The Football

I went to see Barnet play Dagenham last night- Bees versus Daggers!
I love the ground at Barnet, cos it's straight out of The Hotspur and with a visible slope that seems to get steeper as the game progresses.
Barnet was playing downhill in the first half and the team were playing very well- nippy and neat and quick, and they scored one goal about 20 minutes in and another not so long after.
We drank plastic-flavoured tea and marvelled at the wonderful condition of the pitch (it;s like a bowling green at the moment).
After half time, the Daggers must have had a pep talk because they played loads better, down the bottom of the slope (and far away from where we were standing on the terraces, unforchly). They sped up and an air of desperation took them as they frantically grabbed the ball and tried to score: but it just didn't happen.
We counted six balls in the locals' front gardens (one brought back by a sleepy boy a few minutes later).
The fans were in great voice all the way through and the man of the match was the Barnet goalie, who is probably the perfect goalie: strong and supportive when the action's somewhere else but bloody fast and sharp when someone's trying to get a ball past him.
As a non-expert, I could see that Barnet need to remember to keep their wits about them throughout the game and not just in the first half. They are good at defending themselves generally but they need to remember that they have to have that 'attack' stamina all the way through, for when they play really aggressive and experienced teams later on in the season.
Sometimes the guys weren't there when the ball was; and sometimes they guy with the ball just needed to try to score rather than dribbling it around to a place of safety, by which time the opposition had made off with it.
They reminded me of my teenage boy cat, thrilled by his own natural energy and agility, amazed at his own speed and full of joie-de-vivre, clever and smart, but sometimes short on strategy.
But all in all, great game- good team, and watched in good company!

Score: Barnet 2 Dagenham 0