Kettering Vintage 1-2 Worcester Vintage

With Tim Coleby getting injured on Saturday Kettering travelled to Worcester with only 10 over 50s for this 2nd round tie. The game plan was simply to sit back, soak up the pressure and go to penalties. The game started brightly and Kettering had plenty of the play and find not look like they were playing a man short. Mid way through the first half, and not at all against the run of play, Kettering scored through Tim McDowell. Keeper Barry Coe made a couple of smart saves from short corners to keep Kettering ahead at the half. Skipper Tony Heath wanted Kettering to keep things right for the first stage of the second half but a flurry of short corners saw a switch move well converted and soon after Worcester took the lead, again from a short corner. Kettering were under pressure but the back line of Nigel Parkes, Nick Cusk, Vince Davy and Heath stood firm. The midfield worked tirelessly throughout Neil Freeman, Geoff Elliott and Tom Ward supporting their defensive colleagues with Paul Brooker causing Worcester's defence problems down the right in support of McDowell. Kettering were just unable to produce any magic in the opposition D in the second half but can be immensely proud of a narrow defeat.