Dylan Whitelock may be new to the Club but he will soon become an Athletic legend if he continues to produce performances like this. Not only did he claim a hat-trick in only his second game (which was quite an achievement considering the centre half was all over him like a rash) but he also entertained the crowd with his celebratory backflips, which we hope to see a lot more of. If he hadn’t had two goals disallowed on Tuesday night he would have been our leading scorer!! Deservedly he was given the Man of the Match award.

The other two goals came from Ed Daffern, who went mighty close to also grabbing a hat-trick. Ed also had an Assist whilst Frankie Hercules had an amazing 3 Assists in this game and both top the table with 5 Assists each for the season so far.

Our guests started the season without a win in the first 6 games but since then they have been in great form winning 4 of their next 5 games which took them up to 3rd in the table 7 places and 4 points ahead of us although we had 2 games in hand. We started so strongly in this game they must have been in shock to find themselves 4 nil down within 27 minutes.

We certainly had an explosive start, opening the scoring after only 5 minutes with Finn Rolfe the orchestrator. After a long throw was played back to him he curled a superb cross with his cultured left foot to the far post where Dylan Whitelock was waiting to head home his first goal for the Club. It was just the start we needed. Score 1-0.

Two minutes later we went close to extending our lead when Ed Daffern cut in from the left wing and whipped over a super cross which Dylan Whitelock and Max Hercules were just a fag paper away from converting. But our supporters didn’t have long to wait for goal number 2 which arrived in the 14th minute and was down to Frankie Hercules who showed great awareness. Skipper Jack Harvey’s penetrating cross was met by Dylan Whitelock with the ball smacking into the face of the keeper and bouncing away for what the defenders thought would be a corner but Frankie kept the ball in play and picked out Ed Daffern who thumped the ball home. Score 2-0.

If the visitors thought things would only improve they were mistaken when 4 minutes later Ed Daffern doubled his tally. A corner from Max Hercules was cleared only as far as his brother Frankie whose shot cum cross was converted by Ed. Score 3-0.

The visitors defence was looking decidedly fragile and they had an escape in the 24th minute when a lovely pass from Harry Beaumont sent Frankie away down the right wing and his cross set up Dylan Whitelock who must have wondered how he didn’t score. But like buses another chance came along 3 minutes later and the former FC Romania player made no mistake this time. It started with a long throw from Max which was headed on by James Kimber to Frankie Hercules whose shot was saved by the keeper but Dylan was alert to the situation and slotted home his 2nd goal. Score 4-0.

Ed Daffern had a chance to claim his hat-trick in the 36th minute when following a lovely move Frankie Hercules found him at the far post but he was unable to tuck away the opportunity.

The opposition were clearly rocked by our tremendous start and although they are clearly a good side and played some nice football at times they were unable to put any pressure on Freddie Burroughs whose only real save of note in the first half came in the 26th minute when 18 year old winger George Kingham struck a firm shot which was straight at our young keeper. After a superb first 45 minutes we went in with a commanding 4 nil lead. HT Score 4-0.

At half time talented young defender Liam Mann was substituted as a precaution following a slight knock by another up and coming young player Blake Argent who has come through out youth team ranks. This is Liam’s second spell with the club having played 11 games back in the 2022/23 season on loan from MK Dons. Liam is a calm and skilful central defender and we look forward to seeing more of him in future.

Within a minute of the restart Max and Finn were unable to take advantage of some sloppy defending but generally it was inevitable that the game would be less open in the second half because basically it was over as contest after 27 minutes and our opponents were playing mainly for pride. The play was scrappy at times and the fluidity was interrupted by free kicks and substitutions.

In the 64th minute Ed Daffern smacked the ball across the area which bounced off an unmarked Dylan Whitelock who was just a few yards from goal. Freddies handling and kicking was as usual exceptional and he didn’t have a lot to do but he was still alert to any danger and had to race off his line in the 78th minute to snatch the ball off the toes of Kadeem Gutzmore who had been sent through with a searching pass.

Scoring opportunities had dried up but in the 77th minute Dylan Whitelock got on the end of Ed Daffern’s free kick forcing the keeper into tipping the ball away. But Dylan was not going to be denied and in the 81st minute he secured what will hopefully be the first of many hat-tricks to come. Ed Daffern set up the opportunity when he flicked on the ball to Dylan and the big man coolly lobbed the keeper. Cue the by now familiar celebration. Score 5-0.

The visitors got some consolation when their Player of the Month Joshua Kassaye neatly turned inside our area and slotted the ball into the far corner for a fine finish. Score 5-1.

Ed Daffern clearly wanted to join Dylan as a hat-trick hero with a couple efforts on goal which were not too far off target but he can still feel highly satisfied with his performance which yielded a brace of goals and an Assist. FT Score 5-1.

This was a brilliant performance from the lads against a very good team that occupied 3rd place in the table. Fortunately for us we hit them with 4 goals before they could get into the game and they never recovered from their poor start. Ryan Sturges and his team have assembled an incredibly strong squad especially when you consider that we were missing Josh Ameganvi, Luke Peerless, Josh Chamberlain, Mason Clarke as well as Dave O’Conner. It is also pleasing to see the arrival of Liam Mann and Dylan Whitelock and dare we say that they are the missing pierces that plug two gaps in the team? Time will tell.

The win pushes us up two places to 8th in the table, five points behind leaders Winslow United but with a game in hand, so we are in touching distance of those teams above. We are at home again on Saturday against new comers Harlow Town who are 16th in the table but have only played 5 league games so far. They lost 1-2 at home to Kings Langley on Saturday but there are no easy games in this League so we need to be at our best and start eating up the ground above us in the table.

TEAM
TA: Freddie Boroughs, James Kimber, Greg Deer (Dylan Fitzpatrick 74), Liam Mann (Blake Argent HT), Frankie Hercules (Bailey Osborne 71), Edwin Daffern, Harry Beaumont, Finn Rolfe, Max Hercules (Harry Shepherd 71), Jack Harvey (Capt) (Harry Jones 74), Dylan Whitelock.

Scorers:

TA: Dylan Whitelock (5,27, 81), Edwin Daffern (14, 18)

BT: Joshua Kassaye (87)

Crowd: 176

Man of Match: Dylan Whitelock