Sittingbourne 1 Enfield 0

Can the first day of spring possibly be just 3 days away? It was bitterly cold at Bourne Park and the wind was strong and gusty making any attempt at good football almost impossible, writes Peter Pitts.

Those in the know stood on the side opposite the main stand where there was some shelter from the wind whilst the few hardy souls in the stand froze!
 
Sittingbourne continue to be beset by suspensions, injuries and unavailable players.
 
Goalkeeper Steve Williams missed this one through injury as did Lee Browning who it is feared will miss the rest of the season because of his knee problem. Lee Hockey missed the game because he is serving a three match suspension whilst Kieran Marsh is still unavailable and Dan Tanner’s car broke down at Stanstead and was unable to make the match. 
 
In came Rob Hudson in goal who had a confident game, Tristan Knowles who played his best game for Sittingbourne to date, Clint Gooding who also had a good game and Mark Lovell who is still struggling to regain his form after his long absence through injury.
 
Enfield were kicking with the strong wind at their backs but they had terrible trouble in making it work for them.

They had very few shots in the first half and a number of corners curled out of play before reaching the penalty area.
 
Enfield lined up very defensively and were giving Sittingbourne unaccustomed room in midfield in which to play.

This gave Sittingbourne the bulk of the possession but their strike force of Spice, Lovell and Jon Neal were unable to make much forward headway because of the wind and Enfield keeper Stephen Wright was largely a spectator in this half.
 
Enfield were occasionally causing problems but the Brickies back line were comfortably dealing with them.
 
Hudson was called into action in the 8^th and 13^th minute both times as a result of good play by Daniel Gabriel. First of all a cross field ball was missed by the Brickies defence and found its way to Gabriel whose shot was caught by Hudson at the second attempt.

Then his corner was punched away by Hudson and Ricky Spiller completed the clearance.

Apart from this Enfield had very little to offer and you felt that if Sittingbourne could go into the half time break all square they should get something out of the game in the second half when they would play with the wind behind their backs.
 
Sittingbourne almost had an explosive start to the second half as with just a minute gone Spice had made himself a great chance to score but he pulled his shot just wide of the far post.

Sittingbourne were awarded an indirect free kick inside the Enfield area. Spiller took the kick, which found Spice whose shot bounced off the keeper and the ball was just missed by Lovell.
 
On 54 minutes Enfield’s Sherwin Stanley made good ground and crossed to Marlon Stuart who saw his shot well held by Hudson.

Two minutes later Sittingbourne took the lead when a Spiller free kick found Paul Ainsworth just inside the Enfield area, he headed across to the lurking James Campbell whose shot beat the keeper and the players on the line and ended up in the net.
 
Tricky work by Gabriel on 66 minutes ended in a shot from a tight angle that Hudson turned round for a corner. Two minutes later Gabriel had another try, this time heading an effort weakly wide. 

At the other end a Spiller cross was headed well over the Enfield bar by Campbell.
 
On 83 minutes Campbell had another header that was comfortably held by Wright and in injury time Neal had a shot go wide, but generally apart from the goal there had been little goal action to warm up the days second highest crowd in the division.
 
 

Sittingbourne: Hudson, Ashmore, Dowley, Ainsworth, Campbell, Knowles, Spiller, Gooding, Lovell (Sherwood 68), Spice, Neal, Subs: Taylor, Deveraux