With pre-season finally over, the Cambrian youth team began thier competitive games with a deserved win over Pontyclun in the Macwhirter Youth Cup.
This midday kick off provided some real entertainment for the spectators, with Cambrian in boyant mood early on. Strikers Nathan Hughes and Owen Jenkins began sharply, linking up well an creating an opening for Jenkins whose shot was well saved by the keeper.
Liam Reed carved an opening for himself, beaten two players before cutting the ball which Hughes just missed for a certain goalscoring opportunity. The team continued to dominate in midfield, winning key ball and distributing to the clever Morgan Plant who got into some great positions but lacked quality from the final ball.
Reed had a good header saved by the keeper, and Liam Hutchinson also had a header tipped round the post. Indeed it was Hutchinson who had Cambrians best effort. A free kick from 25 yards was hit with so much venom the keeper could barely feel his hand after a world class save.
Nathan Hughes latched onto a mistake by the Clun centre back but his 20 yard effort came back off the post and into the keepers hands.
Credit to Pontyclun whose battling style made things very difficult for Cambrian. They were to finish the half the stronger team, causing a few problems from set pieces, but keeper Tommy Barrett made two excellent saves with his feet to deny them the opener. H/T 0-0
After a quick change around, the game was completley even, with both teams content on maintaining possession and credit to both sides who tried to play an open style of football.
Chances fell to both sides, a quick free kick was well hit but came back off the Cambrian bar. Cambrians main threat was from dead ball situations. Gareth Welsh had a header cleared off the line, before substitute Luke Huntley squandered a 1v1 with the goalkeeper.
The only goal of the game came in bizzare fashion, after a long through ball from Jake Rees, Hughes looked to be in on goal, however the Pontyclun keeper, who it must be said had an excellent game to this point, came charging from his box only to mistime the bounce over his head. Crazily he handled the ball and was rightly dissmissed from the game. From the resulting free kick, the replacement goalie had to pick the ball out from the net in his first action. Hutchinson once agin took an excellent free kick that flew into the bottom right corner leaving Pontyclun dejected. Cambrian saw out the game to ensure a positive start to the season. Credit to Pontyclun, who did have a really good go at it and may feel some what aggrieved to have not scored one of thier opportunities. However, Cam looked more threatening as a team and just edged this close encounter. Next up in our first home game of the season against Taff Well on Sun 20th Sept - 2:30ko
Team: T.Barrett, M.Plant, L.Reed, I.Smith, J.Rees, D.Facey, D.Stanton, L.Hutchinson, N.Hughes, S.Moss, O.Jenkins, L.Jenkins, A.Murphy, C.Rowe, G.Welsh, L.Huntley