Queens' 2 Jesus 0

Yes! at last! Queens' have beaten Jesus!
Last season, we lost a close league game 2-1, and lost the MCR Champions Cup final 3-1 to them.
The game this time was close as usual and we weren't able to play our normal passing game from the start as Jesus were very good at closing down space and all our through balls were running through to their keeper.
Eventually, one of our through-balls was played wide enough and tom did well to take his chance and put us one nil up at half-time. In the second half, we played better football and kept possession alot more effectively and kept Jesus at bay.
Paul managed to get the crucial 2nd goal with 15mins left in the game from an attempted cross that found its way into the top corner and Dan managed a superb seamanesque save at the other end to deny their striker.
In the end, we played well, and are back on track with out league title ambitions after the opening day defeat to Emma.
Next week is a big test against Clare/Fitz, who are unbeaten so far and beat Emma this weekend, so hopefully we can get a result there!!

Team: Dan C, Pete, Me, Adrien, Andy B, Gabriel, Paul, Herve, Stefan, Tom, Matt W, Yue, Roland, Dan S

Goals: Tom, Paul

Check out the league table/results and fixtures using the links on the website.

Catz/Sidney 1 Queens' 6

Much better game than last week :-)
We played good attacking flowing football against a Catz team that was showing the fact that it was their first game of the season. We commanded possession and control of the game, and i think the score in the first half represented this as it was 4-0. Catz were counterattacking well in the first half as they had the wind and the slope but we managed to hold them at bay and intelligently played the ball out through the defence and midfield rather than hacking it away. The shape and workrate of the team was a country mile better than last weeks performance against Emma. Had we taken more of our easier chances, we could have easily had double figures.
Their goal was a quick breakaway from a corner, with their captain racing away and dribbling past 3 of our players and dinking it past Dan. Though Gabriel scored the goal of the day with a looping overhead kick from the edge of the box!
Well done everyone, next week we have a tricky game against Jesus College (who beat Emma 3-2 on saturday).

Team: Dan C, Simon, Andy H, Adrien, Charlie, Andy B, Paul, Herve, Yue, Gabriel, Tom, Dan S, Roland, Gareth, Bob.

Scorers: Tom (2), Gabriel (2), Bob and ME!!!!

Emma/Mag 4 Queens' 1

Not a great start to the season :-(
The first half of the game was cagey, with chances at both ends and after emma took the lead, Gabriel equalised to leave it at 1-1 at half-time. Unfortunately, after this, Emma upped their tempo and we weren't able to keep up after suffer a couple of injuries in the first half and a not enough match practice for some of our players. After a debatable second goal for emma (which was yards offside in my opinion but unfortunately not the referees), and a third goal which when under our keeper, we were out of it. We did create chances ourselves and hit the post/bar on 3 occasions (so in my new version of football which rewards 2 goals for hitting the post or bar, we would have won the game 7-4 :-P).
Anyway, this game is history and i'm sure we'll do much better next week against Catz/Sidney!

Team: Peter S, Peter M, Andy H, Matt M, Charlie, Gabriel, Paul, Herve, Adrien, Charles, Tom, Yue, Dan S, Dan C, Roland

Goal: Gabriel

Deloitte 7-a-side

We entered into a well-organised (by yours truly and deloitte :-p) on saturday afternoon but ended up "doing an england" and going out on penalties in the knock-out round.
and yes, it was pete "own-goal" mason who missed the crucial penalty after 11 before him had gone in, but he did kudos hitting the bar though!
No, seriously, it was a good little tournament, we played some very nice passing football throughout though we were maybe a tad too conservative with our play, adopting a possession style with an extra defensive man to ensure that we didn't concede goals.
group stage:
Queens' 4 - 0 Deloitte1
Queens' 0 - 0 Churchill
Queens' 0 - 0 Clare/Fitz
semi:
Queens' 1 - 1 Jesus, Jesus won 6-5 on pens.
final:
Darwin 2 - 1 Jesus

Next week, first league game against Emma/Mag on saturday, meet at emma pitch at 10.20am for a 11am kick off. Please get there early so we can sort out getting changed and make sure that everyone is warmed up and knows each others names!!!!
Email me back if you can make it!

Queens' 4 Clare/Fitz 3

Decent performance and result against a hard-working and committed Clare team, though we didn't have the right tactical shape to deal with danger posed by the opposition and the shape of the team was a little too individualistic. Basically, what i'm trying to say is that we played well as we had good players playing but we didn't play as a team and we'll get punished against better teams unless we can get organised.

We dominated for most of the game, but Clare were threatening on the counter with two very decent players with pace and skill (and thats not you Ed and Chris ;-). They were 2-0 up at half-time thanks to a Chris Andrews' mis-hit shot which trickled past Dan, and a Peter Mason special where he lobbed Dan from outside the box after Dan had called for the ball. We missed countless opportunities with Gustavo, Itzam, Gabriel and Adrien all cupuable (especially gustavo, as he came wearing trainers and constantly fell over for the first ten minutes, and then put boots on and missed a golden chance from 8 yards out!)

After half-time, we sorted things out with Herve dominating midfield defensively so we could provide a basis for attacking. We won a penatly, which I neatly dispatched for my first goal of the season! and then Herve scored directly from a free-kick, and then Herve scored again after a scramble in the box. So 3-2 and cruising, but then they scored again thanks to a very dodgy back-pass from Adrien to Dan. But at 3-3 with 5 to go, we managed to get the winner from a great lob from Gabriel (in the right net this time Pete!) and so it finished 4-3, although they will protest that the last goal was off-side, but there defence was pretty tired by then and were shouting off-side for everything anyway.

This saturday, we'll have a training session for freshers/returners at 12pm next to Queens' College to get some fitness and technique ready for the new season.
For some of the experienced players, we're playing in a 7-a-side tournament sponsored by Deloitte between the best MCR teams in the league, which should be interesting!