Eight is the Magic Number

The first home league game of the season saw a visit from Minehead and they would have left Taunton knowing that Taunton CS were staking their claim as a serious force in the league.

For the first time in the last few years Taunton had the luxury of fielding their strongest side complete with four subs. Taunton started the game by exhibiting the passing skills that had seen Oakehampton off in the final ten minutes of the week’s previous game. The midfield and forwards were allowed to play the game in the Minehead half with the majority of the possession and were able to cut off any Minehead attempt to break out of their half by expertly pressing and cutting off any potential attack at source. The rare opportunities that Minehead had to press forward and exert any attacking threat were extinguished rapidly by the Taunton back four. The dominance of possession paid off in the first half with break thorughs coming from Simon Jones and Ben Witt and allowed Taunton to take a comfortable 2 -0 lead in to the half time break.

The comments at half time focused on maintaining the pressure and not to take the foot of accelerator and squander a solid lead. Rather than maintaining momentum Taunton stepped up the pressure as the lack of possession took it’s toll on Minehead. The midfield and forwards combined to score a further six goals in the second half. Andy Carter bagged a brace with two goals at the back post and Toron Everett making his first appearance of the season was able get his name on the scorecard with two goals. A further goal from Ben Witt and one from James Coles put the scoreboard up to eight. However with the clock ticking down being only moments from a first clean sheet of the season on certain ex chairman attempted to clear the ball and successfully cleared the ball to the Minehead left wing who was able to drive the ball passed the outstretched current chairman to provide some minor consolation to the visiting team.

Taunton can be extremely satisfied with their performance and ability to convert pressure in goals and maintain their solid start to the season. Andy Carter was voted man of the match for his performance which included two goals and one assist. Next week sees the first deby game of the season away at Vale and Taunton CS will be hoping to extend their unbeaten run further.