Swindon 3rds 3 - 2 Chippenham B

Not much of an intro this week; Swindon had to win if they wanted to be in this league next season!

Things didn't quite go to plan to start with though. Swindon hadn't switched on and Chippenham came out hard and fast and shortly into the game earned their first goal. The ball was moved down the left wing and fired across the D with the waiting attacker taking a big one handed reverse swing but scuffing the strike. The Swindon keeper was reacting to what he thought was going to be a big strike but was stuck in two minds after seeing the contact, leaving his feet cemented to the floor, watching the ball trickle past to his left.

Both teams were evenly matched throughout the half with neither team making many trips past the 25 yard line. Swindon struck on the stroke of half time with Phil Scarisbrick receiving the ball inside the D with his back to the goal, turning around a defender and popping the ball over the Chippenham keeper who had hit the deck. The ball dropped near enough on the line but Andrew made sure it went over.

The second half began and Swindon looked a completely different team and tore through the opposition. Swindon's second goal came soon into the half with a lightning run from Phil Scarisbrick down the middle, weaving in and around the Chippenham defence. After making tonnes of ground and advancing far into the Chippenham D, Phil released the ball across to the left, leaving the goal virtually open for Jordan McKenzie to tap in.

Swindon scored again almost instantly and was a carbon copy move of the previous. Phil picked the ball up again just outside of the the 25 yard line before sliding the ball out to the right to Andrew Kettlewell. Andrew took the ball towards the D parallel with the baseline, putting the ball back across to the left, leaving Jordan with another simple tap in.

Swindon switched off for a long period of time after that and allowed Chippenham to get their second goal with a ball being threaded through from the left to a lone attacker to the right of the D, putting it under the advancing swindon keeper.

Despite the wake up call from Chippenham, Swindon continued to snooze allowing the opposition to keep advancing. Thankfully due to scrappiness and the lack of whistles at the Swindon end of the pitch allowing both teams to get away with a few naughty moves, the scores remained as they were.

A mega win for us today with some spells of excellent play, but again our concentration let us down slightly. There is a fine line between confidence and cockiness and today proved it. No game should be gone into thinking it will be easy. Every opponent in this league is a worthy one and should all be treated as difficult!

Go into next weeks game at Bath thinking will win, but don't think it will be easy, it is going to be far from it...