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Official Match Preview

http://www.afcdiamonds.com/biggleswade- ... 4th-august

Great result for both sides today. So this should be an interesting game. Can Jack get a couple of goals?.

Half time..

Needham Market 6-1 Hitchin

Not sure if this will prove to be an unpopular opinion but I thought we played well tonight and were very unfortunate not to pick up at least a point. Particularly impressed with how we played considering we lost two players to injury early on and had to change the way we were playing. Jack Bowen won a hell of the lot in the air and John Dean was causing a lot of problems. If only that boy could show some composure in front of goal he would have had a couple of goals tonight.

The step up in class from last season very noticeable this evening, certainly in terms of physicality as much as anything, but also a reminder if it were needed that it’s important to take chances when they present themselves.

Hopefully Tom Lorraine and Ben Diamond aren’t too badly injured - Diamond managed to jog off the pitch so hopefully that was just precautionary. If either one of them is out for any period of time we surely need to bring someone in.

Some weird results tonight. Needham Market winning 8-1 against Hitchin, Dylan Wilson scoring the winner for St Ives away at Lowestoft too. Redditch were 3-0 down at half-time again.

I agree, BR, personally I wasn't unhappy with the performance at all, there was a lot of heart and effort put in tonight, we defended well against a team that had put 4 past a promotion contender, gave them a run for their money in the second half and there wasn't a huge gap between the teams, although like you say, players like John Dean, as tricky as he was tonight (his pace is something else!), lacked that bit of quality to put the ball in the back of the net against a step 3 defence and their physicality was at times noticeably stronger than ours.

We obviously will have to get used to losing more often this season than we've been accustomed to in our short history so far, but if the players can play with the spirit they've shown in these first two games consistently, then I certainly won't be complaining if we don't win every game, it's been a positive start I'd say, bring on Stourbridge

Over the 98 minutes the difference was the ref gave their penalty but denied us ours.

Always disappointing to lose but not unhappy with overall performance. We will play worse and win

I fully agree, we played really well considering we have just stepped up and were playing an established step tree team. I thought we pretty much matched them over the park and deserved a point.

Bottom line, unlucky but still have some positives to take into the next leg of this Evo Stik Central journey.

I'd echo the points above. We were the best side in the first quarter until we had to rearrange things. We could easily have taken a point with more clinical finishing. The defence is doing a decent job but sometimes needed to be more decisive about getting the ball to safety.
Biggleswade were one of those sides who argued with every decision. There was a "cry wolf" effect to that, as a couple of obvious decisions went against them and the ref added plenty of time for their timewasting. I wouldn't want to watch those antics every week.

Again like others have already said, it was a good performance against a solid team where the result could have gone either way. You'd think John Dean has done enough to earn his first start now, as his running and determination will be a strong asset to the team. Thought Nathan hicks put in a goose shift also, looks like he'll form a good partnership alongside the other midfielders. Thought I'd recognised the lanky centre half, Tom Smith from Hayes and yeading last season who's a decent player to have in aerial challenges at non league level. Keeper was a prick though!

Quite a fair and honest appraisal from Ian Allison Biggles manager on Biggleswade Town TV.

We had an enjoyable evening on Radio Diamonds seated right next to a very gregarious Announcer whose attire would make Bruce Greenberg jealous, and just behind the Chairman and his mates. Plenty of good humoured banter which I hope did not detract from the match commentary too much. Plus I did win a bottle of wine on the raffle.