Epsom & Ewell

I write this with the shakes as nerves cover my body from head to toe, with the knowledge that some members of the infamous forum find some of these social media posts “a total embarrassment”. I hope this doesn’t make your skin crawl with cringe, my friend, but instead beam with pride…

A cold, miserable afternoon in the depths of Cobham where the rain travelled sideways into the eyes no matter which direction you stood, and If I learnt anything from my GCSE in English,the pathetic fallacy would be too strong and the football game would only go one way. Sadly, my B in English stood strong, and we would not be dancing in the rain all the way up the A3 home.

As per, the Bog End travelled well and outnumbered the home fans with a good 3 to 1 ratio, but it was those 1s who would celebrate first when a cross down the flank found its way to the far post where an Epsom and Ewell player was waiting and put it away.

Thankfully it didn’t take Tooting long to level things, a freekick from our own half made its way to Shay around the edge of the box who held the ball up wonderfully and whipped in a ball that Mario Quiassaca finished after it bounced off the opposition 3 in the box.

We took the lead soon after, Mario won a freekick on the edge of the box and when said freekick was heading to the far bottom corner the keeper “did well to get down to save it”. But in reality he didn’t touch the ball, and I will claim my appeals won the ensuing corner kick. The Corner was swung in and as if there was a strong positive magnet in Mario's head and the negative in the ball, it found itself plum on his forehead and rocketed into the back of the net.

We finished the half playing really well, looked threatening when going forward and comfortable in possession. We were calm in recycling play, allowing ourselves to retain possession by moving the ball backwards if the openings were not there initially and thus creating sustained periods of pressure. We looked comfortable out there. We were good, certainly the best I’ve personally seen us play this season.

During the halftime pilgrimage behind the opposite goal, we passed by a fresher faced group of Tooting fans who have already got their own Tootings flags created bearing the emblems of their respective home counties and I believe one of an American state. It’s always brilliant to meet people who find the club in which you’ve spent your life supporting and have decided that they’ve enjoyed their early experiences with the club enough to get themselves down to an away game in horrible conditions with their own flags, particularly during such a baron run of form. Hopefully this is the start of their turbulent Tooting journey for the rest of their footballing lives.

But as has happened so often this year, dating back to the first FA Cup qualifying game, the first half performance did not match the second. I won’t go through every goal we conceded, but it was same old as we found ourselves level…into one goal down…into two. It’s hard viewing when we seem to find ourselves losing the same game on repeat, a non-league version of Groundhog day.

It ended 4-2. As you can guess by the scoreline, we weren’t good in the second half. It’s hard to stay positive when our last win was back in October and we won’t play again until the turn of the new year, but I’ll try to do so nevertheless.

We were dangerous going forward in the first half, created chances that could’ve put us further ahead and looked extremely dangerous from setpieces. Mario played a fantastic game of football, he obviously scored the two goals, but contributed much more than his goals today. He wasn’t the only individual to thrive in the attacking thirds, Nathan Best continues to grow into the season looking more and more dangerous as the weeks go on. Shay Brennan continues to look the class act he is. Marcus Whittaker was skinning players with ease on the wing.

Sights will be set to Guildford away in the new year, hopefully the new year will bring some new fortune for the men in stripes.