Staplehurst Monarchs 1 Rochester United 0

Match 29/22/2036 - Saturday, 8th October 2022 - SCEFL Division One

Staplehurst Monarchs (0) 1 Osagie 74
Rochester United (0) 0

Attendance: 331
Admission: £6
Programme: £2
Mileage: 1/2,343

Seven years ago I made my first visit to Jubilee Field, home of Staplehurst Monarchs, which considering at the time I had lived in the village for two years was pretty shameful. Admittedly it was for a Kent County League game, but the attendance amounted to 15 people. The ground was an open field with another match being played on an adjoining pitch. There were no stands, no floodlights and no toilets. Equally shameful on my part, it was another three years before I made a return visit despite continuing to live just half-a-mile away, this time for a pre-season friendly, nothing had changed and the attendance had shrunk to just 12.

Fast forward to 2022, the inaugural SCEFL Groundhop and the Monarchs are hosting Game 2 of 6 against Rochester United, in front of a record 331 attendance in an enclosed ground with stands and lights. On the field, they are steadily establishing themselves as a SCEFL club with ambitious plans for the future.

The Groundhop saw a coach load of hoppers, from I know not where, but along from me there were a group that was obviously down from Liverpool, some doing all six, last night at Punjab; this game then on to Bearsted and Larkfield before finishing off at Rusthall and Tunbridge Wells on Sunday. One bloke in the scouse group was disappointed that he had to get back to Merseyside on Sunday for the Everton v Manchester United game!

Groundhoppers need feeding and watering and the queue for Aldo’s was lengthy and continuous whilst the outside bar with a couple of barrels of real ale was also doing a roaring trade at 10.30 in the morning!

Since my earlier visits this season at the tail end of a long, hot summer the pitch has recovered remarkably from its straw appearance to a lovely, lush green surface that encouraged the ball players.

To say that an entertaining game was served up for the visitors from far and wide is a bit of a stretch but it was engaging and, with the hoppers worrying about their goal averages, it at least served up a winning goal that was worth the entrance fee and avoided the dreaded goalless draw.

Staplehurst are obviously being asked by their management team to play a possession-based game that starts with the goalkeeper, who utilises his full backs to play the ball into midfield areas but when this is not possible it tended to go back to Steve Lawrence, the home custodian, who began the process again, and again, and again with the visitors, Rochester United pressing high. It did become a little tedious and had one wishing for a good, old fashioned hoof upfield!

The first scare for either side came from one of these situations, after 11 minutes, when the pass back to Lawrence was a little heavy and the goalkeeper’s touch saw the ball heading towards the line before he scrambled it away with the Rochester forwards claiming the ball had crossed the line.

Rochester certainly made the early running and Lawrence did well to turn aside an effort after 25 minutes and it wasn’t until the later stages of the half that the home side carved out a couple of chances with Brad Large firing a shot across the face of goal and also shooting over.

The second period became a little bit attritional with some hefty tackling that found the referee with some awkward moments to deal with, and certainly not in a manner that brought approval from both benches.

The big moment of the match came in the 74th minute after Rochester had seen a good move end with a shot from Lucas Payne that was cleared from the goal line with a punt forward that eventually found its way to substitute John Osagie, who cut in from the right, found a bit of space open up in front of him before burying a shot into the far, bottom corner from 20 yards.

Rochester made a valiant effort to retrieve a point with efforts from Louis Dos Santos and a header from a corner from Tom Whittaker that cleared the bar before the referee brought the curtain down and the hoppers made their way back onto their coach and on to the equally delightful surrounds of Bearsted. Let us hope they fondly remember their visit to Jubilee Field.