“The difficulty with setting a repairs budget,” said chairman Trev, at this week’s AGM, “is that you don’t know what will need repairing.”
A crisp tenner says they hadn’t budgeted for replacing one of the upper office windows in the 24/25 budget, which was rudely smashed by a clearance from a Canvey Island defender midway through the first half. (Judging by his face, I hope the defender steered clear of Facilities Manager Damian in the bar afterwards.)
I’ve been coming to Lewes for 15 years now and that’s the first time I can recall a window being smashed by a wayward strike. Remarkable, given some of the strikers we’ve signed over the years.
The chairman can count himself fortunate it’s only a new pane of glass we need to dig deep for, because lurking behind that window for the entire game was manager Pitts, who turned the office into a one-man quarantine centre because he was feeling under the weather (get well soon, gaffer). Still, at least they don’t need to worry about ventilating the room now…
Pitts would have felt a lot better after only six minutes of this game, when we took the lead, although not before Canvey had missed a sitter-and-a-half. A Toby Bull save saw the ball squirt across goal to the waiting Canvey forward, Chris Harris, who couldn’t get his feet untangled to prod the ball into an empty net.
There was a stroke of good fortune about our opener too. Danny Bassett’s shot from the edge of the box was going just wide (I was right behind it and will testify in court if a goal bonus is disputed) but a Canvey defender stuck out a lazy leg and diverted it past the keeper.
Now, having robbed Danny of a goal, I’m going to leap to his defence. I see some nonsense written on the forums about he’s “not a natural striker”, and yet even though he’s played half the season on the wing, he’s already notched 13 goals. He’s on course to score 25-30 goals, if he keeps that going. How “natural” do you want your strikers?
We didn’t really build on that early momentum, and the fact that the video highlights basically cut to the second half after the first goal are indicative of such. It was a sticky affair.
The second half wasn’t a great deal better, at least until Calvin Ekpiteta came on after about an hour and instantly started making things happen. He put in a peach of a cross that just evaded the waiting Gianluca Botti, but we scored our second from the resulting corner. A “training-ground move” as commentator Ollie described it saw the ball go short to Sablier, who poked it to Muirhead. His deep cross found Jerry Puemo, who nodded it down for Botti to bang home.
That looked to have sealed it, only for Canvey to come roaring back into it from a corner of their own. Toby Bull twice juggled a ball that was put in right under his crossbar, before it dropped to Chris Harris to lash home.
And it really should have been points shared in the dying seconds, too, when Canvey headed a ball right across goal to the waiting Kane Gilbert, who had an empty net to head the ball into. Thankfully, Gilbert is the love child of Ronnie Corbett and Sandi Toksvig (yes, who knew?) and so couldn’t get his 4ft 3in frame over the ball, instead heading it over.
So, three points, back up to fifth, and the only damage done is to the window. Not a bad day at the office, even if it was a bad day for the office.
Lewes: Bull, Warren, McIntosh, Puemo, Mundele, Sablier (Maliq Morris), Muirhead, Ghannam (Ekpiteta), Allsopp (Ladapo), Bassett, Botti (Hutchinson)
Unused sub: Antonio
Supporters Club man of the match: Toby Bull made three or four spectacular saves before a slight rick for their goal, which means we’re giving it again to Jerry Puemo, who pulled off a terrific block in the second half and set up the second goal with his unselfish bonce.
Video highlights from Your Instant Replay:
Boyesy’s brilliant photos:
