Havant & Waterlooville (2) 2 McCarthy 14 Seager 25
Tonbridge Angels (1) 2 Hinds 6 Dabre 47
Attendance: 975
Admission: £10 Senior
Mileage: 204/6,556
Motivation might well be the watchword for the last six weeks of the season.
For Tonbridge Angels, the season is done. The last eight games will designate whether a finish is top half or not and the manager will shape his squad for another tilt in August.
Off the pitch, thankfully the long journeys are done and so the lack of motivation to get up on a Saturday morning and hack 150 miles or more west is no longer an issue.
The last of the long car journeys took us on a 200 mile round trip to Hampshire and a game that felt like an end of season affair but really should not have done with Havant and Waterlooville fighting for points to avoid relegation. It was a game of missed chances, four goals but there was something lacking in its intensity and on the terraces there almost seemed an air of disinterest.
Who knows what has gone wrong at Havant? There are players there that other clubs would covet, there are players such as Jack Jebb, that are sitting on their bench that I would covet.
Jay Saunders, without Scott Wagstaff serving the second of his two match suspension, fielded the same side as against Eastbourne last time out, with the only changes, significant ones, on the bench where Jordan Greenidge will no longer sit following his departure to Dartford and the arrival of Josh Popoola.
The Angels gave their slightly smaller than usual away following early cheer with a sixth minute lead from Tariq Hinds, who fired in from 12 yards following an excellent run into the box from Nathan Odokonyero.
The lead wasn’t to last when a pass from the left from James Roberts was laid across the edge of the box from where Jake McCarthy was afforded time and space to pick out the top corner.
Odokonyero was leading the Havant defence a dance and once more jinked his way into space but lifted his shot over the bar before, on 25 minutes, the home side went ahead with a well-taken header from Ryan Seager from a right wing cross by Callum Kealy.
Havant had two headed chances to extend their lead before, on 35 minutes, goalkeeper Ross Worner was forced to make a good reaction save to deny Joe McNerney turning Odokonyero’s cross into his own goal.
The Angels came out for the second half positively with Sean Shields testing Worner early before a short corner routine from Shields and Lewis Gard fed the ball to the edge of the box from where Mo Dabre curled a shot into the bottom corner.
A home point was of little value to Havant and Waterlooville and they pressed hard for an winner but their shooting was wayward on several occasions.
A draw was probably a fair result and for a fourth time in four visits to Westleigh Park there was no winner but at least the goalscoring was doubled on this occasion.
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