Exiles Mens Vs Sudbury 3

East Men’s Hockey League  Division 5 (North East)

Sudbury III    4     Broadland Exiles    6

It was a tough away match at the halfway point in the season against a Sudbury side which in recent years has been Exiles nemesis. Exiles started brightly when Dan Cheeseman opened his account with    his usual calm finish after some good passing play. Sudbury levelled the game however, through a penalty corner and then went ahead shortly after when a cross from the by-line found their striker unmarked to give them the lead. Exiles rallied and found an equaliser through Rob Panter who struck home the perfect penalty corner.  Sudbury fought back and regained the lead when Will Mullen dived across the goal and deflect the ball past the post with his arm. Although Ken Shaddock in the Exiles goal went the right way the resulting penalty stroke was just out of his reach. Sudbury sensing the game might be in their grasp forced Exiles to defend a series of penalty corners one of which being too high hit Sam Brewster squarely in the chest. From the resulting free hit Exiles raced away and were awarded a penalty corner, the loose ball falling to Dan Cheeseman who superbly reverse hit it into the bottom corner to level the score again just before the break.

Exiles started the second half purposefully with Cheeseman completing his hat trick after a good passage of play, and with Exiles continuing to pressure the Sudbury rear guard scored a 5th goal when -Cheeseman intercepted the ball from a hit out and unselfishly set-up Broadland’s star player Rob Lukey to score from a better angle. Will Mullen with a deep gash to his eyebrow from a deflected ball  and Rob Panter out of the game with a muscle injury, Exiles were reduced to 10 players for the last 25 minutes of the game  Sudbury converted a penalty corner, scrambling the ball over the line to set up a tense and crazy finish with a series of cards reducing the visitors to 9 men for around 10 minutes. Not finished yet, Cheeseman added a 6th goal for Exiles as the unbeaten league leaders maintained their lead at the top of the division.