65s: Top of the tree for Christmas 🎄

For the second league tournament in-a-row our 65s rocked up at the Littledown Centre in Bournemouth to continue their strong start to the season. It was a bright but chilly mid-November Wednesday morning.

Starting the day in third spot, the squad of 11 expected to be challenging the top clubs ahead of the Christmas break. And did they ever…

DSWFC Tournament report

Tournament report by Terry Benson

A strong turnout of 11 players left us in a position of not being able to offer everyone as much game time as they would have wanted. But our substitutes were extremely supportive and understanding of the situation. Thanks chaps to… Clive, Jonathan, Ed and Glen.

That left the starting line-up as David Bacall in goal, Paul Kybert and Pete Cherryman in defence, Andy Wilson, Peter Kane, and Andy Madden in midfield, with Mervyn Young up top.

Our opening match of the day was against Bournemouth Reds. They were sitting just above us in second spot, but only on goal difference. Mervyn Young immediately opened the scoring with a beautiful turn and shot low to the ‘keeper’s right. Despite being pulled out of shape for a lot of the game, we went on to maintain the 1-0 lead for the win.

After The Reds came The Whites, Bournemouth Whites. Not only were our opponents names similar to game one, so was the match. Mervyn added another to his already impressive season tally (five goals). Another 1-0 win.

Match Three pitted us against the league leaders and impressive Eastleigh. It’d been brought to my attention that Eastleigh play with a tricky number nine who stays up front and never covers back. In order to neutralise that threat we tasked Pete Cherryman to man mark him out of the game. A job he did so well that Eastleigh’s number 9 now thinks he has 2 shadows!

Both teams had good chances but as in the first two ties of the day, David Bacall made superb stops keeping us in the game and another clean sheet. A satisfying 0-0 draw.

Our final fixture before the Christmas break saw the team take to the field with a deserved swagger to face Dorchester. After taking the lead through a tremendous Andy Madden strike (his second of the season) we saw out another 1-0 win. We used some great game management and possession passing that we’d trained for.

All-in-all a very enjoyable and impressive ten of 12 points to put us top of the league, albeit early days. But no reason this squad with its talent and team spirit can’t win this league.

“Pretty sure teas and KitKats are standard half time fare in La Liga now.”

Terry Benson, DSWFC 65s Manager

DSWFC Season Player Stats

Here you can see the DSWFC 65s tournament appearances and goals for the season to date.

League Overview

At this early(ish) stage of the season, the division has already split in to two parts – the top four and the bottom three. As mentioned above, Dexter’s will be top for the festive period, two points ahead of both Weymouth Clarets and defending champions, Eastleigh. Just behind the top three sit Bournemouth Reds in fourth.

The bottom three are so far adrift, even if you add their points together, they still wouldn’t break in to the top four! However, Weymouth Blues scored their first goals of the season, while Bournemouth Whites picked up their first win of the season, against the aforementioned Blues.

Why not take a look at the league tables, including all results and history for the 50s, 60s and 65s.

Future dates

The 65s Dorset Walking Football League will be back in the new year on Wednesday 21 January. Check with your club nearer the time before making your journey though!