Bourne Deeping beat Nomads 3-1, but what a Hallworth goal!

Nomads Twos made their first foray of the season up the M1 - a journey that they will become familiar to them this year. The weather was glorious, with the sun beating down on the men from Cambridgeshire.

Game preparation was cut to the barest minimum, as the umpires wanted to start our match less than 10 mins after the end of the previous one – and we thought the previous match had yet to reach half time. The result was a rather choatic and defensive start as we, once again, we had to settling into formation with new players. Full credit to new player, Joel, for quickly 'owning' the middle of the field and putting in excellent work to smother Bourne's attacks.

Nomads suffered a goal against them, but the latter portion of the first half saw some excellent Nomads' flowing hockey. Our youthful attack of Martin, Sam, Jack and Ellis used lovely individual skills to put together some elegant team passing which, for period of 10-15 minutes, provided dominance inside Bourne Deeping's half. Sustained pressure gave Nomads some short corners which we failed to press home. Some good interplay on the left hand side found Jack inside the D with some space – and he beautifully whisked the ball past the keeper into the back of the net at shoulder height – goal of the season! Nomads went into the break 1-1.

Early in the second half, a Bourne Deeping short corner routine was goal bound but struck a Nomads foot on the line, right underneath the umpire's nose. The resulting flick was despatched. The remainder of the second half found Nomads generally on the back foot with our formation looking raggedy. Bourne Deeping added one more to their total before the final whistle ended the game at 3-1.