Robins Suffer Sucker Punch
8th February 2025: Knowle FC 1-2 Littleton FC
How is it possible to be the better team, to outplay the opposition for 85% of the match, and yet still lose? The answer is to have twelve chances on target and score just one goal, whilst the opposition have but two chances, and take them both.
On a difficult pitch, The Robins were all over their opposition in the first half. Odane Barnes opened the scoring on nine minutes when he shot through a crowded area. For the rest of the first forty-five minutes, they were camped in Littleton’s territory. The visitors could not manage one shot on target, so dominant were Knowle.
However, all changed in the second half. Littleton decided on an attacking ploy that was as simple as it was effective. A long ball from the back, having drawn the Robins to over-commit in attack. Adam Taylor used the after-burners to outpace the red defence and shoot from eighteen yards; goal! They used this pattern twice. Once on fifty-one minutes, secondly on eighty-one minutes. The second goal being a carbon copy of the first.
Prior to Littleton’s goal, The Robins had been in total control. The goal came as a shock, and Knowle began to panic. This resulted in Littleton gaining confidence, and eventually their second goal.
Knowle slid to their first defeat of the season. The fact that this came in February with the majority of the season gone, will be of little comfort at Hampton Road. Still, the Divisional Championship is in their own hands.
The Robins still have to travel to Birmingham United (next Saturday) and Northfield Town. These two matches are as important as it gets.
Knowle FC: Slater; Stone; Powell; Clarke ©; Duddley; Drake-Cervantes (Purves); Barnes [9]; C Scott; Craine (Corry); T Scott; Burston-Keeley (MD Shimu).
Subs not used: Riddiford & Record
