MATCH REPORT: Fisher 2-2 Corinthian

Fisher 2-2 Corinthian
Saturday 1st August
SCEFL Premier Division

Match Sponsors: Available
Matchball Sponsor: Millwall Community Trust

Attn: 232
Scorers: Alex Kozak (14 mins), Don Macaulay (90+7 min pen)

Donald MacAulay’s penalty, late into injury time, rescued Fisher a point against Corinthian on the opening day of the Southern Counties East Football League Premier Division. Fisher were able to field a side with nine players from last season in the starting lineup, giving full debuts to goalkeeper Zacharias Akinde, against his former club, and centre half Colin Skhoyimue. However, despite the familiarity of the starting eleven, Fisher’s early play was a little disjointed and it was the visitors who made the early running, forcing a number of corners inside the first ten minutes. On fourteen minutes Fisher finally settled in midfield and were able to feed left-winger Alex Kozak, who twisted and turned to get past the Corinthian right back and then deceived the keeper by sending in a shot with the outside of his boot rather than crossing and seeing his effort swerve through a small gap between the keepers hands and the near post, possibly picking up the slightest touch of a defender’s head enroute, to open the scoring.
Fisher should have doubled their lead when Flavio Jumo was teed up on the edge of the box but his effort was straight at the keeper. Jake Lovell and Festos Kamara both saw efforts blocked away at the near post as they got in down the right channel as Fisher found some fluency. Just as it looked like Fisher may be taking control of the game, with Charles Yiadom Konadu a growing force, Corinthian battled back. Just past the half hour mark a long ball down the left flank allowed Asanti Amoah, to carry the ball into the penalty area and exchange passes with the centre forward, who seemed to profit from his own stumble, pushing the ball back into the path of Amoah who placed his shot across Akinde into the bottom far corner to level the score. Akinde then did well to beat away a long range effort that looked to be heading in to his bottom left corner not helped by a difficult bounce just in front of him, but the former Corinthian stopper was able to push the ball around the post.
The second-half saw Fisher start on the front foot and the Corinthian keeper brought off a good save high to his right to pluck the ball out of the air after Kamara had found space to turn and shoot following another good run down the wing from Kozak. Jumo then sent a powerful effort from outside the box that rose just over the crossbar. Approaching the midpoint of the half though Fisher were rocked by a second Corinthian goal after Charles Yiadom Konadu gave away a foul twenty five yards out. With the wall already lined up, a slight movement in the positioning of the ball allowed Jamie Billings a sight of the near post and he sent in a low curling effort that kissed the inside of the post the rolled across goal into the far corner of the net. Fisher pushed men forward in search of an equaliser with right back Jack Gibbons regularly joining the attack skipping through tackles, but this left them short at the back and Corinthians should have benefited when a long ball gave them a two on one break but the wrong options were taken and a harmless chip shot was gathered easily by Akinde.
Fisher huffed and puffed looking to level the game substitute Rafael Garcia saw plenty of ball managed to get a couple of shots away but they lack sufficient power to trouble the keeper. A scrappy end to the game saw Corinthian trying to break up play as much as possible had a series of fouls in quick succession saw them rack up five cautions. A rasping effort from Gibbons flew just over the crossbar and the introduction of James Bessey Saldanha added impetus to the midfield. Substitute Temi Alaka just failed to get his head on a floated cross to the back post as he threw himself towards the ball. With the added time almost up it looked like Fisher may be resigned to defeat, but a long ball forward from Conor Darwish bounced awkwardly for the Corinthian defence and allowed Alaka to get in behind his defender and as he tried to swivel on the ball to get his shot away he was pulled to the floor and a spot kick awarded. Centre half Don Macaulay held his nerve, after a long delay to the taking of the kick, to slam it low to the keeper’s right for a last gasp equaliser and a share of the points.