we got the equaliser we settled and grew into the game more and in that second half showed what we’re about. Pleased to have got the 3 points and continue the winning run but plenty more to work on going into the coming weeks.”
Starting XI: Whiteside, Scullion, Palmer, Ketchell, Rivers, Lucin, Freeman, Pollitt, Ovenden, Sharma, Walsh
Subs: Ludlow, Tarrant, Wilson, Grout, Wood
