Low barometric pressure and the passing of an occluded front made for blustery conditions and a wet surface at Newcastle Academy where the A's kicked off their cup encounter with Dynamo Fenham in fine style scoring inside thirty seconds. They continued their impressive scoring form with a flowing passing move from the start that resulted in a fine finish by Sam Collins in the bottom left hand corner of the goal from twelve yards.

Dynamo Fenham, currently bottom of Corinthian League Division Two could have been forgiven for thinking that they were in for a hard time, though they were in fact soon on level terms as they equalised after ten minutes after some liberal marking, due mainly to the use of a 3-5-2 formation, allowed them the easiest of one-on-ones which the centre forward duly finished.

The extra man in midfield allowed Garnett to perform some slick passing on the wet surface but they were often frustrated by patches of standing water that brought the ball to a standstill mid-pass. One such move which was not brought to an end by the conditions was put out needlessly by the opposition centre half. From the resultant corner, Dynamo Fenham failed to clear well enough, with the ball dropping to Perry at the angle of the area, who volleyed home in fine style. However, the opposition soon equalised with defensive disarray allowing the Dynamo Fenham striker to fire a shot into the bottom right corner of Scott's goal from just inside the area which, although the keeper got his fingertips to it, was just too strong to keep out. Manager Blogg decided enough was enough and switched the A's to a more familiar 4-4-2 system with Jackson moving from sweeper to left-back and Monaghan dropping from right midfield into right-back.

From this point on, it was clear which side was the First Division outfit, with Dynamo Fenham creating few chances of note for the rest of the first half and Garnett beginning to impose their dominance, whilst finding a goal before half time illusive.

Half-time came with the sides level at 2-2. Blogg and Kent produced what must have been an inspirational team talk as the A's went out and scored three more goals without reply. The player/manager and captain lead from the front scoring all three between them.

Blogg scored five minutes into the second half after a long ball from the A's was headed back by a Dynamo Fenham centre half viciously hard toward his own goal, forcing his keeper to make a save, which he could only parry. Blogg was following in diligently and had a simple finish to put Garnett 3-2 up. This coming after he had seen a speculative effort with the outside of his right boot curl and zip off the wet surface toward the bottom left corner from twenty-five yards well saved by the opposing number 1.

Another corner for Garnett nearly ended in a repeat for Perry of his first half goal, only this time his volley struck Blogg, who seemed to have an age to turn and pick his spot for his second of the game.

Kent got his goal when finishing after a good run and low cross by Perry. His shot seemed to be a double contact but rifled into the bottom right from the edge of the area and appeared to be meant. Kent said afterwards that he "no longer gets a nosebleed in the box" and this is evident as he made some impressive runs throughout the game.

In the absence of a rush of blood to the head Blogg could well have completed his hat-trick in the last five minutes, though, in truth, his shot from twenty five yards was never going to trouble the goalkeeper, rising, as it did, like a phoenix, to soar high and wide, eventually landing somewhere near the security fencing behind the pitch some fifty yards away.

This game saw another impressive display from Webb at centre half for Garnett, winning the Man of the Match award for the second week running, and a solid performance from his defensive partner Miller, returning from injury. The only downside to the game was again conceding two needless goals - though this was mainly due to the tactical experiment that did not work.

Author: Rob Scott

Team: R.Scott, R.Monaghan, C.Jackson, T.Webb (MoM), P.Miller, N.Blogg 2, T.Perry 1, G.Kent 1 (c), T.Skilbeck (S.Cave), S.Collins 1, M.Deeble

NB: The views expressed here are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the
views of the Gosforth Garnett Bohemian Football Club as a whole.