Milton United vs Reading City FA Vase

I think I speak for everyone at the club when I say we all really look forward to our FA Vase games down at The Heights and everyone comes together to make the day a memorable one for the club. Firstly I was delighted to see so many Milton Mini Kickers in attendance representing the football club as our Milton Mascots for the day. With the incredible help from Zoe Barnes and the other players from our Under 18’s and First Team Ladies teams, I hope every one of the Mascots enjoyed their experience. I’d also like to thank the parents for bringing them down and supporting the team throughout the game.

We knew that Reading City were going to be a really good test for us and we felt this game would give us a good indication of the team’s development. With 5 wins on the bounce in all competitions and a brilliant result mid week against FC Stratford, we couldn’t have been in better form going into this game.

Our starting line up included 5 changes from the mid week game against FC Stratford. Mikey McKirnan started his suspension and was replaced by Matty Woodley, Luke McCormack and Oggy were replaced by Westy and Ty Lee. Connor Harris picked up an injury midweek and was replaced by Jordan Godfrey, and there was a surprise change in the goalkeeping department, as Josh Grant replaced Timmy Mungall due to an injury. (A change that even come as a surprise me!)

I think we started the game well and throughout the first half we limited Reading City to very few clear cut chances from open play. If anything I thought the game was pretty even between both sides. During the half time break we spoke about being patient in possession and trying to show more quality in the final third, but also to try and limit Reading City to minimal set pieces in around our box, especially from corners and the long throw ins. Credit to Reading I thought their set pieces were very effective, but I felt we dealt with them tremendously well.

The goal we scored was very well worked from our own set piece. Some clever movement from Jordan Godfrey to come short to the corner and leave the space at the front post for Louis Joyce to finish, after a quality delivery from Matty Woodley wasn’t dealt with by the goalkeeper. A goal I thought we really deserved!

Freddie then had a brilliant chance to seal the game for us, with a one on one chance after going through against the goalkeeper. I think Freddie won’t hide his disappointment with the finish, but it proved we were still creating chances to kill the game.

Reading City then started to pile on the pressure and credit to the lads, I thought we defended really well to keep them from scoring. However I won’t hide my disappointment at the goal we conceded 30 seconds from time. For starters I’m not sure where the referee got 6 or 7 minutes of added time from, but we have to defend the goal better. In a previous match report I spoke about managing the game better to see out the result, and this is another example of exactly that. The goal is totally avoidable even prior to entering our own half.

I don’t want to say too much about the quality of the penalties but I won’t be in a rush to watch them back again. Full credit must go to Josh Grant for the 3 saves he made to win us the game. The penalty he saved high to his right was an unbelievable save which any goalkeeper would’ve been proud of! This was his moment and I can’t express enough how proud we as a management team were of his performance.

A brilliant result for the team and the club and we look to continue to build on our winning run in the next few games to follow. We look forward to heading down to Little Common in the next round of the FA Vase, full of confidence than we can continue to progress in the competition.
Thanks again to everyone for coming down and supporting the lads and we look forward to seeing you all again down The Heights.

Up the Milton!

Tatty