Lewisham recorded their heaviest defeat today, on a day that went from bad to worse. Having experienced an in-disciplined episode the previous week, Lewisham were looking to make amends by turning in a positive performance on the pitch.

It didn’t help though that in the week leading up to this match, goalkeeper John Henry had decided to join Croydon FC after spending five seasons at Lewisham. With no reserve team or youth team and a number of un-successful phone calls to try to get a replacement keeper, Lewisham were without a recognised keeper for this fixture. Jason Campbell volunteered to stand between the posts and consequently became the sacrificial lamb.

Approaching kick-off time things were even worse, as four senior players failed to turn-up. So Lewisham started the match with 10-men, awaiting the arrival of centre-back Martin West who was delayed at work. The home team managed to hold out for 10 minutes before Coney Hall opened the scoring with a fine effort into the top corner giving Campbell no chance.

West then arrived on the pitch to make it an 11-a-side affair and within a couple of minutes against all of the odds Ousmane Kaba had equalised by scoring his first goal for the club, after good link-up play with Dinah Diawara.

This was as good as it got for the home side as the goals started to flow in favour of Coney Hall. Firstly a Coney Hall forward benefited from indecision by Anthony Sands and West, then another after weak defending by Chris White and Sands and then a forth shortly followed after more poor ‘team’ defending.

The second half was a slightly more even affair, with the away team being made to wait until the last 15 minutes to grab a further three goals. With 10 minutes to go Darren Wallace had a ‘coming together’ with a Coney Hall player, who reacted by twice pushing Wallace in the face, an incident that was obviously missed by the officials as both players were booked. Neither player wanted to accept the referee’s outcome of the incident and followed one-another all over the pitch to get into ‘petty’ arguments and episodes of bumping into one another, stepping on each other’s feet and squaring-up. Trevor Cogley eventually had enough and sent both players off.

They continued to argue as they left the pitch and Wallace was surrounded by a number of Coney Hall players, one of which also received his marching orders for being verbally abusive towards Wallace.

Things will have to improve for the Borough club in the new year, a task that has been made all the harder after an exodus of players and a member of management in the two-week period leading up to Christmas.

TEAM:

Jason Campbell 5, Chris White 5, Marcus Wilson 7, Anthony Sands 5, Martin West 6, Ousmane Kaba 5, Lambert Tsemzang 5, Ricardo Harvey 4, Erron Dussard 5, Darren Wallace 6, Dinah Diawara 5

SUB:

Jamie Fairman 6