Kent Win South East Counties
By Ken Brooke. Sunday, 5 February 2012
Cunningham Strikes Again
A second half equaliser from Rusthall's Theo Cunningham, saw the Kent Under 16 County Representative team win the South East Counties Trophy for the 3rd time in 5 seasons, at Redhill F.C.
With the top two Counties playing each other, Kent knew that a win or draw would be enough to clinch the title, but Surrey knew that they had to win, and certainly gave every last ounce of energy to try and achieve that win.
Kent started brightly. On 4 mins the ball struck the arm of the Surrey defender, and the Referee showed no hesitation in awarding a penalty, which was slotted home confidently by Harry Fenner. This gave Kent the perfect start, but Surrey then began to get into their stride, and with nothing to lose, started getting the ball out wide to their excellent wingers who troubled the Kent back 4 all through the game. Keeper James Blake was called into action on a number of occassions, before Surrey deservedly equalised just before half time. Their forward went through in the box, and cooly slotted the ball home.
At half time it gave us a chance to look at where we were going wrong, and the message was that we had more to give, and we asked the team to up their game second half.
It wasn't long into the second half that Surrey took the lead. At 2-1 we needed to find some quality, and it was a superb cross from the left from Dominic Crawford, that was met by a superb header from Theo Cunningham, which gave the Surrey keeper no chance at all. The game then opened up a bit, and our sub keeper Tom Hadler, pulled off a couple of outstanding saves to keep us in the game. However, with a couple of minutes to go, Mirkan broke clear and having taken the ball around the Surrey keeper, the ball bobbled just as he was going to roll the ball into the back of the net, and instead the ball flew into the trees behind the goal, taking several birds out who had recently nested there!!!
As it happens, this made no difference and the lads held on to clinch the trophy which was awared to skipper Ben Thompson by Competition Secretary Alan Clarke from the London F.A. A fitting reward for a real squad effort.
The squad will now go on to the represent the South East in a one off game against South West to be played in May. A fitting reward.
Well done to the whole squad, who showed a real team spirit and passion for the team, which was appreciated by the Management Team.
Squad: James Blake (Rusthall), Dan Parkinson (Cray Wanderers), Dan Johnson (Cray Wanderers), Ronnie Vint (Dartford), Ebrimah Adams (Orpington), Jubril Adamson (Glebe), Ben Thompson (Dartford), Jordan Robins (Maidstone United), Theo Cunningham (Rusthall), Sam Norton (Cray Wanderers), Harry Fenner (Cray Wanderers), Sean Adams (Cray Wanderers), Dominic Crawford (Ramsgate), Mirkan Yerlikalya (Rusthall), Tom Hadler (Canterbury City), Connor Charlton (Rusthall)
Scorers: Harry Fenner, Theo Cunningham
