M2's Unfortunately Draw in the Last Minute

After a controversial away game at Wakefield, Driffield Men 2’s fought out a tough 2 - 2 draw against a young & in form Leeds University 2’s team on an early Saturday morning.

Captain ‘Lord’ Mike Hirst had the plan to protect the Driffield defence with the aim of shutting out the energy of the Leeds team by switching up the usual formation and swapping out one of the centre backs for a 5 man midfield and playing a 3-5-2 formation. This certainly played in Driffield’s favour of controlling the game.

With the Leeds team being not only short on players but apparently also vehicles, the game was delayed by 15 minutes. It eventually pushed back with only 7 players for Leeds starting, as the remaining team members sprinted from the car park moments later. Driffield quickly took advantage of this, keeping good control of the ball and passing around the University boys, with slow build up play resulting in a cool finish from Mike Sowersby in the 15th minute of the game. Some big saves from Alan Bower and tough tackling from the wing backs, Archie Stall & Will Kane kept Driffield ahead. The remainder of the half resulted in a lot of back and forth with some good running on the wings from Joe Osborne and Tim Moss.

The 2nd half started very much like the first, the central midfield 3 of Si Stephenson, Mike Hirst & Kirk Rothwell controlled the game well, shutting the Leeds team almost out of the game, with Ash Ewbank creating chances up top and their efforts were well rewarded when Mike Sowersby doubled his tally in the 40th minute.

Following a series of impressive reflex saves by Alan Bower, managing to keep Driffield ahead, the team's efforts were ultimately thwarted in the 58th minute when Leeds scored a goal to level the playing field. With the youthful stamina of the Leeds team starting to play advantage in the closing 20 minutes of the game, Russ Lee managed to keep Driffield on top with 2 big ‘1-on-1’ tackles. A 60th-minute short corner for Driffield resulted in a great save from the Leeds keeper, denying a Mike Hirst short corner flick that was destined for the back of the net, with appreciative shouts from the sideline ‘been practising at home Mike?’.

Unfortunately it wasn’t to be Driffield’s day as they were broken down in the last minute when some scrappy defending allowed Leeds to take advantage of a tap in, Driffield put all the pressure on they could in the final moments, just falling short at the final whistle.

Next week, in the return fixture, Driffield 2's will travel to Leeds for an evening match.