On paper a heavy defeat, in reality an excellent performance by a young inexperienced side who all wanted to play at Cambrian on a cold, wet Tuesday night. Hopefully their support will see them have more appearances this season.

Toby Link-Jones came in for his first start of the season and only his third in his young career, he was arguably our man of the match. Jay Thomas made his full league debut, Jamie Karnsang joined him in midfield for his fourth start while Patrick Finneral up front was making only his eleventh start. Off the bench three youth players, Morgan Gardner, Luke McDonald and Evan Thomas all had their first taste of football at this level.  Also on the bench but didn’t make an appearance was a fourth youth team player, Myles Perkins.

As expected all the early pressure came from Cambrian but it was the Lido who almost took the lead on 8 minutes when Chris Jones set up a chance for Patrick Finneral who was unlucky to see his shot hit the post and rebound in the Cambrian keeper’s hands. Cambrian then went down the field and took the lead when Gareth Couch failed to hold a header which crept over the line. On 10 minutes we were two down, Cambrian had the ball wide in our area and were looking for space to cross it. A Cambrian player went down to win a penalty with basically no challenge on him. 13 minutes and another goal, the referee decided that Sean Hanbury had handled the ball near half way, again this was a disappointing decision by the referee but he then failed to notice Cambrian take a quick free kick with a rolling ball. Two passes later it was in the net. So, 3 down in 13 minutes with two contentious decisions going against us. The boys responded really well to this and Lewis Holmes scored with a right footed shot on 16 minutes following a corner. Again, Cambrian had a free kick given for ‘hand ball’ but this time they headed the free kick over the bar. Gareth Couch made an excellent save on 21 minutes when he got down to turn a powerful shot away for a corner. Patrick Finneral just lost out to the keeper in a 50-50 chase for the ball on the edge of the area. Although 3-1 down we were by no means out of the game. Jay Thomas forced a good save out of the Cambrian keeper with a low 25 yards shot and on the half hour he again made an important save this time off Chris Jones. 5 minutes before half time Gareth Couch closed down a Cambrian attacker and made a good save to keep the score at 3-1. Just before the interval Jay Thomas tried to play Patrick Finneral in but again the keeper was out to claim the ball.

Gareth Couch made an save early in the second half as Cambrian looked to increase their lead. Sean Hanbury tried a free kick from distance that the keeper fumbled but he was able to gather before a Lido player could respond. Patrick Finneral was once more unlucky, he cut in from the left but the keeper again saved. Ben Symons won the ball in midfield and his pass found Brad Flay but his shot went wide. On 65 minutes we went 4-1 down, we lost the ball on the half way line and they powered down the left and shot to beat Gareth Couch at his near post. From the kick off several players were involved in an excellent phase of passing to set up Chris Jones but his shot went just over the bar. Cambrian should have scored again with 10 minutes to go but failed due to some excellent defending and blocking by the players with Lewis Holes and Toby Link-Jones to the fore. In the closing minutes Cambrian had a couple of corners which were headed behind and in added time Chris Jones saw the Cambrian keeper off his line and tried a long range shot which the back pedalling keeper just managed to tip over for a corner.